Gardening Woes

It doesn't seem like we have done much in our garden this season. All I have is one new tomato plant, one left over from last season that is still producing, and a few summer squash plants. Everything else has been pillaged by various vermin. I'm getting pretty fed up and it seems futile to keep a vegetable garden around here. The vermin are actually getting worse every season. None of the things we were using last year are even working this year. I'm at my wits end here. 


The gophers are so brazen now, that they are even venturing into our front yard now.

We planted nearly a dozen soy bean plants (for edamame). I have one left.

We have a dwarf peach tree that is several years old. We brought it over from our old house. The fruit was just literally a day or two from being picked. I went out to check on them one morning and they all disappeared. We actually even covered the top of it with netting to prevent the birds from pecking at it. That seemed like our biggest problem before. What's more, the bottom branches are broken from a large animal climbing up to reach the topmost fruit. We are pretty sure that it was the raccoons. They have been very active around here lately. And they are huge. 

We also found out the reason why the raccoons around our neighborhood seem so huge and healthy. Apparently, a "well-meaning" neighbor, thought if they set out cat food to feed the raccoons, they would leave his fruit trees alone. The only thing it has done is make the raccoons bigger and stronger for them to defend themselves against any natural prey that might thin out their population and make them have even bigger appetites. Plus it makes our neighborhood pretty popular. Yeah, um...thanks neighbor. 

We did manage to have a small apple harvest from our two new apple trees though. They are awesome. The kids keep begging for more but we are trying to savor them for as long as we can as there are not very many.