“Man, however, seems to be the only living thing that gets tangled in time. The trees never fall behind, nor does the grass… Maybe they have better clocks than man has ever made. Or maybe they get along better by not depending on such contrivances as man has devised to split the days into hours and the hours into minutes and seconds. I sometimes wonder just what advantage man ever gained by tying himself to a little machine that goes tick, tick, tick and counts one, two, three up to twelve and then starts all over again.” ~ Hal Borland
I was asked the other day if I still wrote and my answer was… well, time has a way of getting away from you, doesn’t it? How has two months passed since last I wrote? Where has that time gone? I have been off in my own head, with an article rattling about, just waiting for it to spill out on to the keyboard. Alas. Now is not the time for that piece; it needs to wait, bouncing around my head some more. In time, I will get a round tuit.
I have an affinity for weird things, odd cast-offs and such. Estate sales, antique markets, thrift stores and Etsy make my heart flutter – so many random and curious things, all in need of a new forever home. I know I can’t rescue all of them, but I do my darndest to save the ones I can.
A round tuit is one such thing.
Is that the meaning of this? I actually have no idea. An old piece of ornate metal. “Where’s My” engraved in the center. Does it mean, “Where’s my round tuit?” I haven’t a clue. But it is wonderfully weird and so it feels right at home with me.
“The round tuit” – meaning “I will do it when I get around to it” – has been around since King Arthur’s days. Or since the 1964 World’s Fair. Your choice, I guess, because the internet is full of conflicting sources. I do remember my late grandma making “round tuits” to give out as Christmas gifts sometime in the 1980’s. And, yes, I tend to write When I Get A Round Tuit. Which, I know, has been much too long ago.
In all honesty, though – I have felt a bit of Imposter Syndrome of late. Am I a gardener? Or merely one that sticks seeds in the soil, only to see them sprout and — perish overnight?! Mowed down in the cover of darkness. My gardening skills have been put to the test as of late. How can one write about gardening when they are struggling so much with their own garden?
I was slow at first to respond to this gardening test, hoping that my lassez-faire approach to pest management would continue to hold. A well-balanced garden will right itself. For every pest, there is a predator. Let nature be and she will find a way. I finally realized – I Need To Take Action.
Perhaps it’s my own fault, for one of my garden signs reads: A well-planned garden feeds many mouths. Did one of the critters read this sign and tell their friends who told their friends and suddenly there was a major party going on outside every night?
Or maybe I jinxed myself for telling one too many people that a balanced ecosystem has a way of balancing itself out. Ah! Build it and they will come! Another thing I have perhaps said a few too many times could be to blame.
Maybe it was my absence from the garden last year as I recovered from shoulder and bicep surgery that opened the gates and rolled out the welcome mat to every critter and pest this side of the Red River?
No matter the reason, this has been a downright soul-sucking brutal gardening season. The pepper plants are constantly getting nibbled to the nubs. The tomatoes have been shredded. Literally! The stems, are being gnawed and shredded and destroyed one by one. The green beans? Mowed down. The peaches? Gone. Overnight. Every last one of them, not even ripe! The figs? Yes, they have suffered the same fate.
In desperation, I purchased a night vision trail cam and set it up along the back fence line of my garden. I needed to know what I was up against, right? In hindsight, was that a good garden purchase? Perhaps not. Did I really want to know that I have a virtual Noah’s ark of critters coming, two by two, through the night, scurrying along the fence? No, I don’t think I did.
Fake snakes and fake owls were deployed and moved around daily, all to no avail. Have I scared myself with the fake snakes? Yes. Yes, I have. I even said: The fake snakes won’t scare me. I’m not scared of snakes. I know where I put them, why would they scare me? Yes. I jinxed myself yet again.
One morning, a few weeks ago, I was hauling a large trash can full of garden prunings through the garden, on the way to the compost bins. Little did I know that I bumped against said fake snake. Little did I know that said snake fell off his perch above a tomato plant, where he was unsuccessfully scaring away the critters. Little did I know that said fake snake fell in to said trash can full of prunings. And there was I. Not scared of snakes. Proceeding to dump the trash can when the fake snake flipped out of the can and landed on to my arm. In that moment, it was a snake. A very real snake. Yes. I might have screamed like a girl and nearly fainted straight away.
