Tom and Jerry

The side porch of our new house overlooks a wooded area. Between the house and the woods is a large hill which I do not own. It is common property of the Development Association. The tips of two or three large rocks, actually boulders, jutted out of the ground. My wife suggested I plant something behind the rocks to improve the view from the porch. We feed and watch dozens of goldfinches, nuthatches, tufted titmice, cardinals, bluejays, cowbirds, woodpeckers, redwinged blackbirds, doves, chicadees,and others we have not identified. I bought some heather in late spring when they were in bloom. As I planted each at the base of the hill, behind the rocks, I uncovered each large stone. More and more of the boulders became visible.
I added more heather and some lavender. It took several weeks of hard digging and uprooting of some pernicioius weeds that made my hands and arms perpetually itch. (I don't like wearing garden gloves.) When it was finished the rough hill became a thing of beauty. The boulders encircled the hill. There were about twenty of them. Our neighbor across the street thanked me for improving the vista from her living room window. Encouraged, I began cutting back the brush from the woods behind to expose large tree trunks and Tarzan-like vines. The Association gardeners who had been mowing the hill now stayed away so I was reponsible for getting the mowing done. The man who does the mowing for us identified with the project and obliged by cutting back even more than I had asked. We gave various names to our hill-Bunker Hill, Stonehenge, Heather Hill, etc.

We were thrilled with out hill ("ours" only in a general sense) but so were a family the chipmonks who had lived in the woods. When you feed birdss you feed everyone else. The chipmonks loved to jump from rock to rock and they began a series of tunnels beneath my newly made mulch. One tunnel lay dangerously close to the roots of a heather plant. It had to go.

Early one morning I placed a large rock over the entrance to the tunnel. The next morning there was new entrance, even closer to my heather. Again, I placed a barrier-this time several rocks. Again, they dug around it, even cloer to my plant. I created a mound of rocks. My wife laughed at my efforts. "You are Tom and he is Jerry. Jerry always wins. Move your plant." I held fast. The mound went undistrubed for a day. I felt myself triumphant.

Jack is my seven year old grandchildchil (one of seven). He loves nature and cathes and releases frogs in our pond. Jack was intrigued by the chipmonk hole. Although I asked him to leave it alone, and without me knowing, he uncovered the tunnel. He was convinced I would have killed the chipmonk. I had explained it wasn't his real home. I had seen him carry seeds from our feeders back to an nest in the woods. "It's only an escape path for him from preditors." There are many hawks in our area and a black stray cat that stalks whatever birds or some animals it can find. He has many other enteances to that tunnel.
No matter, he was unconvinced. He placed two chocolate cookies for the tunnel diger. "Chipmonks don't eat cookies," I explained. "They eat the seeds we put out for the birds. That's why grandmom greases the poles with Vaseline." In two hours the cookies were gone.

This morning I took my pick and destroyed the tunnel. I replaced the rock mound just to be sure. So far no new tunnels. Jack hasn't been back yet. Perhaps Tom is yet to win. My wife is certain he will.