Ravenous Rabbits and other Garden Pests Part #2.

Unfortunately, thanks to my utterly awful soil, I've had to learn more than I want to know about improving awful soil.

As far as looking up websites, I was an investigative reporter for years. Research was what I did. No, I don't have a lot of time to look up things but because of my background, I'm pretty fast.

I think the whole point of DG is for us to pass on what we've learned. And share dog stories. JUST KIDDING. LOL

You always hear people say that about Milorganite (MIL waukee OR ganic NIT rogen), that it has heavy metals etc., when in fact it's one of the safest fertilizers, even for food crops. Nobody's getting E. coli from the stuff. Some farms use almost raw sewer sludge that hasn't been treated anywhere near like milorganite. Many places in the US have more heavy metals in the drinking water than you could get from milorganite.
Plus it's cheap, and deer don't like it!

http://www.milorganite.com/home/faqs.cfm#5

Hart, Thank you so much for all of that. Even if I end up not using the soil perfector on the voles, I need some (a large quantity) to try to fix the overly rich soil in one of my shrub beds. I'll start calling them tomorrow. I use many Espoma products, but have not seen this one at any retail outlets.

The Milorganite would be a less costly and less time consuming solution, if it works. I wasn't planning on fertilizing at this time of the year, but maybe it's worth a try. I've never seen it as HD, but just recently have seen medium sized bags of it at Lowes.

The problem with this infestation is it's not just in the beds. They're all over the grass too. This is an acre lot, so it requires a lot of product. I don't think it's very effective to just treat the beds and not the grass.

I tried HD, Loewes and Walmart for the Snake-a-way. None of them had it. The squirells are really busy tearing up my new plantings and ripping Hosta leaves apart. I was hoping to get some before I started bulb planting. It's funny, the black dog (pit bull) who "visits" me would always stand just outside of my property line, in a neighbors yard and watch and bark as I was working. This week he's started crossing over the bed that separates the properties and coming into the yard. I wonder if it was the Snake-a-way that was keeping him out before. So far I haven't seen any bunnies return.

What I can't believe is how much of my time and money has been spent this year trying to resolve this vole problem. I'd hate to total it up, not to mention plant replacement. Most people peruse their beds looking for new blooms and grooming chores. I look every day for new critter damage. This spring, my number one goal was to edge my beds. I've never started on it!!!!!

Hart, a snake in the basement would definitely get my attention!!!!

The absolute worst was the skunk that got into the cellar and sprayed. That smell lingered for weeks.

Poor Stormy, I know you're sick and tired of dealing with the voles. Have you tried calling your local extension office? Maybe they can suggest something. If they're bad in your yard, I'm sure other people in your area are having problems too.

I wonder if just mothballs could be used in place of the Snake Away? I know gardeners who use those and that's certainly what the Snake Away smells like only stronger.

That's good to know about the milorganite, Claypa. I like the idea of such a good recyling product too. I got a bag at the Weber sale this summer but I haven't used it yet.

Thanks, Hart. Yes, I called the extension agent. They told me to call an exterminator. The exterminator told me that they would come every month & put down poison, but that it just would be population control, not eradication. Mothballs were the first item that I tried.

I knew someone once who had a family of skunks living under their front door patio. The husband stuffed and filled the entrance hole with cement. The skunks were inside of the hole when he closed it. The skunks burrowed further under the house trying to get out. They died under the house directly under her foyer floor. The spray sacks released their stuff and the whole front part of the house stunk. They had to jackhammer and break up the patio to try to get to the remains. Then, the foyer floor boards had to come up!!! Was the wife mad!!!!! I can't imagine how long it took for the smell to leave your basement.

Oh, my gosh! Where was his head? And how cruel too. I'll bet she did want to wring his neck.

Do you have a master gardener's group? I know the one here was not very helpful the one time I asked for help but maybe they could come up with some advice. I guess what I'm thinking is you're probably not the only person in your area to be dealing with this problem this year and someone out there might have a solution that hasn't been found here yet.

Thanks, Hart. I'm not sure how to go about finding a master gardener group. I know there is at least one that teaches community classes at the extension office.

Call the extension office. I think they're all done through the local extension offices. Here they do have an email group that will try to help other gardeners with questions and problems.

In calling the local Espoma dealer, I found 1 27lb bag of Soil Perector for $14.

They recommended another product Permatill, also marketed under the name of Volebloc. It cost $10 for a 40lb bag. I bought their remaining supply of 6 bags.

The Espoma product describes itself as Kiln dried ceramic mineral. The Permatill is 100% chipped shale. The Permatil instructions are exactly those described on the webpage that Hart linked.

