I am finding little holes about two inches in diameter and my watermelon and pumpkin seedlings have their heads taken off and moved a few inches away within a day or two of popping out of the ground. I am thinking it might be squirrels. Is there anything I can do to discourage them or should I keep planting seeds and hope they will leave them alone?
Thank you!
Tabitha
Little holes and seedlings destroyed?
The holes are definitely from the squirrels. You can place netting or chicken wire over your mounds and remove once the seedlings are large enough to not be destroyed. The squirrels at my house have been horrible this year!
BB-Gun
We can't have those in the city limits, but I was thinking pea shooter (aka sling shot)!
sounds like armadillos maybe? Don't they make holes?
Yes, but they make HUGE holes, not little ones.
We had pea size hail a couple times this week and it causes damage to tender leaves. Also sow bugs and snails will feed on tender or rotting vegatation.
smaller hole from mole crickets, but they do the same thing to the seedlings, esp roots
Ugh, forgot abt crawfish, they were hard on my sprouts too
I heard today about a motion activated sensor sprinkler that shoots a stream of water when animals approach.
It is called the scarecrow sprinkler, that might work for you.
Josephine.
you might try a live baited trap, maybe that would tell you what kind of animal you are dealing w for sure, so you can think of what to do with it.
Maybe throw in some nuts, apple peels, or raw hamburger. Of course you could always catch something that isn't making the holes, so then you still wouldn't know. Ok I'll shut up now :)
LOL!! I can tell we are all getting sleepy!!
Say Josephine...did you ever find out for sure what was clipping off the cone flower blooms last year?
Any thing I start from seed directly in the garden I protect wit little row covers made from hardware cloth(wire) otherwise the birds eat every seedling that pops up,tho they never seem to bother any cucurbits ..Maybe the seed leaves are too large
Sheila, I never found out who ate all my coneflower blooms overnight, I hope we don't have a repeat performance this year, that was very upsetting.
Josephine.
My little nasturtiums are being chomped on at night to the point that each day another leaf is gone. I really want to be the one who gets to eat on the nasturtiums but seems my efforts are almost gone. Could it be grasshoppers? Cause neem would of taken care of anything else.
This message was edited Apr 29, 2011 9:20 AM
It does sound like squirrels from my experience...we have placed contractor flags throughout the garden...they do not like the little waving flags!...it doesn't look that good, but it seems to work with the squirrels in our area...
This is a new subdivision less than a year old and no trees taller than 15 '. I have not seen a single squirrel in the 7 months we have lived hear. We have rabbits like crazy but one plants nasturtiums to keep rabbits away so don't think it is the rabbits doing it. I may need to sit out one night and catch them in the act.
Where do you live exactly? I'd be happy to release any squirrels I catch in your neighborhood for your enjoyment.
LOL Stephanie!
Perko...you aren't going to like my answer...the nasturtiums are also a host plant for the Cabbage White (Pieris rapae) and the Great Southern White (Ascia monuste) butterflies! LOL!
Figures it would have to be a butterfly sibling. I'll pass on the squirrels cause it was hell when I lived in Richardson and had 7 and 8 squirrels in the garden at once throughout the day. Squirrels are like 4 legged devils complete with a tail.
what I thot when they disappeared by morning, the 'cat' hides in the mulch or dirt by day...
We trapped and relocated 21 one summer. They are long tail rodents!
I would have relocated 11 and put the other 10 in the freezer for stew night!
Yuck! I remember my Aunt skinning and feeding us kids squirrel once. I will pass.
squirrel is good. If they are older squirrels they can be tough. My mom used to chop them really fine and make 'chicken salad' out of them and they were good. You just have to fix them right. All meat starts out having to be skinned or plucked or something :)
or boiled extra long twice before frying? like poke sallet?
never tried that! But if it is young = tender, you can batter them and fry like chicken. I suppose would be ok in a soup also.
They do not have a strong game taste to them and are not stringy or greasy. Tried a ground hog ONCE, horrible meat. I guess if you were starving, but that would be a last resort!
I do believe it's squirrels for sure. I have the same type holes everywhere, and the other day I caught one in action, just pawing away near my dusty millers. I think they are looking for the pecans they hid over winter as I have pecan seedlings cropping up all over the place as well. Those flags soudnd like a great idea... ty txaggiegirl
Yay, I got my Mantis egg case today so now I can watch my 100-200 Mantises eating all the butterflies and larva! Sorry Sheila I know you like the Butterflies but I am a vegetable and edible flower gardener and cannot afford to let all the fluttering critters destroy my crops. So I am attacking back with vengeance and letting the Mantis do the work for me.
You naughty boy!!!
I have been watching two squirrels in my backyard and all they seem to be interested in is the bird seed in my two bird feeders. One squirrel really made me mad yesterday when he chewed through the lid of my plastic trash can in which I was keeping birdseed. He was outside of my kitchen window about five feet away from me and every time his little head popped up out of the trash can we would stare each other down and I would say some chosen words to him, but I don’t think his feelings were hurt. What really irked me was the copious amount of seeds he could hold in his fat jaws at one time. If I'd had a bb gun I would have put one right between his beady little eyes. But I fixed his wagon by buying a metal trash and switched the seed into it. I also greased the pole holding the two bird feeders so he couldn’t climb it any more. Hee, hee, hee I’m bad.
hrp if your at the etru I'll bring my BB gun w/BB's for ya then you can put 1,2 or more between it's eye's.
I put bricks on either side of a couple of seedlings and the squirrels have left those alone. My back fence neighbor enjoys watching all the squirrels from the window, but after looking at their handy work in my garden I am not thinking they are so cute anymore. I am starting to miss all the stray cats my old neighborhood had.
Only have a couple of squirrels and they don't do a lot of damage as I have a killer cat and two dogs but the dogs are both pointers and ain't gonna deter them squirrels by looking at them and by the same token do not let the dogs break a point without some sort of reprimand