Mr. McGregor's Garden

Beatrix Potter wrote some children's books that we would read to the kids when they were toddlers. There was one particular story about Mr. McGregor's Garden I remember.  Mr. McGregor had a garden and was having problems keeping hungry rabbits from eating up all his produce.  He would try to catch the rabbits and would bake the rabbits in a pie and eat them.  I can't say that I ever ate rabbit pie, but if you are interested, British Broadcast Company has a rabbit pie recipe.  In reading that story to the kids, I always rooted for Flopsy, Mopsy, Cottontail, and Peter Rabbit to escape from Mr. McGregor.

Last Saturday, I took a picture of some of the cauliflower and broccoli I have growing in my garden. I'm pleased with the way it looks so far with nice, big healthy leaves.

I love broccoli and cauliflower and like to eat it roasted with garlic in the oven. That's my favorite way to eat it.

We have a big problem with the broccoli and cauliflower crop this year, for despite it's beauty from afar, when you  look closely, you see that something is very much wrong.  Something ate the tender centers of the flowering heads from the broccoli and cauliflower completely off!

Oh, we'll get perhaps a few small florets off of some of the broccoli like you can see below, but we'll get absolutely nothing on the cauliflower.

So what critter is doing this?  I first thought maybe rats?  But I'm leaning more to believe that rabbits and/or squirrels are the culprits here.  Big Boy, our Great Pyrenees dog, caught a rabbit in the yard near the garden the other day and shook it in his mouth and killed it.  Russ went and wrestled the fresh-killed rabbit away from Big Boy, skinned it and cooked up the fresh, broccoli-fed rabbit. Although he didn't use the recipe posted above, he said it turned out delicious.  Suffice it to say, I no longer root for Flopsy, Mopsy, Cottontail, and Peter!