Rabbit Woes

I've seen a rustle in the pachysandra every once in a while. And something smallish has been digging under the new latticework panels that Andrew and my Dad installed under the porch. Maybe I was hoping for a very tiny groundhog or something (we have loads of them around here), but no, I'm fairly certain I have the dreaded rabbit. Dreaded? Why yes. Because they will eat my entire garden and they will do it while looking CUTE and so I won't be able to get angry enough to actually do any harm to them. I know about nature's defenses such as camouflage and mimicry (looking like something poisonous so you don't get eaten yourself), but what about looking cute so as not to get killed? Stupid rabbits. So far, it seems to have enjoyed my soybean leaves. All but one plant has been de-leafed, but they have new shoots coming out (you'll be happy to know for your later snacking pleasure, Mr. Rabbit). We bought deer fence and a couple of stakes and hopefully will get some sort of fence up this weekend. I'm mildly confident that it will work, though, considering we'll have to sink the fencing so that the rabbit can't burrow and the garden is pretty well grown in now so it will be tough to manoeuvre. Living with Nature is fun!

While I was surveying the damage to my garden and looking for ways to erect the fence, I heard a scuffle nearby. It sounded like the angry mama robin that I'd heard so often when I tried to walk near the nest. But the nest has been empty for days (the last birdie finally flew) and so I was a little surprised to see a young bird on the ground literally nose-to-nose with a neighborhood cat. The mother bird was frantically flying around trying to scare the cat off, but the cat wasn't really stalking, it was just truly curious. And the baby bird wasn't flying away. So I shooed the cat away and then ran to get my camera and managed to get this shot of the cat looking on from a distance.
And then the bird just hung out there for a while so I got a nice close up shot.I figured he was learning how to fly and I'd not see him again, but this morning I went out to photograph the soybean destruction, and I practically stepped on him. If he can't fly, he is seriously going to have to stop hanging out on the walkway. He jumped/flapped his way up to the potted flowers off of the walkway and just hung out, not really minding me. Maybe he's used to a life in front of the camera?? Anyway, I think he's been there for a while because there was a lot of evidence that he'd been, um, fertilizing my plant. He is one high maintenance bird, but his parents just haven't given up on him yet.

In craftier news, I didn't get to go to the Renegade Craft Fair this weekend. There was too much going on all weekend and we were a little too tired to schlep into Brooklyn this year. But I got the nicest convo from Chonkiewoo on Etsy saying that she'd worn one of my wordy bird necklaces and got compliments on it! I love the fact that although I was sad to be missing Renegade, one of my wordy birds was romping around there:)

Today is strawberry picking day so I'll be rolling in strawberry sour cream ice cream soon enough...