So glad you solved your mystery! On another note: for many seasons I've had a bird feeder station with tons of house finches/goldfinches/house sparrows/etc. just a few feet away from my veggie beds planted with peas, without any noticeable losses. It sounds as though the birds in your area are hungry for protein, as nesting season's underway. Now they've learned to eat a handy alternative when insect populations are low: your poor peas! It sounds counter-intuitive, but offering them a feeder filled with oily black sunflower seeds might keep losses to a minimum. In my experience, they'd much rather have enticing, easy-to-get fatty seeds than the so-so peas. Other people's mileage may vary, of course. Since pea-prospecting is a learned behavior, bird netting is currently your best bet until the next few generations "forget" this food source. Best wishes for your garden, L

DH They may be confused or driven from their usual feeding ground with all the weather chaos you've been having, to happily (for them) find your garden and its tomato goodies! You should probably be aware that tomato plant leaves are poisonous to parrots, though the fruits aren't, and they often like them before they're fully ripened. Can you put out water (even a large bird-bath?) and fruit for them away from your tomatoes to lure the parrots away from them? Parrots usually love grapes and small pieces of cut up melons and other fruits, as well as green tomatoes. They're apparently neat and picky eaters, even in the wild! Well, they're beautiful birds, and I suppose I'd have you make a spot for them where they can go for some of their survival needs! [That's what I'd do!] Maybe it's too much trouble for a couple of thieving parrots! Here is a link that might be useful: Foods that parrots like

Blackbird squabbles bothered me, with one pair attacking another pair's baby, etc. Plus they would try to roost on my house. And peck at all my growing things. So, since I have soil with plenty of small rocks I started waving my arms and then throwing rocks NEAR them, not at them. After a few days they learned that arm-waving precedes the rocks, and they would fly away. Next I would slam a door or sliding window before going outside to waive my arms. Persistence paid off and from then on the blackbirds were deterred from spending much time at my place just by slamming a window or door. The next year they only needed a few days of re-training. My neighbors down the street often have fifty blackbirds on their property. I seldom have any.

Yep. We were pretty bummed it was a squirrel. I do see that a red strawberry survived the night. We will have to check critter cam to see if we defeated the squirrel or if he/she didn't show up. Unfortunately making the bed squirrel proof also makes it people proof. A bit of deconstruction effort needed to get to the strawberry. There may be more in there that aren't visible from the edge. As an aside my Pinata rose had very slow growth. Just one inch of new growth. That got eaten yesterday inside the rose cage. Could have been insects as it wouldn't have taken much to dispose of the three leaves on the 1" stem. This may kill it. I have to decide if I want to try again with that rose or get something that grows faster. We've had a couple of tall garden phlox stems chewed down and some short phlox chewed off. Our dogs and us practically trip over the rabbits in the yard. I think we need a dog with higher prey drive. Ours just don't bother with the bunnies.