Native plants for a Cape Cod garden

Apple slices with peanut butter were directly responsible for Chuck’s apprehension.

As another blog post declared, it has definitely been a year of firsts for us here at Cape Cod Woodland Garden blog. Much of the nature we have experienced over the past year here on Cape Cod has had me running for the guide books. Chuck here appeared sometime this spring and at first I had no idea what he was. I saw his head pop out of a large hole he had dug, and I was fascinated. I Googled around and found out he was a woodchuck (also known as a groundhog).

Chuck had kept pretty quiet until late this summer when he began an all-out attack on everything green in our yard. I got to see him in action and it’s both amazing and horrifying. He’ll start at the base of a plant and eat every leaf up to the top like an ear of corn. He also has a predilection for stomping on plants and in his rush to get around knocked some pieces off our porch. Groundhogs are actually described as creatures who “Kill ’em all and let God sort ’em out” –  highly aggressive and competitive. He was determined to fatten up his little body for hibernation this winter and successfully ate about 30 of our most beautiful flowering plants. He has good taste.

As much as we thought Chuck was cute, we decided he needed to go somewhere where he could eat the plants without further undoing the many hours of work spent on our native plant garden. We, the bees and butterflies kind of wanted to have some plants to enjoy next year. We got a humane trap from a garden center and after a couple weeks of trial and error, Chuck finally ventured in. Our first catch was actually an angry hissing raccoon – who we let back out into the yard. Chuck looked pretty pissed off as you can see above – but seemed very happy to get out in the nature preserve we brought him to. He should have fun with the hundreds of asters and other flowers growing there, plus we packed him some extra apples. Our only fear is that Chuck will try to get a ride with Cape Cod RTA back to our house, but hopefully he is happy with his new digs.

Chuck showing off his good side. Captured September 23 2013.