Wednesday 19 June 2013

Mother nature...

When we got home on Sunday we found a dead mouse on the doorstep. This has happened several times before, and it has been suggested by cat owners that it's a gift from a local cat. We do have one particular big, black moggy who comes into the garden regularly, and has even been known to curl up for a snooze on the welcome mat - I shoo him out as best I can, but I have to say he does have serious 'attitude'. I've stood looking up at him lounging on top of the shed, skooshing him with water from a plant spray, admonishing him in proper Gary Larson cartoon style (I know, I know - all he hears is blah, blah, blah) but in a Carl Larsson setting, and getting nothing but insolence and disdain in return. 'Can you climb trees? No? Didn't think so. Then off you pop!' Perhaps the mouse is by way of an apology for his being so rude.

I'm a wee bit fickle. I try to protect the birds from the cat, but also try to save particularly handsome worms from the birds. I feed the birds, and fill water dishes for them, but get irritated by great lumpen pigeons just gobbling everything up and pooping in the water. So I wave the pigeons away, but I'm delighted when I see Mrs Chaffinch at the food dish, and I love watching the blackbirds splashing about, even if it means I'll have to fill up the dish again. I mutter, 'Hey! You! Get off of my thyme!' when the sparrows start tugging away at it, and yet I am thrilled when goldfinches alight on the cornflowers...


and reduce them from this...to this...


I'm glad I only have one garden to worry about...it's exhausting...


2 comments:

Joanne said...

Perhaps the dead mouse thing is a voodoo warning rather than a cat present...

Else said...

Oooh, I do hope not! No, no - it's a gift, albeit unwanted, so I wish they'd leave the receipt so I could return it....