I would suspect rats. They have a habit of chewing seedling, especiall corn, melons, sunflowers, peas, beans. This happened to me last year. I was suspecting rabbits. So I make a rebbit trap. But what I catching were rats. I let them loose in the beginning; I was saying to myself "I don't want to catch rats but rabbits" haha. I kep sprinkling my garden with rabbit repelents, salt/pepper but something didn't give a damn and kept on chewing off my seedlings.This was not definitly a squirrel habit. Squirrel dig up the seeds(corn, peanut..) but do not eat or chew greens. After some internet search, I found out that it was the rat not the rabbit. From then on I went after the rats. Rabbits generally eat the top of the plants, if they can reach it. But rats chew off stems. leaving the top behind. I know this, because I almost eradicated the rats last yar and this year I have some rabbits eating the top of carrots. With the peas on trelis, since they cannot reach the tops, they eat those laying on the ground and the lower part of the rest. So I think, If your father lives in a rural area, with wooded area nearby, then it is most likly that rats are the culprits. Best thing is to get a Mouser cat that can go after rats. It has to be a big cat, rats are much bigger than mouse. The other options are placing all kinds of traps and baits. But be aware of the birds and cats not to eat the poison baits and get caught in the traps. For further information, google rats in the garden. I am sure you will find a lot of information. Good luck!

I'm so sorry for the pain you still are experiencing. How did you deal with your loss at the time it happened? I wonder if you didn't deal with it at all and maybe that is why it still hurts so much? I really can't say, just a thought. If that is the case you may need counseling to help you and you may have to approach it as if it just happened? Regardless, I hope you find your peace somehow. My Dad died 8 years ago from the complications of Alzheimer's and, like cancer, that is a horrible, horrible ending. By the time of his death he couldn't communicate with us, couldn't eat, couldn't do anything but lay there and make a constant noise that I can't even describe. My husband's death was sudden and unexpected and I have to say that I am glad he didn't suffer for long if at all. I just had a thought: why don't you see if in your community there is a bereavement group that meets. Usually there is a contact and you could maybe call and see if they think it would be ok for you to come even though it has been a while since your loss. After all, there really is no end to a loss, is there? It's pretty much there forever. Good luck to you -

Ken, the subject line on here didn't allow for too much description of the kind of farm he has. Yes, it is his Christmas Tree farm. He has Frasier fir, Grand fir, Concolours, as well Blue Spruce trees. I didn't walk onto his property and look at the trees, I just took a look out of a window of one of our guest bedrooms, as it gives a great view of his Christmas tree farm, to see how his trees handled the winter, and saw so many of them are bright orange. I know a lot of people around here wrap their conifers that they have in their yard. This guy has thousands of trees so that really isn't an option. I thought an orange conifer was a dead conifer? I apologize if I am wrong that his trees are goners. I hope, for his sake, they rebud.

Great photo - does it have a date on it? I have photos of all four great grandparents on my father's side and of three on my mother's side. My father's great grandparents on his father's side had oil portraits of them painted before they left Prussia in the mid nineteenth Century (around 1843), and these were hung in my parents' house when I was growing up. We had other family portraits as well. To me, these were a bit creepy when I was a child. My great-grandfather had his portrait painted as well, but someone else has this. Several other remote ancestors of my father's had portraits painted, and I have seen them online. These were on his father's mother's side and were English/Anglo. Ancestors on my father's side did not have hard lives (although they may have made others' lives hard), but some on my mother's side may have - I know less about those ancestors. My mother's grandparents on her mother's side were immigrants from Germany, and her mother did not learn English until she was seven. Her grandfather was a furniture maker, and I have some pieces that he made. He died in 1942 at 89, but his wife died about 20 years earlier, and so my mother never knew her.