Don’t get me wrong – I like to see a fluffy-tailed Tufty scampering about the grass as much as the next Event Gardener, but sometimes that’s not very much.

In the summer the bunch in my garden seem to delight in smashing my favourite pots, uprooting box-cuttings and replacing tulip bulbs with monkey nuts. In fact they enjoy this activity so much that when I first moved in I assumed the house’s previous occupants were peanut fanatics. It was only when I started finding nuts in pots I’d bought – and no tulips – that I realised they were doing swapsies. Perhaps in Squirrel-Land a peanut is the same value as a Flaming Parrot (having said that I also have flaming parakeets, but that’s another story…)

In the winter they dig up and eat pretty much every bulb I have. They’re particularly fond of very expensive parrot tulips, but frankly they’ll have a go at most things except, I have discovered, miniature irises which they don’t seem to like. Luckily I do.

I’ve largely got round the problem by topping every pot with chicken wire, but this morning I found I hadn’t secured it well enough and, well, bye-bye crocus display…