Here’s our greenhouse with the surviving warm-weather plants that will remain there all season—peppers, watermelon, anything that can’t live outside. At the bottom center you can just make out the chipmunk trap.

chipmunk (chip’ munk) n. Any of several small striped terrestrial squirrels of the genera Tamias and Eutamias; has cheek pouches and a light and dark stripe running down the body.

That’s for everybody else, even ourselves before this year. Kids at the campground, hikers in the woods; city kids sighting one on TV. Here’s how it goes at our house:

chipmunk (chip’ munk) n. Any of several bazillion small greenhouse & garden-dwelling pests of the genera Voracious and Devious; has a mouth with a small striped body attached.

Jess first noticed them when her cucumber plants started disappearing in the greenhouse. Mice? Squirrels? Openings are too small for skunks or coons. Small planting cups were spilled on the shelves. Her kale plants started disappearing. She sprayed her plants with cayenne pepper, but a daily deluge of rain washed it off the outdoor plants without affecting the culprits. Alarmed, she set out rat poison in the greenhouse and started keeping watch.

Then she noticed a family of chipmunks that had moved in to the woodpile behind the greenhouse. She started seeing chipmunks inside the greenhouse, and when she found that some of the tomato plants she had raised from seed nibbled through the stem, that was it. She called out the artillery.

She doesn’t like firing my .357 magnum, so she posted me as sniper. The little buggers would stand up on top of the wood pile and wait for me to fire. I emptied the revolver of six .38 shells and hit —none. Or if I did hit any, they were quickly replaced by another rodent, sitting atop the woodpile with his paws in his ears, calling “Nyah nyah nyah.”

Neighbor Tim heard all the ruckus and came up with his .22. (That’s a much better rodent gun, but we can’t afford anything right now. That’s why losing our garden plants is a big deal.) I felt better when Tim spent the rest of the evening and part of the next morning up at our garden and hit —two.

Jessica’s plan worked better. She filled a 5-gallon bucket half full of water, sprinkling birdseed on top so that it looked solid. Then she leaned a piece of scrap wood up as a ramp to the bucket, and smeared the wood with peanut butter and birdseed. The rodents climb up the ramp, fall in and drown. That works lots better, and peanut butter is cheaper than bullets.

Oh, the cute little chipmunks! That’s how we felt until they started eating our food supply. They can be as cute as they want—elsewhere. They won’t starve; the woods are full of chipmunk food. There’s no reason to eat the people food when we can hardly afford to feed ourselves; and you can’t reason with rodents.