Children across the country are spending less time outdoors getting to know their natural surroundings and more time on computers, televisions and cell phones. They are alienated from nature.

The cure for Nature Deficit Disorder starts by leaving no child inside. Take a child for a visit to a botanical garden near you. For both of you it could be the rebirth of wonder and joy.

A new botanical garden in Naples Florida that opened in November 2009, is doing its part to interest kids, their parents and grandparents in gardens and the natural world. Instead of putting a children’s garden on a wish list, they planted it first. Their children’s garden, their bird lookout and their butterfly garden are places for kids to explore, to play, to imagine and to laugh.

A sense of humor is key to interesting kids in everything.  In the children’s garden many of the planters and garden ornaments were taken from a junkyard. Purses, toilets, a basketball hoop and an iron bedstead are among their finds. The signs too are drawing that capture the imagination of a child.

A basket ball hoop becomes a planter.

A crib makes a wonderful garden bed.

Sunflowers always make children smile.

The butterfly garden is a favorite for all ages.  The cycle of life from caterpillar to cocoon to the hatching of a full grown butterfly is on view.

The butterfly garden is inside netting.

A cupboard filled with hatching butterflies.

Butterflies are hatching inside the cupboard.

A close-up of butterfiles hatching.

Even without a child in hand, the Naples Botanical garden has much to interest birdwatchers, gardeners and nature lovers.

An area to commune with nature and bird watch.

Birds are plentiful at the garden.

A willow tree brought down several rose arbors.

A tree crashed into the vegetable garden.

Our heavy metal, antique bench was smashed.

The wind knocked the furniture on the terrace around.

Several weeks after the worst snowfall of the century we were hit with three days of gale force winds and heavy downpours. 51.4 inches of rain has fallen on my clay soil since October. The normal rainfall for the year is less, 49.69 inches. Our soil can’t absorb it and streams are forming along the flower borders and ponds glisten on the front lawn.

Luckily we only lost electricity for a few hours. Several communities near us lost it for days. Sadly, we had two large trees fall down smashing our vegetable garden fence and two rose arbors. Furniture and garden ornaments were blown about and damaged. One of a pair of heavy metal garden benches blew over and its back broke. The benches had sat in the same place for twenty-eight years.

Walking around to assess the damage on Sunday morning after the winds slowed and the rain turned to drizzle, I was more amazed by what survived, then what was damaged. A terra-cotta pot of grass still sat on top of a pedestal in the herb garden, a few yard from a felled tree. It was untouched by the wind. The snowdrops, crocus, dwarf iris and winter aconite were closed up tight but didn’t show any damage from the beating they took. Daffodils in several protected corners had opened, despite the storm. I realized it is the shining example of the plants that keeps me gardening. They won’t be defeated.

It is a miracle that this pot wasn't smashed.

A vole nest of dried grass sits along the path they run on.

Now that the snow has melted and the ground is bare, it is easy to see where meadow voles have taken up residency. With teeth like a rabbit, a dark brown fir body and a tail like a rat, only a mother vole could want one. Although they are small, 5 to 8 inches long, they do a lot of damage. Unfortunately for gardeners, voles dine on tulips, crocus and other bulbs as well as the roots of trees and perennials. Digging tunnels through garden beds, they are the devil to dislodge.

We have found evidence of their tunnels in the perennial garden, by the pond and along the driveway among the groundcovers. One nest was woven in the liriope along one of their footpaths and another in the vegetable garden compost. The nests are made of dried plants and grasses.  One had a bit of string among the grasses.

I have been slow to recognize the problem. It is a new one for us. When I noticed last summer that my red jade tree was loosing leaves, I thought it might be drowning from all the rain. I did find a holes in the ground around its base but I assumed the squirrels had eaten more of my spring bulbs. Now it appears that my fifteen-year old tree is dead, along with the colonies of spring bulbs that bloomed underneath it. All perished so voles could feast. It’s the original underground party.

Thankfully voles are unprotected animals in New York State, probably because they reproduce readily. They can breed any time but the peak breeding time is spring. Females mature in 35 to 40 days and can have five to ten litters of three to six babies a year. You do the math. Just thinking about it wears me out. The only good news is they rarely live longer than a year.

We’re setting mousetraps at each tunnel opening even though the best time to capture them is in the fall when their population is highest.  We have captured three already, only two hundred more to go. For more information on how to trap them, check out the vole videos on youtube.

The entrance to a vole tunnel is a round hole in the ground.