Beautiful Savages

Okay, savages is too strong a word.  But munchers isn't strong enough.

Opportunists, perhaps?

   We have been having deer come by daily now, sometimes several times a day.  The days are getting shorter and the nights are cooler.  Maybe they sense autumn is coming and they are trying to bulk up now.  Earlier this week, we had a mamma deer, three adolescents, and two very young ones all here in one visit.  They were adorable, though I was still glad I had the tomato plants and bush beans covered with sheets.  They have left little of the sunflowers, nasturtiums, kale, asters, and pansies.  They also managed to eat a few tomatoes and part of a large tomato plant that wasn't covered.

   Midway through the summer, I potted a little volunteer tomato plant that I couldn't bring myself to compost.  The garden was loaded with volunteer tomato plants, volunteer asters, and volunteer sunflowers.  The little tomato plant settled in nicely, developing flowers and, eventually, two tomatoes.   

 

 

   To my great disappointment, I went outside a few mornings ago to find that a deer had stripped it bare during the night.  Arhg!  It looks even more pathetic than Charlie Brown's Christmas tree.

 

   To add insult to injury, one of the French pumpkins had also been chewed.  Deer had never touched our squash or pumpkins before!  I covered the pumpkins with several layers of floating row cover and harvested them at the end of the week.

 

 

   On the upside, they haven't yet discovered this cheerful little "peek-a-boo" sunflower nestled among the tomatoes.  :)