From what I've been reading, shrews don't do much damage to gardens and properties. In fact, if you happen to have one around it means that you have an exceptionally healthy garden. They are insectivorous and carnivorous, so I doubt that they have been chewing on the roots of your plants. Mice will sometimes do that. But are you sure that what you have is a shrew and not a vole? They look very much alike. Shrews are usually smaller than voles. And voles are very likely to go about chewing on roots, like mice.

Rats in Brooklyn. Who woulda thunk it?? And all you did was leave the door wide open day and night. Really? I co-managed a supermarket in Flushing one summer 41 years ago. We didn't dare go into the basement food storage area after 4PM, as that was when the rats came out. The owners didn't care to spend money on exterminators--until the Health Department closed the store down one morning. (You'd think they take a little something to look the other way. This was the Rotten Apple.) If what you saw was so small you couldn't ID it, it was likely a mouse. Standard neck-snapping rat traps won't work well, as they won't trigger with the light weight of a mouse. So close up all entries to the cellar. Especially the doors. If it's rats, you have a wide choice of inanimate elimination methods--poison, neck snappers, live trapping, glue boards and electrocution. When we lived in rural Ohio, we had a rat terrier. In downtown Toronto, a brace of cats were good for the occasional mice. Reminds me, time to check the garage traps for last night's stray Mickies. This post was edited by worthy on Sun, Jun 2, 13 at 11:00

I'm glad it's working better. Windows Defender is a poor security program. It ranks very low when compared to other products when all undergo testing and performance assessments. Much better protection is available at no cost and maybe requiring only 10 minutes or less of your time to get and install. First choice - check the website of your internet service provider (or call customer service). Many furnish top quality security programs to customers for no charge. As an example, I get Norton (an excellent performer) from Comcast. Second choice - Look at the following link for ratings of free versions of security software. While I think these are maybe a step down from the paid versions of the same programs, all are better than Windows Defender. Choose one of the three from left to right for the top rated ones - Avast, AVG, Bitdefender. PC Mag ratings of free security programs Good luck.

Genessee_thomas, no I never figured out what kind of bug it was, I did find insect casings on it. Something was eating the new growth, it wasn't watering issue. That picture was from last summer when it was outside on my front porch.