I used to use moth balls. Now the rabbits just move them out of the way!
rabbits
Funny!
DH brought home a live trap, will put a sliced apple in it tonight and see if anyone bites!
Let's hope you don't get one of those black with a white stripe type of rabbit! :) LOL
amen to that. and we do have them around here! I think it will be a great challenge for DH if we catch that kind of rabbit.
llilyfan, you might have a rabbit with babies, someone posted a pic of some born in their planter a few days ago.
Mine had come back and nibbled a few outer leaves from Barbaresco I noticed yesterday, there's a bit more eaten today but the flower bud is still there. It's been struggling along for a few years now and never looks very healthy, probably not lush enough, it might improve if I fed it then the rabbits would eat it, lol.
Well, I don't mean to sound cold hearted but, ......I have an acre of pasture behind the house and gardens and so does the neighbor to the west and the neighbor to the east has 8 acres, those rabbits can either be content with that or pay the consequences. This rabbit is coming right up to the front of the house and so far is only attacking the martagons, that's a very long way from the pastures.
My experience with live traps is that squirrels are super easy to catch but rabbits are almost impossible in the summer with all the food around. You could always set out a bait pile like deer hunters do, and lie in wait ;*)
Thanks for the tip leftwood, I'll let DH catch his stiped kitty and then I think we won't have to set the trap anymore this summer! LOL The squirrels, so far, only come into the driveway to eat seeds. I have no trees to speak of so they aren't real interested in my yard. I tried putting out a head of lettuce and it literally pushed it out of the path but I saw no signs of even a taste!
I make chicken wire cylinders to protect the lilies that are exposed to rabbits. I fasten to the ground with staples made from heavy-gauge wire. I have success with Liquid Fence, but you don't have to apply new chicken wire everytime it rains. I hate Plantskyyd -- nasty stuff! Never again! Got over 20 mosquito bites just while cleaning out the tank sprayer!!
I love Bobex. You just spray it on and litterally nothing bothers it. Its totally organic and I use it on my veggies. The neighborhood is infested with rabbits and not one nibble. I'm also a big believer in clover. I read somewhere that rabbits really like clover so at my other house where the big garden is I let the lawn go to clover. Its just as pretty as grass and the rabbits don't even look at my gardens. Seriously, they're so fat they'll probably all die of heart attacks, all on the clover.
The whole north half of the pasture is loaded with clover, they still leave the 'safe zone' and venture across the outermost beds, through the fence, then through the inner beds, then through the mowed yard, then through the beds surrounding the house to end up on the north side of the house munching my martagons!
When I or DH step out the door they make a very fast zig zag trip back to the pasture through all of that terrain. This is premeditated marty murder!
Sue, I think we're back to "wabbit stew."
I'm sorry (giggle,giggle, giggle). I can just see a platton of little bunnies with camo head bands (ears sticking out the top) in camo pants (fluffy tails out the back) with camo paint around their eyes, low crawling out of the pasture. One holds up the wire along the bottom of the fence as the others duck through. Of course one keeps guard as the others pack their knapsacks with provisions for the mother rabbits at home.
Oh L-rd too many years as Uncle Sams dependent.
For some comic relief check out "Over the Hedge". It will give you a totally new perspective on critter deprivations.
Truely though, try the Bobex. They were eating me to the ground until I started using it.
Looking out my breakfast nook window wishing it weren't raining. You should see them, their so cute! Mummy rabbit and her babies just nibbling away in my neighbours yard. Oh they're so cute! They live in the hideous, invasive, ruins everyone elses yard, ornamental grass clump she planted to cover up the unsightly telephone, electric thingy in the corner. Oh look! one of the babies is strectched out on his tummy eating. Aren't they darling.
My mother used to make the best Rabbit Stew. OOO when I was a kid she'd feed 'em up real good til they were nice and fat and then WACK!! RiP off the skin (comes off like a glove), in the pot with onions and carrots from the garden and served with nice mashed potatoes straight from the garden (baby ones are best with baby green peas) Oh my mouth is watering. Ahh for the good old days!
I'm not that crazy about wabbit stew, momma cats would probably love it though........might have to try the Bobex, although the marty slaughter has seemed to stop. Well, of course it has stopped.....there aren't any left! Well.... maybe a couple have survived the commando unit form the south.
