Biological pest control, marmalade edition

As I noted before, the neighborhood cats have figured out where the little rat bastards are congregating. I was out in the yard yesterday with Jackson and spotted this handsome fellow guarding the tomatoes.
Luckily Jackson was oblivious, so I put him inside and grabbed my camera for a portrait. Mr. Marmalade reluctantly turned away from his thoughts of deeelicious rodent snacks.
He was quite friendly, as it happened, leaping over the greenery to get a good skritch. It was hard to get a decent picture of his wiggly self in the overcast light.

He soon went back to hunting mice, and I filled my apron with more green tomatoes in anticipation of another freeze warning. Which was yet again a false alarm, darn it.

Many of the green tomatoes I harvested last week are now ripening on the counter, so I was able to make another pan of roasted tomato sauce to freeze. And there's enough basil to make a nice batch of pesto.