Nurturin' my babies

The vegetable garden is doing great!  I've only lost three plants.  One tomato plant met its demise due to early blight and another was found broken over beyond repair.  A squash plant also broke and had to be thrown on the compost pile although I never compost tomato plants due to their disease-carrying propensities.  There are a ton of baby veggies forming, including tomatoes, eggplant and peppers and I can't wait for them to mature for harvest.  It's like eggplant parmesan in the embryonic stages.  The voles never made it into the vegetable beds, or at least not that I have seen and I have been extremely vigilant.  They never tripped any of the traps, but the Rozol bait has proven to be as palatable as is claimed.  A body count would be nice but just knowing they've nommed up their fate right from their own tunnel is satisfaction enough for me.  Brian's hunting trips to dig into their tunnels may have also helped repel them, and at least he and I like to think that's the case since he has such a fun time digging.  There have been fewer fresh tunnels seen and fewer flower losses since my attack began.  If you need Rozol, buy it up and buy it now because as soon as homeowner-accessible nurseries run out of it, they can't restock because its status has changed and will now only be available to people with a pesticide applicator's license.  Trust me, it does work. 

Disclaimer:  I covered each Rozol-baited tunnel with an upside down clay pot weighted down with a rock.  I didn't want anything that I didn't want dead to get into it, including squirrels, bunnies and BRIAN.  I don't like chemicals but had no other choice.

Purple coneflower

Chinese eggplant.  I have some of the regular variety, also.

Roma tomatoes

First the smell..........

then the dirt goes a'flyin'