Its been a rough week or so, what with Phelps quest and the Bigfoot travesty. So understandably, blogging has been at a low. I sent the camera to Philadelphia with Casey so that he could take pictures during his ACS trip. All of the zero pictures Casey took should be posted soon. While Casey was gone, I spent some time in San Francisco with some college friends. We had a good time up there and hopefully I will get some pictures from them up on the blog.
In the meantime, we set out to the Stanford gardens to check on our big fall harvest. As many are aware, Casey has gardened every year of his life. This first summer in California was no different and it even seemed like a great opportunity to try some new crops. After all, California is nicknamed, "America's salad bowl". Similarly to UW, Stanford has community gardens with plots one can rent and garden. It isn't as nice as Eagle Heights and the plots are smaller and more expensive, but it is right near work, and one could potentially garden all year long. Casey just loves it. Here he is next to his plot, surveying his bumper dirt harvest.
Looks great! Here's where the gophers dug under the tomato cages and the somehow got full grown plants out. Maybe back through the hole they came in through, like in a Bugs Bunny cartoon?
This is the culmination of a long, noble battle Casey fought, and eventually lost (much to the amusement of his boss, who compared him to Bill Murray in "Caddyshack"). At one point Casey even tried feeding them Juicy Fruit because of advice he read on the internet. The people that run the gardens don't seem to be too concerned about their extreme vermin problem. I have never seen anything like this. We would have animals eat our produce in Wisconsin, but they never took the whole plant right out of the ground. Through an elaborate system of chicken wire, Casey did manage to protect one basil plant that we harvested on Saturday and ate on a pizza. yum. 
I guess gardening is over for now. The whole thing is very disheartening.
8 comments:
that is so heartbreaking! interestingly, we also had a very difficult time gardening in the salad bowl of america. between the slugs, vermin, and drought, nothing grew. how does it feed the country? i'm confused, and i am deeply sorry for your loss.
That is so sad.. its like the Grapes of Wrath. I would just take all the dirt and go elsewhere. That'll teach em.
Yeah, what a bummer. Maybe you needed to use more fertilizers and chemicals and pesticides. That might have worked.
Or more explosives. I'm pretty sure you can buy organic explosives.
I think the juicy fruit would work, but maybe get the ruby red variety. Damn varments.
Incredible! This reminded me of an amusing article:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/05/garden/05animals.html
That last one was me... D... let it be!
Well, I must say that IS one really good looking basil plant....
I too am sorry for your loss. Gardening is hard work - that's why I don't.
PS - I couldn't open that link LMP123.
Post a Comment