Yesterday, we lifted almost all, but a very thin layer of the very thick mulch off of my 1 shrub bed. I had two shrubs in this bed that required repositioning and 3 new young ones to plant. I lined the bottom and sides of the planting holes with about a 2" layer of the product and then planted them with dirt as usual. Then, about 2" outside of the shrub's drip line, I dug 4" deep and 4" wide "Moats" around the plant. These moats were then filled with the Permatill. 8 shrubs done, about 70 to go! 4 more shrub beds to get their mulch thinned! Well, the mulch is getting put to good use as I never mulched the one side of my large bed as I am still planting it. Well, got to go to work!!

I'm so glad you found what you needed and more besides. Did you see this from the second article by Viette I posted above?


In home grounds mulch around plants may serve as an excellent cover for the voles. Deep mulch in gardens and plant beds should be reduced and/or avoided where voles are known to be problems. Certain mulches are more likely to attract voles than others. Avoid using mulches which have fine or small particle sizes. Large sized crushed-stone mulch and pine bark mulch may reduce vole tunneling. Plastic and landscape fabric mulches may increase vole populations and subsequent damage.

Yes, Hart. I've read it several places and have been waiting to have the time to lift the mulch. I don't use really finely shredded mulch. To dig the moats, I have to thin the mulch. I do not use landscape fabric, mostly because I have bulbs and poppies planted between my shrubs.

If I'm going to use the Permatill to plant bulbs and make moats for the hosta, then I'm seriously under supplied. Have to start calling local nurseries to see if anyone has any.

That Black Pitt Bull was back to visit again. He got into my garden supplies bin & and took out two bags of bone meal and chewed and ripped them to shreds!!!!! There's just no end to these garden pests!!! They lurk everywhere.

Poor Stormy. You can't win for losing it seems. Let's hope that next year will be a better year for you.

Ruby

Oh Ruby, It's not so bad!!!! Yesterday my helper caught a vole and it is now living in a pot on my potting bench covered with a bucket of water. Everything I've read says that they can only climb about 2 or 3", but it was climbing out of a 6" high pot, so now I wonder how effective my wire pots are. I didn't know what to do with it. I didn't want to release it so it could go back into my beds and reproduce. Have to get DSO to handle that one. Right now I'm busy planting all of my bulbs in permatil so they hopefully won't dig through it to eat them.

I can not believe it!!!!! I went outside to show DSO the vole and it is gone!!!!! How did it get out of the pot? There are two holes on each side of the pot that are less than half an inch tall!!!!! He was about 3"tall and 5"long, not counting his tail. That bugger's probably back in my bed reproducing as I type!!!!!!

Oh Stormy, I feel so bad for you! But I have to chuckle at the same time. Those voles are out to drive you insane, it's a conspiracy I tell you.

Lady, I can't imagine who the conspirators are!!!!! It is comical. I was thinking of you today as I planted my African Queen in Permatil.

Stormy,

It is amazing what animals will do!

I have one of those metal, 4 gallon buckets with a lid that fits fairly snug on it that I keep my bird seed in.
Well--one day, about a month ago, I kept seeing this squirrel scoot off when I walked out on my patio, I remember thinking---"What is that squirrel doing on my table"???
Then--eventually, I saw a pile of sunflower seed hulls all over the table. This squirrel had figured out how to dislodge the metal lid from the metal bucket! NOT an easy job--but he did it! SO--I put 2 bricks on top of it to keep it safe.

Today--I went out to my Patio--and I see this pile of bird seed on the table. HMMMM! I think.....Where did THAT come from?
Believe it or not--the darn squirrel(s) had chewed through where there is a seam in the metal bucket. Oh--It was a bit rusted--so maybe that helped! But--I cannot believe they did it!!!!
I put a brick, upright, right along the seam of the bucket--and 2 more bricks to hold the first one in place. MAN!!!! Those critters are desperate!!!! I feed them enough--already!

Now--there is a lot of Oak trees 3 houses up. They can have ALL the acorns they want!
There is also a Beach Nut Tree only 2 houses up. This tree has oodles of small nuts all over the ground. But--NO! They want my Sunflower seeds!!!!! Go figure!

You just never know......The Critters do what they do.......

Gita

They sure do Gita!!! Maybe you're part of the conspiracy too. LOL It's like you said before, they are stupid, why put out all of that energy when they can just hop over to the next yard? I was also thinking of you today as I planted Regale Lily in Permatil.

Today I found new trails and more holes in my shrub bed. This makes me wonder if I've even diminished the vole population. I need to say that the new application of Snake-A-Way does not seem to be curtailing the squirells like before. I also put down a case of the Shake-away and don't seen any discernable effect from that.

