Personal Blogs

All my posts: https://learn1.open.ac.uk/mod/oublog/view.php?u=zw219551

or search for 'martin cadwell -caldwell' to eliminate caldwell returns (take note of the position of the minus sign) or 'martin cadwell blog' in your browser.

I am not on YouTube or social media

[ 6 minute read ]

Badger, Badger, Rabbit

These days, I spend a lot of my time inside. Whereas, once I was close to nature and happy within a wild space, trying not to disturb the animal neighbours, my neighbours now are people, with the values of people.

I tried to grow a lot of courgettes / marrow plants this year but fought the near drought conditions with an infrequent hosing. As a human with human neighbours I had enemies in the garden. Initially the muntjac deer stripped my Euonymus shrubs from all their leaves during the frozen ground spell in January and February. Later, the new fruits on the courgette plants got eaten. I fixed the fence with chicken wire. Rabbits, deer, badgers, or six inch long orange slugs? I don't know. Now that they no longer fruit, the leaves are disappearing. I was once in a Disney film with Snow White, now I am alongside Elma Fudd with a shotgun in a Bugs Bunny cartoon. I picked no courgettes or marrows from all eight plants. I have to examine the evidence to establish what is taking place. However, there are no historians and no architectural ruins to consult. So, Sherlock Holmes, Miss Marple, and Hercule Poirot are the order of the day.

       'No fruit, you say.' Sherlock tapped his boot with his cane.

       'Bitten clean off, as you say?' Poirot inquired.

       'Could be munched back from the tip.' observed Jane Marple

       'Hmm. Shallow burrow under the wire fence.' Sherlock had moved away from our group

       'Cats like to pass through and lunge at birds in my garden.' I offered, somewhat muddying the imagined scenario, 'Also Badgers.' I added hopefully, thinking about lunging badgers.

       'Visual evidence of Muntjac on this Euonymus.' I was surprised that someone known for travelling on the expensive Orient Express would be humble enough to recognise Euonymus. It is after all, no orchid.

       'I think so, Hercule'. I nodded enthuastically.

       'Euonymus Japonicus, was it?' asked Jane.

       'Still is.' I wryly returned.

       'Euonymus stripped of leaves to a height of three feet, and then healthy growth.' Sherlock poked the air near it with his hat.

       'Muntjac.' I said. 'I have seen them in next door's garden.' Simple solution and jumping the gun with Sherlock's whatever is left no matter how seemingly impossible must be the truth, evidence thing. I refrained from saying, 'Elementary.'

       'He says that he placed large pieces of paving slab at the bottom of the fence where he noticed the shallow burrowing and then they were moved, though not by him.' pondered Jane, hand on chin. 'Not cats.'

       'Nor slugs.' Hercule knew about the orange ones because I had told him.

       'I hope not!' Jane uttered, mortified.

       'No obvious tracks to the naked eye through the bordering undergrowth.'

       'Pasture meadow beyond.' Sherlock pushed a few saplings aside to have a better view.

       'Not rabbits, is it?' I asked.

       'Badgers.' Sherlock said.

       'Rabbits.' Jane said.

       'We need to tie a hedgehog to a stake and see if it is still there tomorrow.' mumbled Hercule.

       'I'll look on the internet for one,' I said

       'Joke!' the three of them chorused.

       'Shallow scratched out burrow under the fence only eight inches high.' Hercule pointed at the scraping.

       'Loose fence at the bottom with plenty of give allowing an animal of a creeping height of eighteen inches to pass under.' Sherlock added.

       'Badger.'

       'Badger.'

       'Rabbit.'

       'How does one reason with a badger, Britain's only bear?' I asked.

Hercule corrected me, "Mustelid. The UKs largest predator. Weasel, otter, polecat."

       'Use a big Dog.' mused Sherlock.

       'Can you draw?' asked Jane, she knows I can't keep animals happy.

       'No, but I have a seven foot tall mirror I can lay lengthwise along the wire fence.'

       'Males?' Sherlock was following my train of thinking and was checking that I had safe and harmless animal violence in my mind; animal frustration really.

       'Females? Cubs?' Jane looked at me, the question on her forehead. 

       'Drat! Delinquents!' I thought. I hoped they didn't get drunk on the fallen plums all around.

       'Rabbit.' Jane repeated. 'How is your bank balance?'

I frowned, "Absent.Tea anyone?" I offered, embarrassed.

They declined.

I had been staring intently at the telly. The picture on the screen went to the credits so I turned it off.

My leek plants are unaffected but the strawberry plants were dug up in Winter and early Spring. What does that? I looked through my contacts in my phone but Chris Packham wasn't there.

What to do? Buy a GoPro to spy on the animals? Lay shallow concrete footings and erect a real fence or turn to raised beds? I asked myself aloud.

       'Raised beds.' said a female voice

Pippa Greenwood, Alan Titchmarsh and Monty Don! How are you? Thanks for coming.

       'Raised beds are too high for badgers and Muntjac, and easier to defend against slugs and snails.' said Alan smiling and nodding knowledgeably, and waving his hands.

       'Did you bring any copper with you?' I hopefully asked.

       'How's your bank balance?' Monty tentatively asked.

I closed my gardening books.

       'Monetise your static assets.'

       'Mr Kotler, I am honoured.'

       'Call me Philip.' he generously granted. 'Grow a cash crop and sell it.' He waited for me to respond but I didn't. 'You have already developed goodwill among your neighbours, monetise it.'

       'Crowdfund?'

       'Not much fun, is it?' He agreed.

       'I can't do that. I can't turn kindness and sharing into a funneling of money that goes solely towards something from which only I benefit, a fence.'

       'You can share more produce in the next years; do greater good in the future.'

       'Bill Gates savaging people's pockets to give a locked-in product and then turning philanthropist? No!'

       'Barter.' I knew Adam Smith would spookily appear sooner or later. 'Bundles for bundles.' He faded and Philip Kotler with him.

       'Welcome back, Martin. You have been gone for so long.'

       'Honesty and kindness take a heavy toll on capitalist gain.' I sagely offered.

       'Nonetheless, you are recovering.'

       'No, I ate the wrong pill or something. Too much salt or caffeine, I don't know.

       'That job interview scared you, didn't it?'

       'It made me think about money again. It made me calculate how much opportunity cost remuneration is enough for me to feel comfortable taking on more hours. I have had three more phone calls than I wanted this month.'

       'You have had four phone calls in five weeks!'

       'Exactly!' I said.

Sherlock Holmes is a fictional detective in Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's books, which have been televised.

Hercule Poirot and Jane Marple are fictional detectives in Agatha Christie's books, which have been televised.

Chris Packham is a wildlife expert, on the telly, I think

Pippa Greenwood is a gardener who has been on Radio Four's 'Gardener's Question Time'.

Alan Titchmarsh and Monty Don are gardeners who have had their own televised gardening shows.

Philip Kotler is a marketing guru

Adam Smith is an 18th century economist, well known for his book, 'Wealth of Nations'. A book I bought eight years ago and have not got past page 42.

The person speaking to me at the end is me.

Martin Cadwell as himself

Written and directed by Martin Cadwell

Produced by Martin Cadwell in association with The Open University.

MMXXV