this post was submitted on 09 Jul 2026
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Gardening

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21
The agreement with wildlife (lemmy.world)
submitted 4 days ago by DokPsy@lemmy.world to c/gardening@lemmy.world
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It's the time of year again when I find my citrus plants covered in wiggling bird poop. The caterpillar form of the swallowtail butterfly is extra fond of citrus plants and they make a point to have their first point of life in my garden. I have a rule that I make plain to the little critters: you can stay if you don't eat too many leaves. Eat too much and you get evicted. It does no good for them if the plant dies.

It got me thinking: where do others sit on the scale of "magazine perfect lawn piece" to "it's less garden and more forest area I found to live in"?

Do you have everything where the animals can't get to them or are you fighting the birds for the perfect ripeness of a fig?

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[–] RBWells@lemmy.world 1 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

I have pretty much given up. The insect apocalypse has me worried. The watermelon seems able to out-grow whatever it is that always eats its leaves. Squash, never. Tomatoes I hand pick the bugs off with chopsticks but can't keep up with them. Citrus mostly does ok. Okra grows without anything bothering it, also broccoli, cauliflower, collards, mustard, fennel, sweet potatoes, hong tsoi, catmint, most of the trees.

Passion fruit, I had a vine but some caterpillar that can only eat passion flower vine ate it to death and didn't even stick around to make butterflies. So I gave up on that even though it does like the heat.

And I don't know how many years I would have to not grow squash to get the squash bugs under control.

Birds, I grow elderberries for them. Crows I give cat food in the front yard hoping they ignore the backyard, so far so good.