Rabbit problems

Last week I transplanted several volunteer Columbine plants to a new bed in my back yard. They were thriving until yesterday morning when I discovered one eaten off to the ground. This morning very early when I put my Rottweiler out to potty a rabbit was happily chowing down in the same bed. My dog chased it out of the yard but I'm sure it will be back. It is the same area that I've planted several different kinds of seed and I'm afraid Ms. Rabbit will eat all the seedlings as soon as they come up.

Is there anything I can sprinkle around that will repel rabbits? I really don't want to let the dog kill it, and even if I did, there would be more, I'm sure. Probably the same rabbit that recently had babies in a small indention in the middle of the St. Augustine grass in the back yard that I almost stepped on while mowing. Once we saw it, DH put protection around it to keep the dog from getting the babies but then the hard rain came with the storm and they all died. Probably a good thing for my flowers!

Glenna in Cleburne

I don't have trouble with rabbits, that I know of, but I sure have trouble with squirrels they dig up everything, I am having to put covers on my flats and pots.

I'm afraid of what I'll see when it gets daylight !! I figure it will have finished off all the Columbine I transplanted. I called DH on his way to work and he suggested we might use chicken wire to keep rabbits out but I can just visualize the whole back yard wrapped in chicken wire!!! Not exactly the "look" I wanted for my new butterfly garden.

Glenna

We have had serious issues with 'curious bunnies' for a long time...often it is not the eating, but just pulling new plants out of the ground to see what it is!...I have planted some type of onion...usually chives around all of my greener root crops such as...carrots, kale, etc. They leave them alone. My seedling or growout beds are covered with white row cover....and if I just HAVE to plant a seedling out somewhere in the garden, I use a landscape staple through the plant so it is hard for them to tug out and mark the plant with a contractor's flag....I don't think they like the little plastic flag waving....

I have found that for the most part, the same techniques work with the deer...and now, I have also found that when the Doe takes the fawn down the street in the spring to teach them what to eat...she trots right past our garden and nibbles on the neighbors...I do believe it is cultural training for the deer and am very curious to see if it is cultural or learned with the rabbits as well....

Maybe a trip to Lowe's...cost is minimal considering the cost of plants...and if you need more columbine, let me know!

I'd be inclined to see if rottweiler pee is a deterrent...

Not a deterrent. That is what has seemed so strange about this rabbit's behavior. The Rottweiler has full run of the yard when she is outside, so her scent must be everywhere, and yet a rabbit had her babies in a small hollow that the Rottie had dug in the grass. From its behavior, I'm assuming this is the same tiny cottontail rabbit that grew up in my front yard and startled me half to death a few times when I was deadheading flowers and it would unexpectedly hop out from under a rose bush and go a few feet and then just sit and look at me !!! But all it ate in the front yard last year was a pot of chocolate mint, which easily grew back. But last night in my new beds it ate a blackeyed Susan to a nub and dug next to Lyre leaf sage I had transplanted. I wonder if wind chimes or just a bunch of cans on strings would make enough noise to keep it away.

Glenna

We got some coyote urine from Solutions to keep critters away from the 80 yo farmhouse. Seems to work. Instructions were to re-treat the perimeter area 3 -4 time a year. Sure ran the skunks off. Did not have much effect on the Copperheads, tho.

I have the same problem with squirrels. Sometimes my mulch looks more like the surface of the moon...

Can't help with the rabbit, but just wanted to say that your rottie is BEAUTIFUL!

I think the same squirrels that live in Dennis' yard live in mine. I wonder if pellet guns are legal in the city limits of Fort Worth???

Thanks. She's a wonderful companion and wants to be right in the middle of anything I'm doing, whether its digging in the yard or reading a book. I've been digging up and moving a lot of sprinkler heads as I'm building these new beds and she wants to get right in there and help me dig. Too bad she can't understand which direction I want the trench to go. LOL.
Glenna

Sounds like that rabbit may have been a tame one at some point, not to be scared of the dog. Guess you can always trap it and relocate it.
As for the squirrels we had an over abundance last year. We trapped and took 21 to local wild parks and released. Others this year along with pidgeons have been food for a local red tail hawk in our neighborhood. The two new dogs we adopted this year chase the rest out of the yard when they see them, but do a lot of damage to my plants in the process!

The coyote urine that Bubba suggested sounds like a great idea, but if you can't get that, I find that some blood meal spread around your plants will keep the rabbits away, too. Just make sure you don't mix the blood meal into the dirt, or it won't work as well.