Thanks for the belly laugh this morning, I've been in need of one!
If she were still alive I'd send you my old dog. she was a shelti-pekanize mix. She also could catch any rabbit on four feet. I wish I had a dime for everytime my city raised, Airborne Ranger husband came to get me because "Bracah's got another rabbit" or what ever else looked tasty and was kicking in the yard. She'd catch it and start eating before the thing was bumped off. I've seen him bring 6'4" Marines to their knees, but bash a half dead rabbit on the head. I even have to knock off the goldfish! So out I'd go with the crochet mallet. Look what do you want want from the daughter of a hollocaust survivor. After the war, shoot. My cousin can skin, dismember, wrap, and get in the freezer a deer before it even gets cold let alone rigor set in. Think I'm kidding? I've seen her do it. This guy hit a deer in front of her, she slammed on her breaks, jumped out of the car, had me help her sling it over the hood of the car, drove home skinned it out and... Oh the piney woods of New Jersey. You can live off the land if you only know how.
yeah! You need Bracah. Solve your problem in a week!
Bonide Deer and Rabbit repellent. One good spray when the tips appear and I have no damage as they emerge. Otherwise, those rabbits will bite the tips off of everything.
Donna
Yehudith, you're such a hoot!
surprisingly when I had cats they kept the rabbits away and when one ventured too close to their territory I would find some fur and appendages. If I didn't live in town this would not be an issue!
Deer Off and live traps. (Got hooked on the live traps last fall when the chipmunks were feasting on my crocus bulbs. Captured them, marked them (fluorescent pink spray paint - after the second chipmunk I wanted to be sure it wasn't just the same one over and over again...), and released in a public park about 5 miles away). Somehow during the winter the Nasty Evil Bunnies made a hole in the chicken wire under my deck and started living there. So I took some paving blocks and made a passage outside the hole. After a couple days, I started putting my trap in the passage. Since I got the NEB sized trap two weeks ago, I've already captured 3 NEBs. Right now, I alternate. A day or two with no trap for the NEBs to find the hole and decide that under the deck is a nice safe place, then the trap goes in the passage again. I wonder if people ever see the NEBs with fluorescent pink butts and wonder how that happened....
LOL Great job!
yehudith - I just heard about them loving clover a few days ago. Does anyone know where I can get the seed, like enough to seed a yard! The kind that has the little white flowers, not that leggy stuff with tiny yellowflowers (I don't even really know what that is.) My fescue can't survive Altanta's summers anyway.
I'd love any clover growing tips, because that's going to be my next effort. I've bought Shake Away with the fox urine, but haven't gotten any conclusive results yet.
Too funny about the fluorescent spray. I started spraying squirrels this spring with orange paint. I caught 13+ last year and was thinking maybe some were the same. I sprayed 3 this year but no orange tree rats at home yet.
threegardeners
I really don't know. Mine just grows and I don't bother to get rid of it. You might try one of those natural organic sites that sell green manure. I know its reccomended for that. I think the yicky stufff you're talking about is oxalis. I'm so sick of pulling that stuff.
Yes, probably an oxalis (Wood sorrel), or if it sprawls in long "vines" with a tinly yellow ball of a flower, it could be Black Medic (Medicago sp.)
The clover you want is probably White Dutch clover, the bane of many a lawn fanatic. You can probably find seed at a local (farm) coop. No need to seed the whole lawn. It will spread happily on its own. It is a legume, of course, and can produce its own nitrogen. To encourage its growth in a lawn, don't fertilise. "Starve" the lawn, advantage: clover. Can be killed by Weed-B-gon type products, but not as easily as dandelions.
when I was a kid they called it sour weed. it is lemony tasting. they also said it would make you pee. can't remember if it did.
