by Leslie Cox; Saturday; November 4, 2017

Snow! On November 2nd! Tally in our garden was 2.25 inches (6 cm) by the time it stopped coming down. This is the earliest snowfall I can remember but, apparently, this was not an anomaly. We have had snow on this date before…back in 1991, according to the weatherman. How quick we tend to forget.

Needless to say, we had to hustle our butts that morning…rounding up all of our pots and getting them into the greenhouse out of the weather. By the time we had tucked the last pot away, we were wet and cold through and through. Served us right. We had been having too much fun going for hikes with Sadie and our cameras…photographing the stellar autumn landscape in different parts of Vancouver Island. Nothing like a good string of sunny, fall days hovering in the mid-teens to entice you away from doing mundane chores.

But by Thursday afternoon we could truthfully say the garden had been put to bed for the season. Good thing. There is more snow in our forecast for today.

The one thing about snow…you can see who has been pussy-footing around in your garden. Like discovering twin tracks from a pair of raccoons on Friday morning’s trip to the compost bins with my kitchen scraps.

They had climbed over the fence from the neighbour’s pine tree, wandered through the vegetable garden, trekked across the lower lawn, passing the compost bins to head under the transparent apple tree, and up along the cedar hedge. Being in a hurry to get back to making lunch, I declined to investigate the coons’ progress any further and returned to the house.

Turns out the pair of masked critters were napping the day away in the cedar hedge right close to our grape arbour. Unwittingly, I flushed them out and up a couple of cedars later that same day when I tossed my bucket of soapy water under the trees. (The raccoon in the photo was one who visited earlier in the season. It was in the ‘Crimson King’ maple..not the cedar hedge…and all alone.)

Pretty cheeky to be that close to the house during the day and truthfully, a bit of a concern because of Sadie. Should she ever get close to them, they could possibly do her some serious damage if they felt threatened. Two against one is not good odds for our puppy.

But maybe the threat of being doused by another bucket of soapy water will be enough to encourage those two raccoons to find another, more quiet, location for their daytime naps. A peek into the hedge today will hopefully provide verification. I will take another bucket of water with me, just in case they are back again. They must be encouraged to “move on” for Sadie’s safety!