Update: Patio Garden and my ON-GOING battle with the Squirrels!

So I hate squirrels.  I've wavered on this a bit, but the longer this battle continues, the more sure I am that I absolutely hate them!

After my plants were repeatedly knocked off that very cool pallet garden....knocked down, dug through and even eaten, I had to move them.

Remember this?

It happened OVER AND OVER AND OVER!  These squirrels are finding joy in annoying me!

So I took my plants off the shelves.  I happened to find these fabulous old apple crates at my parents' house, hiding in their garage.  This was a perfect alternative.

The plants are in the center of the crates, making it harder to knock them down (though I'm sure these rodents will find a way) And I only stacked them two crates high to cut down on the temptation for the little pests.

And even with all that frustration, my plants are growing!

My tomato bloomed its first tiny yellow blossom this week.  My lettuce is growing out of control.  And the KALE!  See the two kale plants on the top of the crates?  Those were once tiny little kale plants with hardly any green leaves!

I think I'm MOST excited about my rosemary right now because this weekend I plan to make Rosemary Blueberry Ice Cream from The Paleo Kitchen, a new cookbook from PaleOMG and Civilized Caveman!  The cookbook comes out in a couple of weeks, but this sneak peek recipe from PaleOMG has me convinced that I must have this book!

I've harvested lettuce and cilantro and rosemary and basil and mint more times than I can count!  I can't wait to get some peppers and tomatoes and kale on my table!

The squirrels won the battle of the peppers (ate both my jalapeno plants), thai basil, one strawberry plant (and they have nearly killed the other), 5 of the 6 daffodil bulbs, one hosta.   But I am winning this war!

I bought two 2-gallon pepper plants, hoping that a heartier plant would withstand the torment of these creatures.  However, after the first day, this is what I found:

That little bugger was digging in my brand new pepper plant!  He broke off one stem (that had a bloom already!) and exposed roots on the other, in addition to making quite a mess.  

So far I've tried cayenne pepper, chili powder, human hair.  All of them work for a day or two, but after watering they stopped keeping critters away.

Up next is some dog hair (luckily one of my friends has a really hairy dog that sheds a TON of hair) and dried blood (mixed reviews on this one, you buy it at lowes...so no worries about me butchering something).

I also found an ultrasonic noise machine that is supposed to keep them away...but I'm nervous about using it since I live in an apartment.  I don't want to drive my neighbors dogs and cats nuts!