I can't kill anything. Ah that's nice I hear you think, but it causes quite a bit of extra work to remove the creature from where it is being offensive, and placing them in their new hotel. The mice, shrews, rabbits and other live rodents are taken to a field across the road to recover from their feline ordeal, their little hearts beating so wildly as to be seen through their cat mauled coats. The snails are all collected up in a pot, I have taught P to remove them very gently from the plants and walls so as not to crush their delicate shells. She does this with pride and marvels at the bubbles they blow in some sort of defence.
Slugs are removed with implements, a little less cute but treated with the same respect, all moved to a new home over the fence (it's not into someone else's garden by the way but a piece of wasteland perfectly adequate for molluscs) - they probably all come back and find our garden again within a day. In removing lily beetles we discovered they squeak, quite loudly actually, as if to say:
"Don't kill me, I know I lay larvae which decimate your lilies, but I can't help that and anyway, look at my beautiful red shell..." squeak squeak.
Oh OK, lily beetle, you win, have a nice life over the fence and see you tomorrow probably.
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