Even though I've thinned the mulch, they still are running through it. I'm trying to get the leaves out of the beds too so they can't hide there. I'm not buying any more poison this year.

Now I'm hoping that the Permatil will keep them from going near the plants or eating the bulbs. We'll see.

Stormy--

With all the money you have spent on "Snake Away" and all the time and energy building those wire cages, and what not--you might just turn to a professional exterminator for a solution. Do something more serious!

I feel for you! You cannot be going on like this!!!!! How much money have you now put into this battle???? And it seems nothing is curtailing your vole population....

Gita

Gita, I'm afraid to add it up,because I might become depressed!!!!

Calling several exterminators was the first thing I did. They all said that they would just have to keep coming out and put down rodent poison. None of them said they could eliminate them, only hope to reduce the population. But thanks for the suggestion.

I've been thinking about why the Snake-a-way does not now have it's prior effectiveness. I'm having those same thoughts about the highly reccomended Shake-away. Could it be that the cooler temperatures diminish the effect?

with this cold, aren't the snakes pretty immobile anyway?

Sally, I wasn't using it for snakes. It was doing a good job of keeping the rabbits and squirells at bay. I'm planting lots of bulbs and the squirells love to dig up the freshly planted ones.

Stormy,

Unless you are planting the "small" bulbs (Crocus, Grape Hyacinths, etc.) All other bulbs should go 6-8" deep, depending on variety.
Are you saying that the squirrels can dig down THAT deep?????

Gita

Yes, Gita. I use a spade with a measuring guide on it for bulb depth. They dig up my tulips all the time. Also daffodils, which they just throw about the bed.

Hmmmm....

I wonder what would happen if you threw in one mothball in each hole??? Or a small sprinkle of the "Sake Away"????

Just wondering....

I have some mothballs. Might try some of them. Napthalene is the main ingredient in mothballs, snake-a-way and shake-away. I put an entire case of shake-away down as someone recommended it for voles.

Stormy, the Snake Away worked fine last fall and winter to keep the critters from digging up and eating my bulbs. I know squirrels are more active in the fall, getting ready for winter. I would imagine the same is true of the voles. I always have a devil of a time with field mice - ie voles - coming into the house in the fall and the squirrels have been busy for weeks getting the black walnuts here.

I never used huge amounts of the Snake Away, just sprinkled a bit all through the areas I wanted protected. I don't think it's a matter of if a little bit helps, more is even better.

Thanks, Hart, I know you are right. It's just that I have such a large area of beds to cover. So far this year the squirrels haven't dug up any tulips, but they went to town on the Blue Bell bulbs that I planted. They must have been irresistable.

My niece, who is a raw foods nut, kept looking at all of my tulip bulbs in the garage and smacking her lips and saying they looked good enough to eat. I was beginning to think that I'd have to add her to my list of garden pests!! Time to order a case of niece-away.

Stormy, that is cute about your niece, thanks for the chuckle ; ^ )

Niece Away, LOLOL! They are from the onion family, aren't they? snicker

You know, they say you can tell how bad the winter is going to be by how active the critters like squirrels are in making their winter stash.

It still sounds like the mulch is the problem. I wonder if you removed all the mulch altogether it would encourage them to move on?

Hart, I thought that too, but in thinking about it, I realized that I never mulched my tree line bed. I planted quite a few mini hosta there and put them in mini anti-vole cages. Quite a few of the cages have the dig holes up against them and 1 actually had the creature dig down into it. So, they are there, mulch or not.

It's probably true about the squirrel's forecasting ability. Somedays this season, I got lazy on the walnut clean up duty. Even though I picked them all up as soon as I saw them, I didn't get rid of all of them right away. There's an iron table in my yard right under the walnut tree. Somedays I just piled them on the table. When I would go out to get them, the squirells had been at them and tore them open and took the nuts away. I had to pick up all of the bits of hull and had stained black fingers!!!! They have been very busy digging since August.

I'm going to lose at least two to three of my maples from the vole girdling. The squirells have been kind enough to bury acorns from the oaks across the street in my yard. I now have 3 beautiful Oaks growing in pots. When the Maples go, I have their replacements, except, I'd also like a peach tree.

Yes, but if they have a cosy home in other areas nearby with lots of mulch, I'm sure they'll eat things all over the yard.

You'll need at least two peach trees for pollination of different but compatible varieties. You can also do a peach and a apricot if you want.

I'll bet the squirrels really appreciated you taking all that time to gather the nuts in one convenient spot for them. LOL I don't get nuts every year but usually just leave them for the critters. They fall in a spot where them being on the ground isn't a problem.

