ALREADY??

last few scrappy leaves on what was attempting to be a verdant row of snow peas

 Already as in:  am I already having to combat garden-loving critters?!?
Indeed.  Something is already eating the leaves off my vulnerable new snow pea plants, and while I haven't seen these varmints yet, I suspect a multi-generational family of chipmunks. This generation seem to have lost touch with the soul of their humble ancestors--those who would at least sit on a planter and twitch their tails to make a cute show of gratitude for my gracious and bounteous provision them-ward.  But as for this generation of ingrates!  They are surely entitlement-afflicted!  Do they really believe they deserve the first few puny seedlings--the sweetest and tastiest of my garden's new growth?  Thankfully, they haven't found the cabbage (see below) nor are they munching on the broccoli...Just my snow peas.  My precious snow peas.

adapting to conditions:  watering with Miracle Gro and treating for pests

Time to take them down a notch or two.  The garden gets the mothball treatment.  These little white packets of mothballs usually do the trick against the chipmunks. 

And just in case my trouble is with some landed-gentry bunny lordlings, they get the spray.  The horrid-smelling "deer and rabbit" spray, available at most any garden center and usually offered in non-toxic, organic varieties.  Funny how much I've become conditioned to "like" the smell of hot peppers and rotten eggs as I mist my plants.  I gagged the first time I used the stuff, but I guess Pavlov was right, because I've certainly learned to associate it with un-munched, happily thriving veggie plants; and the smell doesn't bother me at all any more.

The critters? I'm not entirely heartless. They can eat the clover and dandelions--which we'd like to see get critter-harvested anyway. 
Ah, the trials and tribulations of being Garden Steward...

Happy protecting!