A few nights ago my cat was sitting by the window gazing out into the moonlight. The light of the full moon danced off the thin layer of snow and illuminated the outdoors with a lovely blue cast as far as the eye could see. Mini’s tail was twitching, her ears pointed up at full attention, and her gaze was unwavering. I couldn’t help but wonder what caught her interest, so I followed her line of vision to my garden across the road from our house. There, four plump deer munched on odds and ends they had found hidden under the light layer of snow.

Admiring the beauty of the creatures quickly gave way to a resigned “Harrumph!” With more than a bit of disgust, I watched them paw through the garden, probably eating the last clear green stems of the parsley and remains of whatever other superhardy greenery they could find. They munched on the stems and buds of vines that clung to trellises.

“Don’t you see the oak trees over there by the tree line?” I said to the windowpane. “Can’t you go paw around for acorns over there?”

They have to eat somewhere, true. But must it be in my garden?

Some gardeners fret about deer damage all summer, but in these parts of interior Waldo County, where an abundance of open farmland has helped the deer herd thrive, you must worry year-round. Thankfully the ground is frozen now, so the critters aren’t leaving behind 4-inch-deep footprints. A footprint here or there is no big deal, to be certain. Yet when a herd of eight or nine visits your garden, they leave deep track marks in the fluffy soil that look like a giant potato masher came through in the night.

And the deer aren’t the only wildlife you have to worry about. If they don’t drive you crazy, the turkeys will. Wild turkey flocks have been repopulating our area for more than a decade and if general observations mean anything, their numbers have grown immensely over the past three or four years.

Throughout summer, turkeys traipse through in groups of five to 30. During the winter, they appear to gather up even more, and flocks of 80 or 90 aren’t hard to spot. They eat acorns, and a group of them will scratch and tear at the ground under oak trees in search of food. A crisp layer of snow is replaced with scattered leaves and torn-up grass. The powerful legs and claws of the hefty birds can be quite harsh on that particular bit of earth. If you look carefully at the roadsides or field edges, you’ll see where either deer or turkeys have scrounged for acorns – precious winter fodder.

Turkeys are eating machines. In summer they wander through open fields, through the garden, indeed right through the yard, passing by the house so closely you could probably reach out the window and touch them. “I don’t understand the whole turkey hunt bit,” my neighbor says. “I could reach out the window and catch one as easy as a barnyard chicken.”

My husband, an avid outdoorsman, assures me that hunting turkeys is in fact rather difficult and that the creatures, despite their accepted stereotype, are quite intelligent. He also claims that, if anything, turkeys should be considered a gardener’s friend. “They eat mostly insects,” he says, “and some seeds and berries.”

Last winter, I watched three toms struggle to get a meal from a wild rose bush behind my house. Actually, it was rather sobering to think about how difficult it can be for wildlife to get through the winter. The toms jumped up repeatedly, trying to harvest one fruit at a time from the stems of the thorny rose.

I think I suppressed any merciful thoughts I may have had, however, when I stepped out the back door into their fresh, shall we say, manure.

All right, I suppose I should be grateful that the turkeys – oops, I almost called them buzzards – eat insects. But the problem is that they don’t care to discern between “good” and “bad” insects. For example, I didn’t see one of those gigantic black and yellow garden spiders this summer and I’m convinced that the turkeys gobbled them up. This isn’t a fact, mind you, just a hunch. I worry that this year the turkeys tipped the ecological balance in my garden, perhaps depressing the population of beneficial insects there.

Ah, well, I guess if we don’t garden through winter we can at least fret over the usual garden ailments. As the new year begins, we’ll most likely find that deer – or perhaps in some locations, turkeys – top the list of those creatures which almost unanimously win the most criticism from gardeners. In this new year, may your garden be bountiful, may wildlife’s presence in your garden be minimal and may your manure be applied when and where you choose!

Diana George Chapin is the NEWS garden columnist. Send horticulture questions to Gardening Questions, RR1, Box 2120, Montville 04941, or e-mail them to dianagc@ctel.net. Selected questions will be answered in future columns. Include name, address and telephone number.