This gardener's worst enemy...

...THE GOPHER.  They eat the roses!  They eat the artichokes!  They eat the Jasmine!  It goes on and on.  For twenty years we've battled them.  Hoses, vibrators, traps, even chewing gum.  They really are just like in the cartoons!  If you see a plant waving in the wind, yet look around and see there is no wind, you know it is a gopher!  If you see a plant going down into the ground before your eyes, you know it is a gopher!

Fortunately we do have other allies in this war - ferrel cats as well as the family cats and dogs.  Ugly as those gophers are I breathe a sigh of relief when some four legged family member brings me a headless gopher or sometimes the head of a gopher.  Cats are rewarded with bits of salmon when they turn in their gopher. 
Here are a few shots of Nala a resident skitty kitty doing her thing guarding the garden from above.  Must have been a guardian angel in a past life.

When preparing for any job one must prepare one's tools.  Nala sharpens her claws while keeping a steady eye on her prey - a gopher we hope!

Keeping her eyes on her prey, tail swishing, Nala begins to crouch down from her guard tower.

Darn I missed the photo of her crouched at this hole.  Another hole.  Another day.  Nothing for Nala this time.  In the meantime Nala decides she's earned a nice roll in the dirt. 

Interesting she chose to roll right where I had fallen into a gopher run earlier in the month. Do you suppose she is creating an olfactory camouflage?! 

 "Ahh! It's good to be a guard cat!"