This morning, I came out to my (covered) raised bed and every single spinach seedling was gone. I had buried rooted garlic to help with pests, and all of that was dug up and left near its holes. My second set of sweet corn seedlings were gone - the first set is still fine. A few bean leaves were plucked from its stalk. Note that the bean seedlings have cardboard collars, so it's something that could reach up high enough to get the leaves w/o disturbing the rest of the plant. Also, only one plant was disturbed; 5 of the other bean plants were fine (for now).
On a much higher table near the raised bed, something dug up the garlic bulbs I planted in a container, as well as ate or otherwise removed two leaves from a bean seedling.
At this point, I am concerned that by tomorrow morning there will be absolutely nothing left in my garden.
The only thing I can think of at this point is that there is a rat in the garden. Because of the covers, I don't think a rabbit is the culprit even though we have many, many baby rabbits in the neighborhood right now. They would have to lift the cover, but a rat could squeeze through the spaces between the cover and the wooden raised bed edges. The digging up (and discarding) of the garlic is also bizarre but could mean a rat is involved.
I thought that a cutworm was messing with the new sweet corn, but after this, I think it's all related to one particular pest.
The covers are essentially 2x3 sq ft cubes of PVC pipe covered with bird netting.
I had just gotten a slug problem with my sunflowers under control, and now this. Help! This is my first veggie garden experience and I feel like I am just growing vegetables for the wildlife at this point! Only the tomato plants seem immune. I knew the spinach was a gamble anyway bc it is too late in the season here to grow it, but it was growing fine and had gotten its first sets of true leaves before whatever this was completely decimated it.
