Mountainside Gardening

      When you decide to live perched on an excavated shelf, high on a mountain in the middle of what is essentially a forest, you face a few challenges.  I’ve written before about the rarity of “wired” utilities; obviously when it snows, you don’t go anywhere; and it is constantly an issue convincing delivery men that their vehicles really can make it up my driveway.  But the one challenge I was determined to conquer on the mountain was having my very necessary fresh vegetable garden.

    I have gardened all of my life and I am not about to give up on the taste of newly picked flora nutritio.  When I informed my wife that I was going to put in a garden on the only tiny section of flat space that is not occupied by the house foundation, well, she told me to “stick where the sun does shine.”

     My wife, Shirle, says I don’t mention her enough in my posts, so there, she’s mentioned.  I’d include a picture of her also, but from what I understand, after she killed me and destroyed my camera, she would have to hunt down each one of you, too.  It has something to do with Jimmy Hoffa and witness protection.  I don’t fully understand; I try to not pay attention to her family’s business, it's healthier that way.

     

     Anyway, there is a small level area between the rock face of the mountain and my driveway that actually gets sun most of the day.  I took Shirle’s advice and stuck it…there.

     In spite of the “winter that refused to quit” and the tiniest of sunlit spaces, my garden is coming along quite nicely.  Pictured is garlic, three varieties of tomatoes, two different types of cucumbers, zucchini, yellow squash, eggplant, both hot and sweet banana peppers, red bell and yellow bell peppers, and five varieties of salad greens, Great Lakes, Butter, Green Leaf, Romaine, and Swiss Chard.

     

     I haven’t been bothered by critters too much, but I did sublet a small cave to one of our local gnomes, and he eats chipmunks, so that seems to keep the other animals away.

     So far we have been enjoying some fresh salads, but most of my harvest won’t be ready for about another month.  Until then, it’s the Wednesday and Saturday Farmers’ Market.

Chipmunks can fly?

     It has always been my good fortune to rescue the quirkiest dogs.  Our newest four legged child, Sebastian, is no exception.

     The first few weeks proved difficult, but finally he humbly agreed to assimilate into our family and immediately elected himself emperor.  Besides his all too frequent escapes, our biggest problem with him is his ADHD (attention deficient, hyperactive dog).  With each request to go potty, the imagined possibility of seeing/smelling another of the neighborhood dogs, frequently distracts him to the point he forgets the reason he asked to go out.

     All winter long, we dealt with his wishful quest for friends, and thankfully occasionally some of the neighbors’ kids would come to visit.  Angel is a regular; Chance, the boxer who lives above us, comes by to say hello, but our friend White Dog has been inexplicably corralled by his humans.  (I heard rumors of fights and murdered chickens, but I don’t know.)  Sebastian, thanks to his escape talents, has also met a number of other doggies up and down the mountainside.  He is always expecting that someone will be in the yard visiting.

     As spring sprang, the trees leafed, the songbirds filled the air, and our resident population of wasps and chipmunks appeared.  At least as far as Sebastian goes, wasps and chipmunks have a distinct similarity; both are among the best toys a dog could have.

     I have no idea where or when he learned it, but my Little Bubba has a comical technique to catch and play with wasps.  He crouches and crawls and sneaks up within striking distance of his prey and with a feline-like pounce snaps the wasp in midair.  He knows they sting, so as soon as he gets one, with a flick of the head, he throws it down on the ground.  He’ll stand over it as it collects its wits (and to be sure the stinger is not pointed in a dangerous direction), and then with another snatch and flick, he throws the wasp around until it manages to escape or just stops playing and lays there.  He does get stung quite often, but that does not deter him from playing the game.

     Chipmunks are a much more daunting challenge for him.  He sees them in the yard eating the seeds meant for our avian tenants, but he has yet to master a successful technique that would enable him to capture one of the elusive playmates. 

     We are all familiar with chipmunks, but Sebastian recently taught me something new; chipmunks can fly.

     There is a wall of stacked rocks on the side of the driveway behind where my Earthbox garden is.  The other day as he exited the garage on a requested potty run, his sudden leap was an obvious sign that something had been spotted over by the garden.

     Potty?  What potty?  We have got to find where that toy went.  After a general survey, Sebastian began a systematic, nook-by-nook search of the rocks.  He stuck his little brown nose deep into every hole and cranny searching for his would-be new best friend.  At about the twentieth fissure, long after he had lost my interest, he stuck his snout in and a chipmunk flew out.  It was a good two-and-a-half feet off the ground and the flight spanned about four feet of open space ending in some dense shrubbery.

     If Sebastian had not been off-balance, stretched tall to explore the higher hiding spots, I am sure he could have caught Alvin in mid-flight. But the chipmunk made it to safety and left my dog to ponder how much more fun these friends could be now that he knows that they, like wasps, can fly.

Puppy Love?

     It was about ten minutes before 2:00 AM when Sebastian sat up in bed, did a whole body shake, and said in his limited canine vocabulary, “Dad.  Wake up; I have to go potty.”

     I made a futile attempt to reason with him, which only resulted in him getting loud and barking at me, “I’m serious!  Get up; I need to go now!”

     I dragged myself from the soft comfort of my bed, donning my LL Bean slippers and rubbing the much needed sleep from my eyes.

     Sebastian was already off the bed and sprinting back and forth from the bedroom door to my feet in a futile attempt to make me hurry.  I lifted his sister down to take her with us since his argumentative

Betsy

retort to my innocent questioning had roused poor Betsy from her peaceful slumbers.  Betsy is a cute kid, but the dumbest quadruped child I have ever known; she has never learned any language at all.

     Illuminating the kitchen, staircase, basement, garage and finally the side yard with painful light, too bright for my over-dilated irises, the three of us made our way outside.  Vacuous Betsy, driven only by mute instincts, immediately found an appropriate spot for her business and patiently waited while Sebastian surveyed the area for the possibility of nocturnal chipmunks.  

     “Nope, none by the birdfeeders; better check the garden.”  

     He thoroughly checked behind my Earthboxes, along the as yet to be transplanted Knock Out rose bushes, along the embankment above the drive; he peered into the dense coppice on the steep grade over the house and finally, with a crouched stealth technique that is more feline than canine, sprang to the retaining wall hoping to catch some unsuspecting rodent frolicking in the woods below the house.

     To his surprise, none of the elusive prey that he desperately wants to capture and play with were awake at that early morning hour.  But to be sure, he backtracked to the garage and rechecked every spot previously known to harbor those quick and evasive toys.  Frustrated, he sat down in the middle of the driveway with the intent of a doggy-style, overnight stakeout.  Knowing what he had forgotten, the real purpose of this pre-dawn sortie, I dragged my insolent leashed brat around to all the places he normally uses to relieve himself.  He showed no interest in anything other than a vigilant chipmunk watch.

     I eventually gave up and took both kids in, darkening the passageways behind us as we climbed the stairs back to the bedroom.  I did scold him for waking me for no reason, but he doesn’t understand how chipmunk hunting could be considered no reason.

     Back in the warmth of my bed, I slowly slipped over the edge of the precipice, returning to the mental quiet of sleep.

Sebastian

     “Dad?  Dad, wake up, I forgot to go potty.”

     It is needless to say that as I roused myself for the third time this morning, this time with coffee, news and urgent business emails, my normal office companion is still sound asleep downstairs in the bedroom.

     You have got to love him.