Being an organic gardener, I encourage wildlife into my garden, try to achieve a balance between its pests and predators, and provide nutritious soil for my plants. But I confess my kindly feelings don’t always stretch as far as they could. I can’t be philosophical about waves of slugs and snails, armies of nibbling rodents, a devastating flock of pigeons, battalions of badgers and tirelessly mining moles.
However much I make my garden a haven for wildlife, it’s still an artificial environment where I grow an all-year- round supply of fruit and veg. But, should I selfishly claim everything for myself, when I could share my harvest with other deserving causes?
The problem is that these deserving causes think like me. I’ve never seen a slug stop halfway along a seed tray to leave some for me. Then there's my long-necked gander, who devoured every last cauli that was being hardened off on a dyke last spring. And if two or three passing pigeons fancy a salad, I’ll be left with a few sad little stumps.
There are unseen problems whatever you do. My so-called safe organic slug pellets, based on ferric phosphate rather than metaldehyde, aren’t the simple solution I had hoped they'd be. The bran in organic pellets attract every mouse in town. They gorge the pellets and wash them down with some greens before climbing my pea sticks for a dish of fresh peas.
There’s more to wildlife in my garden than cuddly wee rodents. Up in the orchard, roe deer have always nibbled the lower buds on my apple trees and weren’t above damaging the bark. But, for the first time, one bright spark got into the kitchen garden and scissored off every single kail leaf. So there was no kail until spring when the mutilated plants recovered. The deer even ventured into a fruitcage and stripped the strawberries bare.
Then there are the badgers. Mr Brock and his ever-expanding family have a terrifically sweet tooth. Not only do they gorge on my juicy greengages and excavate my favourite tulip bulbs, but they’ve started working over my recently planted raspberry bushes. Low-growing "Ruby Beauty", which you can grow in a large pot, produces an excellent harvest, as the badgers will confirm. In pursuit of these gems, they trashed protective bird nets and broke several canes. Heartbreaking.
That’s not all. Worms are a badger’s staple food. Since good soil is the starting point in any organic garden, the ground should be crammed with badger fare. Every time I prepare a patch, work up a fine tilth and sow some seed, an opportunistic badger appears on the scene. Under cover of darkness, soil and seeds are hurled in every direction as it sniffs out its quarry. So there’s a second sowing and an unsightly net is pegged down over the seed.
These wonderful worms are also a magnet for half the moles in the valley, it seems. In the early days here, I could live with the occasional mole, but as the ground has improved, their numbers have swollen. Our gardens and polytunnel now boast an extensive network of mole runs, at different depths to accommodate weather conditions. Three or four could be working the ground at one time.
What to do, then? You could use a sonic mole deterrent, but, since the poor wee beast simply moves next door to escape the noise, your neighbours will scarcely thank you. I’m afraid mole traps are the only solution, and I’ll catch one every three or four weeks. You have to set the ferocious spring very carefully to avoid an agonised hand. But death is instant and my plant roots won’t be growing into the thin air of a mole run.
Now I’ve got that off my chest I’ll live and let live as much as I can next year.
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