If you’ve been reading this blog at any point during the
past 20-plus years, you’re probably already aware I’ve spent most of those
years trying to grow anything that even remotely resembles a flower or a
decorative bush in my yard.
But in my defense, the odds are stacked against me. For one thing, the majority of the soil (and I use the term loosely) on the land surrounding my house resembles something you’d spread out your blanket on at Hampton Beach. It is about as rich and moist as the Sahara. The remainder of it, however, would work nicely on a pottery wheel if you ran out of clay to make your vase.
Anyway, I finally managed to get a rhododendron bush to grow about six inches tall on my front lawn (a.k.a. an expanse of weeds and crabgrass), so I have been protecting it with my life. I even covered it throughout this past winter so the deer wouldn’t eat it, the way they so mercilessly gobbled up my last three attempts at bush-growing.
The other morning I got up and looked out at my lawn, and my mouth fell open.
“NOOO!” I shouted, causing my dogs to jump up and stare at me as if to say, “Hey, lady! We're not guilty of whatever it is this time!"
I ran outside in my pajamas (thank goodness I have no neighbors close enough to see my front yard) and stood staring at my lawn. It looked as if giant snakes made out of dirt were strewn all over it. Upon closer inspection, however, I discovered they were mounds with raised tunnels connecting them.
And they were headed straight toward my rhododendron.
“It's probably a gopher," one of my friends said. "Stick the garden hose down into the biggest mound and turn on the water full blast to flush it out of there."
“I can’t,” I said. “My water pressure is so weak, it wouldn't even flush out a grasshopper, never mind some critter that's obviously on steroids!"
I just knew my rhododendron’s days were numbered. Visions of some subterranean beast yanking it down through the ground and making it disappear right before my eyes, like some bad magic trick, made me head to the hardware store.
“Do you have something to repel gophers?” I asked the clerk, who looked about 18.
“You sure it’s a gopher and not a mole?” he asked.
“No, I'm not sure,” I said. “But whatever it is, I have to get rid of it fast. The tunnels are heading straight for my prized rhododendron.”
“Well,” he said, “Moles eat grubs, not roots. Gophers love roots. So it's probably a gopher.”
He led me to a shelf and grabbed a plastic container. “This should get rid of him,” he said.
“Is it safe to use around pets…and my well?”
He studied the back of the container. “It says caution, it will kill fish and birds, and not to get it on your skin. Oh, and to be careful not to use it near ground water.”
I was beginning to think it would be safer to drop a bomb on my lawn. “What kind of repellent kills fish and birds?” I asked. “It sounds pretty extreme.”
“Oh!” he said. “This kills gophers. It’s not a repellent.”
I frowned. “I just want the gopher to leave my yard alone, not drop dead!”
He scanned the other containers, then grabbed one of them. “Here you go! Castor-oil pellets. Safe for your lawn, safe for pets, and it repels both moles and gophers.”
“Castor Oil?” That was a new one to me. I remembered my mother giving me castor oil, “the miracle health tonic,” when I was kid. The stuff was so foul, I had to hold my nose whenever she put the spoon up to my mouth. I also remembered the kids at school, when we compared notes about castor oil, agreeing it was disgusting enough to “gag a maggot.”
Castor oil definitely used to repel me, so I suppose I could understand why it also might repel animals.
“Just sprinkle these pellets around your yard,” the clerk said, “and the gophers and moles will keep their distance.”
Just to be safe, I decided to buy an extra container and sprinkle the entire contents around the base of my rhododendron.
I’m pretty sure the stuff worked because I haven’t seen any more signs of the tunnel-digger since I used it. I also, with fiendish glee, stomped on and then raked down all of the above-ground tunnels and mounds and then sprinkled grass seed over them.
And if I’m lucky, in another year or two, I just might see something that resembles grass.
But just when I was beginning to feel is if I'd won the battle, today I noticed a bunch of tiny white bugs munching on the rhododendron's leaves.
That did it. I can’t take any more of this stress. I'm through trying to grow anything pretty in my yard. I’m throwing in the towel and raising the white flag. Those bugs were the proverbial straw that broke the camel’s back (I've run out of any more corny clichés to add here at the moment).
I now believe there is only one logical solution to my decades-long dilemma…
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Sally Breslin is an award-winning syndicated humor columnist who has written regularly for newspapers and magazines all of her adult life. She is the author of several novels in a variety of genres, from humor and romance to science-fiction. Contact her at: sillysally@att.net.
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