We caught the woodchuck! Details to follow
Hi all, I'm rather tired and want to put together a video presentation of the catch-and-release. Took him over 5 minutes to leave the cage! Will put it all together with some music and stuff.
There may be more of them, so I set it back up again. Here's a few pictures of him[1] in the cage:
[1] -- No, I did not check.
He wanted to stay in the cage so you could take him back to his preferred habitat,aka our garden! ;)
owww... so cute. you should release it. i don't like to see animals in cage.
Yep, that's what I did, far away from our garden.
Ha ha - he didn't want to leave the cage! He wanted you to take him back to your delicious garden.
hehe finally !!!
I know, right?
meep
Yeah you were funny the first three or so times. Now I'll flag you if you show up around here.
meep
meep
No.
meep
good catch :)
Outstanding post very beautiful photos
Thanks for sharing such great post with us!
resteemed
Now that he has enjoyed some cheese, he can sit in time-out and think about what he did wrong 😆
I had a feeling last night that you'd catch the critter. Curious to see if there's more.
Nice feeling! Nothing new today, although the sweet potato's two vines are stripped of leaves and they had leaves yesterday. So, there is more to deal with; might not be more woodchucks, though... Have-a-heart traps set and baited with stinky cheese... :)
Usually foliage eaters leave a pretty good indication they've visited by shitting somewhere near where they helped themselves to your plants. 😆 The deer eat my blackberry leaves and I can always tell by the mounds of crap all around the bushes!
I'm trying to think of what eats potato leaves besides beetles'n'bugs..hmm
have you had any problems prior to this, with your sweet taters?
Yes -- the leaves had holes in them from insects. Leaves missing, I don't think is insects but perhaps I let them go too long?
They will drop 'spent leaves', but dropping most/all is usually a disease - which is probable because many garden insects spread it. Do you use compost tea or any sort of kelp/seaweed for micronutrients?
Would animals scavenge the "spent" leaves? I saw a lot of leaves under one pepper plant, but none around the sweet potato -- I think they're being consumed...
The kale, for instance, I removed several yellow and chewed leaves today (the lower leaves), but none had fallen off.
Also gave the squash and cucumbers a severe haircut yesterday and today, bagging the leaves (and one whole cucumber plant!) for the trash as I don't want whatever disease they've got coming back... And sprayed neem oil yesterday but with the rain I'll need to again.
I used some kelp/seaweed once, perhaps a month ago. What schedule do you use for it? It's raining today and tomorrow so I'll add it to the watering the next day, if it makes sense to. Thanks!
I don't think most animals will opt for ground source if there is fresh foliage available. It sounds like something might've preferred your sweet potato leaves. If it is a disease, the lower leaves will show deficiencies first. Sometimes they dry out and by the time they are released from the plant - crumble into dust. Not uncommon for late season. If it was recently planted, then that is something to look into.
We are getting hammered with rain here as well. Had a bad wind storm yesterday and I've got a big clean up effort ahead of me.
I use all natural fertilizer and organic amendments the same way; I look at the recommended strength/mixture and I only ever feed at 50% of any recommendation. The kelp/seaweed can be used pretty frequently, I use it once a week. It will generally not harm the plants because it actually feeds the microbes in the soil and the microbes convert nutrients in the soil that the plant is unable to intake. Micro and macro nutrient deficiencies can sometimes mimic disease, so if you know you're feeding them what they want - it is more likely a disease. It's certainly not easy to give accurate diagnosis because many types of problems can look very similar.
The Neem oil spray can be applied every week or biweekly and is usually not going to wash off in rain if it was dry before rainfall. I will suggest spraying the undersides of the leaves, if you're not already. Many pests will feed from beneath the leaves, like aphids for instance. The undersides of the leaf can tell you a lot about what sort of pests you're dealing with.
Rain splashes soil born illnesses around the garden and many times up onto leaves. Another reason I prune my tomatoes up so high from the ground - at least 18" from soil. I also mulch with straw or wood chips to provide a protective layer between plant and soil. Don't get me wrong, disease can still spread! I lost about 20 plants in the recent set of storms.
Heavy rain followed by wind can spread spores of a sick plant very quickly. I actually have my tomato plants in 5 different locations for that reason. Once it starts, it spreads fast. Powdery and downy mildews are ruthless spreaders. I've had all sorts of problems to solve this year, so I can tell you that after you conquer a problem, it gets easier the next time. Then new problems come up..LOL 😆
Lovely story and nice pics Thanks for sharing
Keep the good work
Beautiful animal what will you do with him?
See my next post. :) He's safe, miles away across two rivers so won't be back.
Perfect!
you mean you want to let the critter go?....may be you can start training them
Haha, nope! Miles away across a salt-water river and a fresh-water one. Unlikely he'll be back.