Gentlemen, Start Your Tractors!

After all these years, it still amuses me to see my neighbor Joel stop by for a quick visit...on his tractor.  We have a common gate between our adjoining properties, otherwise it's probably a mile going around by the big road.  We are starting to seriously think about our vegetable gardens, and Joel is going to try using some of my extra industrial plastic barrels for above-ground planting.  The first garden I planted here was wiped out by deer and my then-neighbor's donkey that jumped the fence.  The next year Steve fenced in a large area out on the west point and we tried again.  For two years, I fought with the gophers, ground squirrels, and voles.  I was holding onto a cabbage plant while a gopher was tugging it underground...true story!  Pumpkins grew large and beautiful and just at the point of picking, I'd go out and find them "deflated."  Gophers would come up underneath, gnaw a gopher-size hole in the bottom, and eat the pumpkin from the inside, not touching the outer shell.  How disappointing is that!  Water is a precious commodity, and the soil here is called DCG (decomposed granite).  What could be considered a thorough soaking elsewhere only goes down an inch or so and then runs off before it gets to the root system.  The solution to the problem was lidded barrels that Steve brought home from the commercial laundry where he worked, cut in half, and drilled.  Esthetically, my garden has all the appeal of a tank farm, but until gophers learn to jump three feet, the barrels thwart the little buggers and conserve water.  Some of the barrels are five feet across, perfect for the pumpkins, some only three feet.  Joel is going to try the barrel system this year, having fought his own good fight with the underground wildlife.  My girls, furred and feathered, provide enough fertilizer for both of us.  Joel and I try to plant different crops so only one of us is overwhelmed with zucchini or cucumbers and we trade the excess.  Nothing goes to waste, however, because the chickens gorge on overripe tomatoes and other trimmings.  I've missed the planting window two years in a row now, and it's not gonna happen this year!