Run, rabbit, run

Head gardener Marko Pesu has had enough of damage to the University of Helsinki's botanical gardens

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By Merituuli Ahola
     
      The brown hare doesn't know it yet, but tonight he is enjoying his last supper. For today, hare and man are going the full nine yards, and the hare is going to lose.
      At the botanical gardens of the University of Helsinki, in Kaisaniemi, nothing and nobody is moving on Wednesday evening. At the meeting points of the neat gravel pathways, white streetlamps illuminate well-tended lawns, and the greenhouses give off an eery golden-yellowish glow.
      From the construction site for the new music centre, across the railway tracks, comes the uninterrupted thudding of a piling machine. Over towards Kruununhaka, the traffic gives off a dull roar.
     
This is the realm of head gardener Marko Pesu. He lives and works inside the fences of the botanical gardens.
      Among his subjects, blooming even now in this curious January weather, are Daphne mezereums, Korean rhododendrons, and Manchurian cherries, as part of the university's display of its extensive collection.
      Unfortunately, their winter activity has been spotted by other eyes - by the gardens' uninvited residents, the 50 or so rabbits who now call this place home.
      Still, they are not really interested in the flowers.
      The rabbits will dine on just about any bush, tree, or other plant that the place has to offer, and will dig up even the smallest mound of earth.
     
For professional reasons, Marko Pesu is not a great fan of rabbits. The gardeners protect their plants by fencing them around with chicken wire, but not all the plants can be cordoned off like this, and in some cases there is no wish to do so. And fences or no fences, the rabbits destroy valuable plants from the collection to the tune of several thousand euros each year.
      Last winter, for instance, they took a distinct fancy to the Koyamakis (Sciadopitys verticillata) or Japanese umbrella-pines, conifers unique to that part of the world. Hence the area in front of the main building contains several little pine saplings, all yellowing and seriously nibbled.
     
Suddenly a red eye gleams out from behind the trees. A streetlamp catches for an instant the reflection from a rabbit's eyes.
      The head gardener loads his rifle. Two quiet clicks. But the rabbit hears them, and its pale shape is already bounding away at some speed down a gentle gradient away from us.
      Pesu knows that there is no sense in heading off after a retreating rabbit. The animal will hear the hunter long before the hunter sees or hears the prey, and will make itself scarce in good time.
      "This is simply a matter of which of us notices the other one first", grunts Pesu.
     
Marko Pesu is probably the only hunter in Helsinki with a licence to operate in the built-up area south of the so-called "Long Bridge" on Unioninkatu that links the city centre and the district of Kallio.
      He has an exceptional permit granted by the Uusimaa Game Management District to shoot rabbits and hares from his garden, even though this method is only used as a last resort.
      Last resort or no, in the past year and a bit, Pesu's rifle has terminated 37 rabbits with extreme prejudice, and a further eight hares.
     
He does not particularly enjoy what he is doing. "Frankly I rather find this an unpleasant exercise", he says, and inches his way along the side of the main building to a small mound from where he has an uninterrupted view of a flat grassy area.
      And right down there, next to a small flower-bed, is crouching a brown hare. The hare has no idea that around a hundred metres away he is being observed from behind a large tree by an armed and dangerous head gardener in full camouflage gear.
      The hare continues doing what comes naturally - concentrating on the grass and nibbling at the plants. It slowly changes position, moving from one bed to the next.
      Pesu keeps his rifle lowered. The animal is too far away, and the chances are he would not get a clean shot from here.
      "Then again, that hare will eat four times as much as one rabbit", he mutters.
     
Suddenly there is the sound of steps on gravel. A dark figure walks onto one of the paths and heads across the otherwise silent gardens.
      "It's the Professor of Plant Biology", whispers Pesu.
      The hare snaps to attention and starts running. Unfortunately for the animal, its radar is off, and it races straight towards the main building, where the head gardener awaits.
      Pesu takes the safety off and shoots. The hare's flight ends close to a granite boulder.
      Its last meal was a delicate plant from Section 102.
     
Helsingin Sanomat / First published in print 14.1.2006


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Wild rabbits came to the heart of Helsinki (8.11.2005)
  Helsinki is urban but teeming with wildlife (1.6.2004)

Links:
  University of Helsinki Botanical Gardens

MERITUULI AHOLA / Helsingin Sanomat
merituuli.ahola@hs.fi