Master Gardeners

I grow a vegetable garden every year. I love my garden. Master gardeners such as Seth Blood of Centerville and Bob Davis of Logan, now long gone, have inspired me over the years. This year my garden is as close as I have come to their high standard. I'm proud of my garden... downright boastful even.

But I do have enemies. Each year a family of cottontail rabbits live in the tangle of rosebushes which separate us from the Williams family to the south. Each year our cat Bandit proudly presents us with gifts on the doorstep, such as the bottom half of a baby bunny. Bandit single-handedly controls the bunny population for us. The rabbits generally content themselves with grazing on our lawn, and only occasionally have I noticed any nibling in the garden...and then never enough to get this old gardener exercised.

This year it was different. I planted my peas early. They were doing great when I noticed that a couple of plants had been nibbled at the end of the row. The nibbling turned into a feast and each morning more plants were destroyed. I started saying nasty things about those cute little bunnies. I even had a frank discussion with Bandit...offering huge incentives if she would take care of the critters. She didn't listen...the damage continued. It was as if some huge cut-worm had started at one end of the row of peas and was working its way down the row. When one third of the pea plants were gone, along with my cucumber plants, I got mad. Then I noticed that the critters had started on my last row of new corn shoots. I was furious. You don't mess with a proud master gardener. This was war.

One morning, as I was leaving for work, some movement in the garden caught my eye. There was this strange looking animal in my garden calmly devouring pea plants. It looked like a squirrel, yet it was too big for a squirrel. In fact it was as big as a cat... yet it did not have a cat's face...it did not appear to have ears. And it was brown with a grey face.

So I called our son Dan...the taxidermist...he's a wild animal expert. Let me put it this way...Dan's five year old son Asher, knows more about wild things than I do. As I started to described the critter, Dan just laughed..."You've got rockchucks dad". I really did not know much about rockchucks, so I looked them up on the web. That threw me into a panic... rockchucks, aka woodchucks are of the marmot family...they can get huge...like 40 lbs... they can decimate a garden...and they are hard to get rid of. We discussed strategies. We did not want to set a steel leg trap...we valued Bandit, the killer cat, too much. Dan suggested that we try his cage trap.

So I set up the trap and baited it with watermelon. There was nothing there the next morning, but when I came home from work, we had ourselves a rockchuck. It did not look too impressive. It did not look like it could eat a whole garden. It was, in fact, just a baby...and it was dead. In less than a day it had died of exposure. I gave it a suitable burial for such a bold adversary. The next morning I saw the big one again. It ran under my wood pile. I noticed that there were a couple of entrances to what WikiPedia said would be a series of connected tunnels. So with malice in my heart, I took my 1.5" irrigation pipe, poked it down one hole and turned on the irrigation water full force...and let her run...and run. I repeated the process in the second hole. That took care of the problem...no more rockchucks...or so I thought.

The Carlsons are our neighbors to the west. One day Jay called me and asked how the battle with the rockchucks was progressing. He reported seeing a big rockchuck run under his deck. Then he reported seeing a big rockchuck sunning itself on the roof of his neighbor's shed. I did not fess up to driving my rockchucks out of their home under my woodpile...onto his property...but I did loan him the trap. He had no success and after a few days returned the trap.

So I reset the trap but did not bait it. A couple of hours later I noticed that the lid had dropped...we had ourselves a big rockchuck. Dan had allowed me to use his trap on condition that I destroy any rockchuck which his trap caught. He had offered some creative ways to do the deed also. The problem was that Jay's grandchildren were out in his yard when I yelled..."Hey Jay...we got ourselves a rockchuck". Any malice aforethought regarding the demise of the rockchuck had to be tempered by sensitivity to the feelings of little children who asked... "Grandpa...what's the man going to do to it?" Grandpa Jay suggested that they take a drive up Green canyon and let the critter go. To me that was about as smart as letting Al Qaida terrorists go after capturing them red handed....they were bound to turn up again...and this is war. The more liberal viewpoint won the day. The grandchildren were pleased to report that Mr. Rockcuck ran off and lived happily ever after.

Since that day we have neither seen a rockchuck nor witnessed any damage to the garden.

I have often thought that there are wonderful lessons to be learned about life, in a garden. One can sense the reality of a Master Gardener in the universe...the pleasures of creation...and actually live some of the parables of the Master. I have also been told..."One can trust a man who grows a vegetable garden". Those are generous sentiments...but the fact is that this old gardner has developed a mean streak...I have malice in my heart towards some of our Father's cute creations. I am one gardener who cannot be trusted. I'm sure that our Father had a purpose when He created rockchucks...but I would still have to ask..."What were you thinking?" If it was just to test and torment vegetable gardeners...I would have to humbly submit...while whispering under my breath..."OK...but it's still war!"