Sunday, September 28, 2014

Gosh Darn Varmits: Big and Small!

I continue to use gopher repellent in the garden and the gophers continue to eat the roots of my plants, leaving limp leaves above with nothing underneath.  I've decided that, going forward, I'm going to plant everything -- big and small, groundcover and accent, plants -- in wire cages.  It will be labor intensive but I don't see how I can win the battle any other way.  And I do intend to win.

The garden is mine.  You hear me gophers?  Mine!  That goes for you deer out there, too.

Yeah, deer got into the garden the other night.  They stripped the leaves on my Jonagold apple tree.  Fortunately, they left the leaves on the lower branches and I think the tree will be fine.

They came in over the gate.  Do you see the top piece of wood above the gate?  It's there to keep deer from jumping in.  But, Brett can't fit his tractor into the garden unless he takes that down and we needed the tractor to bring in all the bark.

He started the project Friday and we thought leaving the top wood bar off one night would be okay.  We were wrong.

Deer never used to come onto the property while Sedona was alive.  She didn't like to be in the house and she was a guard dog through and through.  Kersey loves being in the house with us.  When she is outside, she is usually asleep on the front porch furniture.  If she did see a deer, no doubt she would run up with her tail wagging and lick it's legs in welcome.

More rain today.  The storm will move out tonight but we sure appreciated it while it was here.  

4 comments:

  1. We are lucky not to have gophers here but deer are a HUGE problem. Your poor apple tree! I'm glad it will be OK though.

    Maybe you need a little gopher-eating terrier? ;)

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  2. I have had some success using castor oil as a gopher repellant. You can saturate some sawdust with it and sprinkle it around. It does help. Slugs are their prime food source, if you can get rid of the slugs it will also help get rid of the gophers. Diatomaceous Earth works well on slugs, it is safe and organic.

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  3. So glad you got the rain... and I would love to see pictures of the deer jumping in!

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  4. I had great luck getting rid of gophers from my lawn area using Exhart Gopher and Molemover stakes that emit a "Chatter-Sound" technology that simulates the alarm & distress calls burrowing rodents use in nature to warn kin of danger. I got mine at Home Depot. Check them out at this link: http://www.homedepot.com/p/Exhart-Gopher-and-Molemover-with-LED-90065/100497234. The gopher left my yard within 36 hours and hasn't been back since -- over a year and a half. Good luck! Vicki ~

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Thanks so much for commenting!