In this era of all things ZOOM, I have been part of a book group called GREEN READS organized through the Greensboro Public Library. Who knew that some libraries actually have an Environmental Resources Librarian on their staff? There is an excellent one that acts as a resource for our group. Our book selections, some presented by the librarian and others we select within a category (for example, Environmental Science Fiction—usually called Cli-Fi because these books often focus on a future world dreadfully affected by climate change).
A friend invited me to join this group; at first I was a little hesitant about a book group on ZOOM but this group has been a true gift. It is wonderful to have discussions with this diverse group of bright, intelligent people who know much, much more about the environment than I do, many who are actively engaged in making a difference in the world. I look forward to our monthly discussions.
Our most recent book was The Dirty Life: On Farming, Food and Love by Kristin Kimball. It is the true story of a young couple who starts a farm in Essex, New York. This is no romanticized back-to-the-lovely-land version of farming. It is a realistic and brutally frank look at what it is to farm, to show up twice a day every day to milk your little Jersey cow even in the freezing cold on an icy winter morning; or to chase escaped piglets running wild through a field so muddy it sucks the boots right off your feet. Yes, there are joys, too; but no words are minced about the level of hard work that farming demands. The good news is that Essex Farm is still in existence and going strong. It is a book that could convince you either way: yes, I want to do this—or—no, no, no, there is no way I want to be a farmer.
The reading and following book group discussion of this book led me to remember the brief foray Tom and I made into small farming on 17 acres of land in Greene County, Virginia. Farming might be too illustrious a term for what we were doing for our only animals were one cat, a small flock of Rhode Island Red hens, one very handsome but hateful rooster, and four white ducks who sadly froze to death on their little pond one bitterly cold night in the winter. After months of musing through the Stark Brothers catalog, we planted a small orchard and a raspberry patch; thanks to a tempting stack of seed catalogs we planted an enormous garden. The garden really was glorious. Tomatoes and peppers and cantaloupe and carrots and eggplants…if a vegetable could be named, we planted it.
We were avid readers of organic gardening magazines and knew our way with mulch and weeding and tenderly caring for our plants. What a wonderful day it was when tomatoes started appearing on those vines! If you have ever had a tomato fresh from a garden, you know there is nothing in a supermarket, even an organic one, that can compare.
We were delighted with all the vegetables but oh! those tomatoes! But then one morning I go down to the garden and discover big bites taken out of some of the tomatoes. No tomato was fully eaten, just a bite here and a bite there. Ruined for human consumption. Who was the culprit? It didn’t take long to determine there was a groundhog (we hoped it was only one) who was feasting on our hard work.
I knew I could conquer the critter, in a humane way of course. My first call was to my mother who grew up on a farm. She suggested stringing aluminum pie tins around the garden.
“Garden pests don’t like the way they flutter in the wind or the noise they make,” she advised me.
I strung pie pans all around the perimeter. More tomatoes with huge bites out of their juicy flesh! Our groundhog obviously did not mind pie pans fluttering in the breeze.
I next consulted the Rodale Organic Gardening Encyclopedia. They reported that groundhogs do not like the smell of human urine. I left that task to Tom who took care of, shall we say, marking the garden. Our groundhog seemed unfazed if not amused by our efforts.
Next I learned that groundhogs did not like the smell of human hair and it was suggested to stuff hair (which I collected from a local salon) into old pantyhose and hang those around the garden. My mother mailed me a large padded envelope of her old pantyhose and I went to work, stuffing the pantyhose with the hair and then hanging the bags around the garden in between the aluminum pie pans.
As I took a step back to admire my handiwork, I realized quickly that our garden was not going to make the cover of Southern Living ! At this point I was no longer striving for beauty, just for the survival of our tomatoes.
The next morning as I approached the garden I quickly noticed that the hair-stuffed panty hose bags were gone. Disappeared. The bags had been carted away after more tomatoes had been chomped. Our squash and cantaloupes were now joining the menu.
