Vegetable protection and South London squirrel stew

I have recently been battling nature to keep my vegetable garden (which is coming along nicely) safe from a variety of predators. The birds ate a fair few seeds after I originally sowed them but this is somewhat expected. What I didn't count on were the squirrels and foxes digging up (and leaving!) many of the carrots, onions and lettuce.

Something had to be done. I looked into buying a fruit cage style cover for the whole plot but the prices seemed on the steep side, so, having a bit of time on my hands I took the opportunity to make one.

The whole structure can be assembled and disassembled since I used nuts and bolts for the vast majority of the joinery- which means it can come with me when I move house- whenever that may be. The netting I got from Harrod Horticultural, a company that initially seemed to be promising but turned out to be rather disorganised (I once spent 36 minutes on hold to their customer service dept. when I finally gave up and called their sales telephone they answered in under 5 seconds!). In short, I would recommend looking around for alternative suppliers if you are considering making one yourself, but if all else fails make sure you order the netting about 2 weeks in advance as it takes them a while to deliver it.

The wood was purchased from Travis Perkins, but while I was there I noticed that there was an amazing amount of wood they were throwing away because of faults that would not cause too much of a problem to a structure like this. Unfortunately, it was too late for us but in the future I would try my luck in their skip first. Just make sure you ask for their permission first.

The only problem with this is that the cage doesn't cover the cherry tree. For that I have been using the air rifle. Which brings me on to the second half of this post- South London squirrel stew.

I shot a squirrel that was helping himself to one too many cherries and decided that I would see how it tasted. After all, Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall is full of praise for the way the squirrel tastes a and couldn't understand why more people don't eat it.

Feeling confident after paunching the hare earlier in the month and after a quick refresher by HF-W's amazing River Cottage book, I set about gutting it. I warn you, some of the photos below might not be to everyone's taste so if you are eating I suggest giving this a read later.

After the success of the hare, I got Brownie and a somewhat hesitant Cowie around again and we essentially made a slow cooked "squirrel au vin" (or more technically écureuil au vin). Here are a few photos of the gutting and cooking process (the more squeamish of you may not want to scroll down):

an incision was made up the belly of the squirrel exposing its guts.

the guts were removed and carefully slicing with a sharp knife between the meat and the skin the legs were exposed.

the head and feet were chopped off leaving a rather neat carcass.

The squirrel was then boned.

... and fried briefly with butter in a hot pan.

some onions, bacon, mushrooms and garlic was also browned and then stewed for a few hours with the meat in red wine.

The meat was still a little tough but very enjoyable. If I am honest it's taste was rather overpowered by the other ingredients and the wine. Still, the result was one less squirrel eating my cherries and a very cheap enjoyable meal. Perhaps I will wait until Autumn before cooking squirrel again once they have had a chance to fatten up over the summer. I will keep you informed.