Screen Project Completed

Raised Bed With Screens

We've now completed the enclosures for all three of the raised vegetable beds, and they're looking pretty good.  The two smaller beds, including the one with the tomatoes, are completely enclosed by the screens and the larger bed is about two-thirds enclosed.  

We didn't enclose one end of the large bed because so far the neighborhood critters haven't displayed any interest in eating the leeks, chives or basil planted there.  However, that meant that Cindy had to install some additional hardware cloth down in the dirt to keep the varmints from simply digging under the screens at that end of the bed and getting into the good stuff in the rest of the bed.  

Tomatoes Are Growing!

The tomatoes have almost doubled in size since Cindy planted them last week, so it was time for the tomato cages to come out before they get any bigger.  We're hoping it will be a good year for tomatoes and a shutout year for varmints.  

Unfortunately, one type of predator we can't keep out with the screens is the birds we've been encouraging to visit our yard with the bird feeders.  This morning we watched as a California Towhee flew over the screen to invade the vegetable bed, pulled up one of Cindy's earthworms, and then hopped up the bean trellis before he flew off.  

Later a Spotted Towhee made a serious attempt to get at the ripening blueberries.  The Towhees are beneficial in many ways; Cindy leaves any slugs she finds in the garden under the bird feeder for the Towhees to dispose of, and she's even seen them fly up and knock aphids off the roses in the front yard, but dammit, they'd better leave our blueberries alone.