Strawberry beds were being carefully weeded, and two of the students were erecting posts round them, over which nets would be hung later on to protect the fruit from the birds.
"Birds are our greatest pest here," explained Miss Heald.

"One may like them from a natural history point of view, but you get to hate the little wretches when you see them devouring everything wholesale.
They've no conscience.

Those small coletits can creep through quite fine meshes, and simply strip the peas, and the blackbirds would guzzle all day if they had the chance.

I want to borrow an air gun and pot at them, but Miss Carson won't let me.

She's afraid I might shoot some of the other students." A row of cucumber frames and some greenhouses stood at the bottom of the garden.