Musashi wrote:

> "Dan Logcher" > wrote in message ...
>
>>Musashi wrote:
>>
>>>My green shiso has just about completely died. My wife already took some tops for shio-zuke.
>>>I was waiting for the rest of the seeds to fall naturally
>>>as they do each year, giving me an automatic crop next summer.
>>>Yesterday I found 2 squirrels in the shiso patch, breaking the
>>>stems and eating the seed tops. I have never seen this before.
>>>I hope I still get a crop next summer.
>>>
>>>
>>I've never seen the squirrels eat my red shiso, and we have plenty of
>>squirrels. They dig in my lawn more than anything else. Maybe your
>>squirrels don't have any other options, like the abundant acorns and
>>hickory nuts we have here.
>
> My yard connects to woods and usually we have lots of acorns. However, this year, I think
> that the acorn "harvest" is small, based on the amount I've had to clean up and how
> few squirrels I've seen burying acorns. Although in the NY are we had alot of rain
> this summer, for the same reason we had less sunshine than usual and it was an unusually
> "cool" summer for us. I suspect that may be why there aren't as many acorns this year.

Don't the acorns drop in the fall? I haven't seen much of any this season.
We've had a major increase in squirrels in New England, dispite the mass road
kill everywhere. They have probably eaten all the accorns and have moved on
to other food stuffs.

It was a very wet summer for us as well. The shiso grew pretty well though.

--
Dan