Phew…it is sooooo hot!!  When the dry season comes, it comes with a vengeance.  Well what’s been happening?  Gnome’s tomatoes are getting to about 200 to 300g (1/2 lb) and they are slowly turning purple red.  The only problem is that the birdies have discovered these delicious choice fruit and they’ve been feasting on them.  Poor Gnome…he was devastated!

“No…not my lovely tomatoes!!  Why don’t they eat something else…there are plenty of other things!!”

We did an Internet search on “how to scare birds away” and the easiest thing was hanging up silver foil in a line.  So I cut out about 50 old pie containers and hung a whole lot, on string, like Christmas decorations.  That didn’t work at all!  The birds still came and bit chunks out of our tomatoes;  we were getting so frustrated since we hadn’t eaten a single intact tomato!

I said to Gnome with a wry smile,

“you can buy decoy owls from Amazon but I’m afraid we can’t  get 24 hour shipping to Belize…”

Anyway, I left Gnome to his own devices for a while and later he called me out to look at what he did.  He placed a cotton work glove on each and every tomato so that the plants looked like they were displaying a show of hands.

So far, it has worked.  Great…very simple and cheap way to fool the birdies away.  Those dastardly birds  are also getting my suriname cherry which is really quite upsetting.  These fruit don’t taste like “cherries” but have a very sweet and resinous taste.  They usually get to about an inch (2cm) in size.

The other day, I spotted an enormous one that was about 2 inches in size.  It was still green so I decided to leave it on the bush.  I thought that it would a really nice treat for Gnome and he would really appreciate it.  A while later, I went back to pick it and the whole thing was gone!  Those cheeky blighters!!  Those Montezuma oropendola…you know, those ones with yellow tails…the ones that bird watchers go on about all the time.  Well, they’re eating up all our fine epicurean delights…Wahhhh!!!

Yes birdie…I know you are looking at our lovely tomatoes…

On a happier note, we have four more kids on the block.  Say Hello to our lovely new baby cavies!  The sandy looking one is very nice…oooh and look at the third one with the black patch on its nose.  What cuties!!