Oh Deer Me

On Thursday morning, a deer trespassed in my garden. He munched his way from the daylily cotton candy, to mini pearl, to Lady Jane Staunton. He sawed off the purple blooms of two hostas and nibbled away at the sedum autumn joy. I found his footprint pressed into the soil next to my eggplant. A friend intervened and chased him away, but the damage was done. Still the next morning, a few lilies opened in defiance and enough color remains. It was disappointing, but not devastating.

I had a deer several seasons ago, who after tearing through my garden like it was a salad before dinner, dropped scat to further the insult. Since then, I have been carefully selecting plants from the catalogs marked "deer resistant." But the daylilies are my passion, I plant them fully acknowledging the risk that a deer might come and take them out in just moments. He must have come from Cherie's backyard and indeed, he likely stepped over and around the lobelia and monarda and cones that are not to his liking. A success, I suppose.

The garden attracts. It calls out not only to my spirit, but the birds come--there's an abundance of guana now splashed on my chairs from a nest somewhere high above. The bees and wasps and yellow jackets are attracted. The mosquitos. It is a haven for wild things. And so too, a deer. The Putterer

Postscript: Life's synchronicities are intriguing. Shortly after posting, I drove past a dead deer at the side of the road. Heartbreaking, to see it.