Enter Plan D. Deterrent of another kind. Garlic is known to repel vampires, surely it would work on the rabbits and possums. Even better: mix the dried garlic with some hot pepper flakes. Alas. While sprinkling said mixture about my poor remaining tomatoes and peppers, I dropped the container and out spilled several cups of dried garlic and hot pepper flakes. Cleaning up that mess nearly did me in and, at that point, it was Me waging war against Myself and neither one of us was winning. And now, more than a week later, my eyes still burn whenever I hand water that area of the garden for those dollar store hot pepper flakes sure are super potent! This all leaves me questioning the old gardener’s wisdom that garlic and hot pepper repel pests. My garden smells like a 1980’s pizzeria at the moment and I can’t help but wonder what new critters have wandered in, in search of some pizza.
I have tried multiple methods of Plan B – Barrier – with mixed results. Covering young plantings with chicken wire or using old animal cages – meant to keep animals IN the cage – as a way to keep them OUT of the caged area. I have found that a determined critter will find a way. Placing mesh bags over ripening tomatoes only slightly annoyed whatever was intent on eating them. I would find the mesh bag, gnawed open, in one spot of the garden, the half eaten tomato in another. Seriously! If they are going to steal my tomato, they should at least have the decency to eat the whole thing, amiright?!
In addition to the nocturnal critters, I also have a squirrel that has decided to use one of my hanging baskets as his own dirt filled swinging hammock in the sky.
He – because all bad squirrels are males – uprooted the Cherry Falls tomato plant in that front basket, shown above. Where the tomato went, I haven’t a clue! Did he eat it or take it off somewhere? It was never found, dead or alive. To add insult to injury, his preferred route to get to said hammock is through another hanging basket, so he jumps down from the tree branch above, on to another basket (shown below), stays there a bit munching on some herbs, before jumping on over to the other basket where he spends his afternoons, happily splooted out where my tomato should be.
Plan D.O.G. has also been a fail. While my Princess Leia may love nothing more than chasing rabbits and squirrels and wayward neighborhood cats, come summer she prefers to stand and watch life go by from the shade of the patio.
This morning, I swear she looked at me and said, “Mum, it’s a bad hunting day, the rabbits are too fast, it’s too hot, it’s been real, it’s been fun, I’m ready to go inside now.” So she left me to garden by myself – forever hopeful, to continue sticking another round of seeds in the ground, for “Hope springs eternal!” in the garden. I am pretty sure Princess Leia shook her head and uttered “Fool” at me as went back in to the air conditioning.
Desperation has set in. What keeps critters away? Or will I eventually have to admit defeat? The jury is still out. I am in discussions about building a legit fortress around the edible portions of my garden, but that will likely stay in the discussion and dream phase of development. So far, I am still in this to win it. I have hopes I will either find a solution or lean in to the crops that haven’t endured pest damage, such as the longevity spinach shown below.
Which brings me to Plan U. Up.
Yes, Up. For several years now, I have grown sissoo spinach, a tender perennial spinach variety, in a container. She has thrived outside in the summer, even in the heat of summer, granting many harvests and nary a pest. In winter, she is cozy inside the house. This year, for the first time, she was mowed down to the soil level one night. So Plan Up was put in to place. UP. And AWAY from the rabbits. Score one for Team Gardener!
Here in North Texas, we are entering one of our best gardening seasons – fall! Yes, the calendar may say it is August and the thermometer may be set to FurnaceHot, but now is the perfect time to be thinking about fall gardening and getting those fall crops in.
Bean and summer squash seeds can now be sown for fall harvests. We are about 100 days from our average first frost, so look at seed packets and see how many days to harvest specific varieties take. Winter squash often take 100+ days to harvest, but each variety is different. It is best to err on the side of caution and look for vegetable seeds that have 90 or less days to maturity/harvest.
Cool season crops, such as broccoli and Brussels sprouts, can be planted out as transplants toward the end of August. Winter greens, like lettuce, chard and collards, are easy to grow from seed, which can be sown directly outside in another week or two. (This gives one time to shop for seeds, either locally or mail order.)
Watering is key when planting (either by seed or by transplant) this time of year. Seeds will germinate quickly in our sun warmed soil but they take frequent watering, so be sure to monitor the soil’s moisture content and adjust watering as needed.
Time, hurries swiftly on,
Each fleeting year seems shorter than the last,
And many hopes which cheered its opening dawn,
Are buried with the past.
~ Mary Ann H. Dodd Shutts
Keep Calm and Garden On.
All photographs taken today, August 13th, in my Denton County, Texas, garden.
the melodious garden 