Just shy of a quarter of an acre, our yard bustles with wildlife. Yesterday morning, turning the corner of the driveway with Tetley, I spotted a Bluebird. No, not a Bluejay – a real Bluebird perched on a recently pruned oak branch. It was perfectly and entirely, an extraordinary royal blue. I hoped this fantastic bird might be considering taking over one of the birdhouses, although I think the sparrows might have claimed them all.
Later, I brought my cup of tea outside and settled into a wicker chair on the un-mowed lawn when a rabbit emerged from the hedge. With slinky-body moves, he moved out of the shadows into a patch of sun where he proceeded to preen and clean himself not ten feet from where I sat. I made no effort to stay still, shifting in my chair, crossing my legs, yet instead of diving back into the bushes, he came closer. Soon he was six feet away, close enough for me to observe his eating technique. His mouth moving like a non-stop motor, he leant over and plucked stems of dandelions (ours is an organic, thus interesting patchy lawn) from the bottom, then munched the stem down to the blossom end, he paused before swallowing this last (favorite?) bit. He seemed to prefer spent blossoms, no longer an explosion of yellow, but not yet turned to seed. Sucking in half-a-dozen dandelions stems like so much spaghetti, I couldn’t help but think of the devastation he and his family (you know there are more) will cause in the vegetable garden. I’ll dust off my camera on the chance I’ll see him today and you can see how cute he is.
Even as I imagine rabbit just as quickly devouring tender lettuce, peas and other produce planted by me, I am charmed by him. Yet I do not delight in watching the big-old groundhog that has sniffed at our traps, (of course humane) circumvented our fences, and ignored our dog for many years. I feel mean and yell at him when I see him loping across the yard. Nor do I watch the surplus of squirrels with much pleasure although their gymnastic technique to reach the dangling bird feeders is nothing short of remarkable. So what kind of double standard is this?
I love our rabbit families and even the squirrels I don’t mind feeding along with the birds… but the deer are just so ravenously all-consuming…perhaps since they are ravenous, I should let them eat and count myself lucky that I can go grow a few tomatoes up on the roof.
That’s a great solution!