A trip into the local Southern States farm store and a consultation there told me the best way to be rid of a pesky groundhog was to find the ground hog’s holes and use what can best be described as a tiny smoke bomb thrown into the hole to get the groundhog to move on down the road. They wouldn’t kill the groundhog; they would just smoke him out and make his home an unpleasant abode.
I bought a half dozen smoke bombs but as I drove back home I wondered how I was going to locate the groundhog’s holes. Turns out it wasn’t hard. Our groundhog had taken the pantyhose bags of hair back to his holes clearly marking their location.
I tried the smoke bombs but to no avail. The next day more of our vegetables had been ransacked and enjoyed. I would have been happy to share. One tomato for you, one tomato for me, and so on. The problem was our groundhog seemed to only enjoy the first bite out of each piece of tomato or squash or cantaloupe and then he moved on down the row to the next one.
Tom had an out of town trip so the kids and I were there by ourselves. Tom’s brother who lived down the road offered to loan me his shotgun and teach me how to shoot. I was not sure this was what I wanted to do, but I was so frustrated that I agreed to a lesson. He came over, we went over the basics and he left the shotgun with me in case I decided I wanted to give it a try and end the groundhog problem once and for all.
The groundhog continued to use our garden as its personal self-serve cafeteria.
One evening as the kids and I sat down to eat supper, I realized that this was the only time of day that I was never down at the garden. I wondered…hmmmm, maybe this is when the groundhog enjoyed his supper, too.
I told the kids we were going to go down to the garden and that mommy was going to try to scare the groundhog with the shotgun. I did not want to tell them that mommy wanted to kill that greedy, tomato-destroying groundhog as I did not want them to be scared of the gun, the groundhog or their mommy. We quietly walked down the hill from our house to the garden area.
Sure enough there was Mr. Groundhog walking down the row of our tomatoes as if he was shopping at the grocery store. A bite here. A nibble there. I put the kids in the backseat of our VW station wagon which was parked near the garden as I wanted to be certain they were safely out of the line of fire (or misfire).
I loaded the shotgun. The groundhog looked over at me and I am sure I caught a look of pure disdain. He continued his chomp chomp chomping along the row without a care in the world. And he certainly did not care about my presence.
I aimed the shotgun and fired. BOOM! The groundhog took off running (no, I didn’t even come close to hitting him). But suddenly, to my great dismay, I discovered that I had been standing right on top of a yellow jacket nest in the ground. The boom brought them to life and they began flying up the legs of my pants and stinging me over and over. I screamed and yelled, dancing around, flailing my arms, shaking my legs, trying to get them out of my pants, which of course only made the yellow jackets angrier.
My children came flying out of the car screaming and crying because they thought I had shot myself!! Up the hill we all ran, me ripping off my pants, my children screaming at the top of their lungs. It is good we did not have close by neighbors at the time.
The next morning I returned the shotgun; it was the one and only time I have used a gun. I think I learned my lesson. Live and let live, even if means the loss of your tomatoes. The groundhog hung around until one day he just disappeared on his own.
I don’t think we had a garden after that. In fact it was not long after the summer of the groundhog that we moved into town. Since those days we have been living happily ever after in cities and towns, enjoying beautiful tomatoes from farmers’ markets, roadside stands and good friends.
Every year on Groundhog Day when they hold up Punxsuatawney Phil, I am pretty sure I can see tomato juice dripping from his little lips.
Fun reading!!
I have a groundhog that visits my yard but as I have no garden he or she eats my flowers. I had an episode with yellow jackets some years ago. I ran over a nest I didn’t know existed with the lawn mower and they weren’t very happy about it. They came storming out went up my pants leg and stung my arms. I went running to the house to the deck tearing off my clothes. Lucky the deck was in the back of the house with woods behind me. Yellow jacket stings hurt so I can sympathize with you. Great story!