Did you know...

...that woodchucks love chamomile? This particular woodchuck, who I've recently made acquaintance with, enjoys most herbs (dill and cilantro also being, in his book, "choice edibles"). Though we are Arch Enemies, he and I agree on a lot. For instance, he prefers kale to lettuce, just like me. (I didn't know this, but if you're dining al fresco, a cushion of lettuce is good for sitting on, while you're eating the kale.)

And here is something else I've learned, which I'll share because I think it might be helpful. Do you have a "jet" setting on your hose nozzle? People probably use it to clean their cars, I don't know - but I like to hide behind my gooseberry bush and then, when my woodchuck comes around the corner on his way to the vegetable patch, I blast him with it. If I get good contact, he doesn't return for at least twelve hours.

"That's no woodchuck - that's a walrus!"

View from the back porch

My friend Rosie and I spent last evening sitting on the glider and sipping margaritas. Entertainment was provided by Baby Woodchuck, who scampered to and fro, hither and thither, nibbling, munching, and stuffing wads of comfrey into his mouth. (He is a pulp-grinding machine.) Occasionally I would liven things up by chasing little 'chuck under his shed, but for the most part, me and my defeatist attitude stayed on the back porch with our sorrow-drowning drink.

The title of this post is what Rosie exclaimed when she first spotted him. He has doubled in size over the past few days, by turning vegetable matter into animal fat. Just one of nature's marvels.

For the record, I deserved to take a load off last night. I don't know how many assorted vermin I've shuttled off this property and out to the State Forest over the past three months, but it's getting old. The Others keep getting caught in my woodchuck trap. We'll just call them Others because everyone is so horrified when I say Rats. Oops.

Anyway, I dressed myself like a sane person this morning, and went out to check my trap, slowly, without running, because I have matured over the past week and I am now accustomed to disappointment. Guess who? Well good morning, Baby Woodchuck - so pleased to see you.

I did not dawdle. I loaded trap and 'chuck into the 6am bus service to Somewhere Else, and off we went. Baby Woodchuck bared his teeth at me in parting. I told him not to let the trap door hit him on the way out.

For now, I'm drinking my coffee on the back porch, and it's pretty quiet. No crazy woman hollering and throwing potholders into the sunflower patch. Just me and the stray cats, who have never, not once, eaten any of my brassicas.

Baby Woodchuck, taken into custody sometime in the night

Spawn of Cupcake (or Cupcake is Ruining My Life, Part II)

Baby Woodchuck, posing behind his designer galvanized salad bar

There's this time in the early morning when it's not quite light, but it's not quite dark. And I wonder: might I get away with a quick dash out the backdoor to the garden shed, wearing nothing but my skivvies? It would only be just a moment.

In the time it takes to think that, the sun rises a little higher. It becomes most decidedly clear that streaking in my own urban neighborhood would not be prudent. So, bothersome as it may be, I take the time to throw on sweats and a tanktop - a hampering process, when I'm really champing at the bit to see who (anybody?) is in the woodchuck trap.

Lo and behold, it's Cupcake's Baby! Good God, I've got him!

High on victory, I rush into the downstairs bakery to do a little dance in front of the baker, and announce: Guess who won the smackdown? Me, me, me! There will be no rematch - I've caught that fat little vegetable vacuum, and he's totally outta here.

As Matt, the baker, will point out now, I was gloating. I made coffee and a frittata, I ate on the backporch (basking), I grabbed my keys and went out to collect my 'chuck for transport to the State Game Lands.

Oddly, from a distance of ten feet, it appeared my trap was empty. Hard to believe. He's practicing the wild animal art of camouflage... surely?

Good God, he's gone. That little motherf&%$er.

I was terribly deflated. I was grumpy pretty much all morning, grumpy enough to tell Matt to make his own damn change during bread sales at the farmers market. I wasn't sure how that chubby Baby (who is the size of a cantaloupe) made his escape until this evening, when I witnessed a reenactment after having reset the trap. Remarkably, he's able to flatten himself into a jellyfish-like 3/4-inch pancake and bolt - not slither - out from under the (sloppy) door.

What a crappy freakin' trap.

As I type on the back porch (where I am drowning my garden sorrows in Chardonnay), that little bugger is gobbling clovers. He is welcome to all of those that he can stuff in, as well as the dried out old opium poppy stems he's sampling. But please have mercy on my cauliflowers, okay?

So. I need someone to build a better 'chucktrap, because this one sucks. If you revisit my blog and find a final post featuring a photo of a burnt out old lot littered with smashed forty-ouncers and smoking tires, it's because there's nothing left of my garden, after Baby has had his way.

Cupcake is Ruining My Life, Part I

Cupcake is ruining my life

Cupcake the Woodchuck was missing all spring until NOW. Where has he been? He looks like he's been sleeping in the scrapyard, using a busted up gas tank for a basinett and greasing his 'do with dirty motor oil. Or maybe he just packed himself away in a rock pile without any moth balls last winter.

Cupcake loves strawberries. He likes sunflowers, and he positively relishes tender young cabbage leaves. He says I should write this list in alphabetical order, and base it on my seed starting records, because he intends to sample his way through my entire list of Things Cultivated, then make a final death-sweep through the garden during lunch hour. Well, Cupcake, maybe I should fill up the birdbath with beer so you can wash it all down.

I am so obsessed with this woodchuck that I mistook my boyfriend's filthy old baseball cap, sitting on top of the washing machine, for Cupcake. (In my own defense, I was in a really big hurry). I actually slammed the medicine cabinet door and whirled around thinking, how the f&#% did he get IN HERE?!