I have a lot of white clover taking over on my drive and some on my 'lawn', I prefer that to any other weeds, bees love the flowers too. I also have lots of the wild daisy now, Bellis perennis. I found my adjoining neighbour poisoning my 'weeds' last year, she has a garage space at the end of my drive which she has right of way over but doesn't need the garage space (old legal clause) and had been poisoning her part. She thought my 'weeds' were going to invade her little bit, I promptly told her I would prefer it if she did NOT poison them as the clover is taking over. Shortly after her poisoning it a cat walked over it, then a butterfly landed on a weed. She hasn't done it this year, but still pours poison (weed, feed and moss killer) over her front grass, that is in circles with large areas missed! Birds feed all the time on my grass, she thinks that stuff is safe for animals!
I have some of that clover type stuff with little yellow flowers, didn't think it was an Oxalis though, but it has a strong tap root and is very similar. Lesser trefoil is a clover type weed, but not the one I have, which has very small leaves and tough wiry stems, it spreads out from a central root, just like the Oxalis I keep finding from my other neighbour's once had plants.
http://www.gardenorganic.org.uk/organicweeds/weed_information/weed.php?id=127
White Clover info
http://www.gardenorganic.org.uk/organicweeds/weed_information/weed.php?id=102
Medicago is on this list, but I don't see an Oxalis.
http://www.gardenorganic.org.uk/organicweeds/weed_information/weeda_z_latin.php
The Yellow Wood sorrel we have is Oxalis stricta (syn. O. europaea). It is sour tasting. We have a trefoil too, Burdsfoot Trefoil (Lotus corniculatus). It is listed as invasive in Minnesota.
I just pulled a weed and mine is Lesser trefoil, not the daisy flower as I thought, getting confused with the other one I have now invading!
This site is good for weed leaves, with links to more info, we have several of the same type of weeds.
http://www.dgsgardening.btinternet.co.uk/weedlf.htm
Sorry for the diversion, but rabbits led to clover leaved weeds, lol.
That's OK, I'm still stuck on yehudith's comment about sour weed and it making you pee. Made me think of dandelion, AKA "piss-a-bed", due to it's diuretic effect.
Usually I so envy you all with your big gardens and wildlife and wish we weren't boxed in by fences and neighbors. But reading this thread, I see there's a silver lining to big city-gardening. Some people in the city have rabbits, but not us (knock on wood), and we definitely don't have deer. And rats don't eat lilies, thank goodness.
And Bellis perennis? We sell that here. No kidding!
They sell Bellis perennis here too, but it's a biennial with larger flowers, with pinks to reds. The wild one is small and white.
Those are wonderful!! I wish my whole yard was covered in that. The flowers are low enough so that when I had to mow, they would still be there. Is it a perennial in 7b and how long is the bloom time? And where can I get it! That and the white clover would be a great groundcover instead of grass (that doesn't live anyway).
Info here, read the bit about earth worms ingesting them in the spread section.
http://www.gardenorganic.org.uk/organicweeds/weed_information/weed.php?id=121
As they should make seeds if not mown down I can try to get some, but I have never taken a lot of notice and mine are really only just getting going nicely. There's gravel (small stones) under them and they seem to like that.
Everywhere I look, they keep calling clover and these daisy's weed. I think that is from a lawn point of view. But in ATL we are in a record 100-year drought and grass is not growing or surviving. both of these are very disease resistant, don't like fertilizer and are drought tolerant. I'm really going to look into seeding my yard with these. I do need to actually be a ble to find varieties of the 2 that are maxed out at about 4 inches so that when I have to mow for some reason, the flowers remain.
I will also have to do this under cover of night. If some of my neighbors were to find out I seeded my lawn with "weeds", I'm sure I'd be hearing about it from the Homeowners association. But considering our drought and that no outdoor watering is permitted (and hasn't been since last august), I think it is a great idea. And think of all the pesticides and fertilizers I WONT be putting out. Great for the run off problem everyone is worried about.
I really think this should be a route more people take.
Now I just need to get the seed in bulk and I'm set!
I think the fad of neat lawns evolved through garden programmes, people's minds have been manipulated too much but there is hope! Maybe you should set up a meeting with your neighbours to 'educate' them, lol, good luck.
Both the white clover and daisy are much less then 4", more like 2" for me.
I use moth balls, blood meal, and a 22. Fried rabbit is great!
No rabbits now, but the snails are eating my Hostas. Its really hard to hit them with the 22.
Cathy
LOL Maybe a little buckshot would work better.