By John Brown

It’s time to start thinking “vegetable garden.” I can remember as a kid growing up in a big city during World War II we all had gardens, however humble and teeny. They were called Victory Gardens and probably helped the food chain slightly, with a major war in progress.

In the 1960s the rage was Gorilla Gardening sparked by hippies and tree huggers who thought growing your own food was really cool. They used every piece of ground along buildings, and just about anywhere else, to stick in a tomato or pepper plant or onion set.

Let’s face it, Adam and Eve were gardeners — Genesis tells us they were put on Earth to tend the Garden of Eden. I can’t picture gardening naked but fig leaves must have given some modesty. That’s what sin does — makes us want to cover our — whatever.

But is gardening in today’s world really worth the frustration and work? My main problem always has been crop invasion by critters. Grow a nice row of tomatoes and some pest will come along and take one bite out of each red ripe tomato. Birds will pluck corn seeds just when they begin to germinate. Ground hogs have devastated some of my best pumpkins. Raccoons shred ears of corn and deer think my garden was planted just for them. Some people have put up impenetrable fences and electric fences and all sorts of things. I always wondered if the cost of such construction was worth it for the produce you salvage.

I read that sprinkling dried blood around the perimeter of the garden will repel animals — fat chance. Then it was cayenne pepper, which I diligently applied — total bomb and much too expensive. These two “cures” cost more than the produce was worth anyway. I even ran 100 feet of lamp cord from our house, through the trees, to the garden to power a radio. All it did was make the critters rock and roll their way through the foliage.

We even tried hanging our sweaty clothes around the garden at night on the suggestion of a friend who is a bubble off level. It was a dud.

A game load of buckshot seemed the only solution, but I never could catch anything in the act. I had better things to do than baby-sit those devils anyway.

Then I met a man who claimed to be descended from an ancient Mayan priest. He suggested an alternative deterrent. What I was supposed to do was make a small altar out of garden stones. Then place food by the altar and ask the animals to enter into a covenant with me to exempt my garden from foraging, and in exchange I would supply the altar with food for them. This approach was far too “woo woo” even for me, so I rejected this idea.

Then there was the owl exercise. I got one of those blow-up plastic owls and mounted it on the handle of a pitch fork. I’d been instructed to move the location of the owl frequently — that’s why I chose a pitch fork, so I could move it. Some suggested plywood cutouts of foxes — this was sure to do the trick. Bull!

One morning I was amazed to see a scarecrow in the garden. It was the best scarecrow I’d ever seen. My brother had made it to surprise me. This decoy sprung up overnight, deaf, mute, blind, with a Steelers cap on his burlap head. His outstretched arms made the frame for one of my old plaid shirts.

He had no legs — didn’t need any. He’d never be cast in the “The Wizard of Oz” yet he did have charm, charisma, personality — a certain magnetism. He was so magnetic, even the birds would rest on his arms.

His form overshadowed his function — we vowed that the next year we’d make another — more realistic, believable, elaborate, more flexible, more flapping in the breeze. His effectiveness as a secondary issue — just to know he was there, 24/7, a sentinel against our enemies seemed comforting.

All I can say for this creation is that he WAS out standing in his field.



Brown is a Meadville resident.