Well until now I have been silent on the matter, but with the addition of rabbit I feel I must squeak.

The current members that dine on my work are, Mouse, Rat, Mole, Deer, Rabbit, Pheasant, Blackbird, Thrush, Wasp and various colour (White, Grey, Green, Black) of Fly, Butterfly (White .... )

Just a starter.

After reading about arsenic poisoning from ground water, I'm expanding info on contamination and possible uptake in foods.

That's right, not Microsoft Office, nor even My Office. The mice have taken over. I should have paid more attention to Hitch-hikers Guide to the Galaxy.

The security. They use clothes and paperwork for bedding and feed on hazelnuts, poppy heads, apples and potatoes.

Some years ago, they managed to get almost 30 potatoes into the sound hole of a sub-woofer speaker. How they did it I don't know as they had to get then out of a box, push them over the floor and up some few inches to the hole. I still can't work out how they did it but here's the picture.

and here's what I extracted from the speaker ??? and no, they are not small potatoes. That's a full size coal sack they are upon, the largest potatoes was some four inches.

The battle recently is as follows:

Date / Time	Caught	Escaped
22 Oct		0
23-27 Oct	I'm Away	~ ~ ~ ~ ?
28 Oct		0
29 Oct		0
30 Oct	0	~ ~~ ~
31 Oct		0
1 Nov	0	0
2 Nov 03:02		0
3 Nov	0	0
4 Nov 01:16		0
5 Nov 02:57		0
6 and 7 Nov	I'm away	~ ~ ~ ~
8 Nov 03:02		0
9 Nov	0	0
10 Nov -00:32		0
11,12 Nov	0	0
13 Nov -02:03		0
14~18 Nov	0	0
19 Nov	Not back till 6am	~ ~ ~ ~
21 Nov -05:38		0
22~23 Nov	Not at home	~ ~ ~ ~
24~27 Nov	0	0
29~30 Nov	Not at home	~ ~ ~ ~
01~04 Dec	0	0
05 Dec 00:16	Not back till 00:16am	~ ~ ~ ~
06~08 Dec	0	0

Generally I am inclined to support the unconventional and wild, but neighbours, Kay and Steve, seem unable or unwilling to make a secure place for their 'Black Sheep'.

Today is the third time I have had to chase them off and the response from their 'owners' is not very helpful nor forthcoming in making any permanently effective resolution.

I managed to catch one with a young cabbage in its mouth, which it dropped on me shouting at it.

I do not want Kay and Steve to foster the idea that I will tolerate the sheep incursions. I am neither happy to chase them off nor to chase them about and round them up.

Consequently I've written to Kay and Steve asking them to make defined plans to prevent further problems and to be prepared to make reparations in future. A draft of the letter is on the main ELF website. Contact me for the user name and password to access it.
http://elf.calstock.org.uk/admin/kaynsteve/sheep1.htm.

28th May 00:58 Have emailed Michal and Steve to check the letter.

29th May 15.40 Steve is ok with the draft letter so must chase up Michal

3rd June 12:10 Michal has agreed to the letter as is, so will tidy it up and get a print off.

13rd June 08:52 Vera has just come to report the sheep are out and about again -:- Later said she had talked to Kay who said 'they' may get rid of the two males a s they were the trouble, the females don't escape, asif.

Well I was a bit slow on the uptake here. I wondered why the Capsicums leaves were distorting, why the cucumbers plants were not growing well. Well its the thousands of greenfly. Bugger! Never seen a single one before, so where did they come from???

22nd May
Haven't dome anything about this yet largely as I'm not sure what to do. I can't see much option but to brush them off or spray them with soap. No doubt many will die. Does it affect my view of being vegan, ahimsa, and Jain principles, well yes and no. If I chose to eat then I either only eat what they don't want or I kill them rather than have someone else do it via commercially. Maybe its a choice of food, or rather that where there is a choice avoid the killing.

Bummer! Most of my tomatoes, jalapeno peppers and chillies died in a night of frost. I not only failed to cover them in the greenhouse, but left the window open.

This has set me back a month or more.

Half of the courgettes and the only butternut squash also died.

I've brought them into the caravan to see if any will recover.