My mom used to crack black walnuts every year and her hands would be black for weeks from that job. You know they used to make dye from the hulls.

Hart, Thanks. I was looking at some peach trees on the web and there were a number of self pollinating types. At least I think that's what it meant.

As my beds fill in more, I can probably go without mulch. I wonder if RCN mulches all of her beds. I don't think I can go without mulch in my shrub beds, but certainly ultimately could in the perennial beds.

I pruned these 2 old trees each year since I moved here 3 years ago. They are bearing more fruit each year. I really do have to find someone to give the nuts to.

All of them are self pollinating but you'll get a teensy fraction of the fruit you'd get with a pollinator. The tree that was here when I bought the house had only had fruit one year of the seven the lady I bought the house from had lived here. It bears every year since I planted more peach trees.

They don't take a lot of space compared to other trees so you can easily plant two. They sure are pretty in the spring.

Heh, good luck finding someone who wants black walnuts. They're so hard to crack and the meat is really hard to get out too. Mom used to sit on the sidewalk and crack each one with a hammer and then laboriously pick all the meat. I don't know how she had the patience.

Actually, you might try suggesting it as a fund raiser for a local church teen group or something. It's a lot of work but the shelled nuts are expensive so they could make a decent amount of money.

I was just thinking if you could remove the mulch for a year, it would give them a reason to move on and take care of the vole problem at least for a while and then go back to mulching, only maybe not so deep. It took a couple of years to hit on the right solution to the deer problem here but once I convinced them to go elsewhere, they haven't come back.

My goodness, Hart, I'm impressed. I didn't know anyone had been able to tame their deer problems. The posters in the Shady Gardens forum are always looking for deer resistant plants. How did you do it?

Thanks for that good information on the fruit trees. I'd like to have 1 early and 1 late producing peach tree, but an Apricot is really tempting!!!! Depending upon their light requirements, I might be able to do three.

Maybe next summer I'll post a blurb in Craigslist and see if anyone wants the walnuts.

Regarding the mulching & voles, I might be able to go without mulching the perennial beds next year as they should be a lot more filled in. But I don't think that I would want to leave the shrub beds unmulched. I did remove a significant amount of mulch from them. As I was constantly amending the soil in one last year and replanting different items, that one did not get mulched last year. It was a hugh job trying to control & pull all of the weeds. Weeds and groundcover are also some of their favorite playground. Also, it had to be constantly watered.


I know that with all of the planting I've done, there is a lot more attractive food for them now. In the shrub beds, I've ringed all of the shrubs with Permatil. I'm also planting tons of bulbs in these beds directly in Permatil. Maybe that will make them not like it there so much.

Just when Doc had convinced me not to disturb the mulch and let the Mycorrhizza grow. I put a lot of it in the shrub beds and it was very expensive.

I can only hope and if it gets worse, or remains the same, then I will try removing the mulch all together.

hi,
i noticed this post because someone asked about what to use to help there lilies to not be eaten by voles and wow has it gotten loooong. anyways. i didn't see anyone answer this with my remedy so here's my story.
4 years ago, in early spring everything is sprouting up, but my lilies.i also noticed that some other plants weren't coming back and in several occasions i found a hole under were the plant was. the previous fall i had gone to clean under a hosta and the whole plant came up in my hands without roots. next my parsley patch was all wilted. same thing no roots. i came online of course and soon found out i had voles. so now i started to research the buggers. they ate about 150 of my lily bulbs plus plants. now my favorite flower is the lily. i was devastated as i realized the devastation they had done in one winter. of course they were using the moles tunnels that i had gotten the previous year as there super hyway around my house.
anyways the solution i chose was vole control. http://www.volecontrol.com/product_kaput.html
this company make what they call bate stations, that you put by there active hole. this station is a 3-4' piece of white plumbers pipe and in the middle there is another piece that comes up and is held to the ground with a metal piece. you then cover this with a big piece of thick black plastic and mulch. the vole now comes out of its hole and goes into your vole trap and creates a new hole at the end and now it is in there system. you place just a small amount of white pellets, they used one called rozol then but they have switched since, for a less toxic to other animals one. but i have only used the rozol. the other good thing is they take this bate with them to there dens, like they do with a lot of there food, to feed mom and babies. so now we have poison that is in the den. it also doesn't kill them right away, so they have no association to what killed them. good thing. the best is that it worked. no more holes, no more voles. next year i spotted a couple of holes and i put the traps back. you check them every once and a while to see if they need bait. anyways, i found that i had no more serious problem with voles by using this. also, i discovered that they don't like hard scratchy things around there food sources, like my lily bulbs. so 1st i tried these small pointy pebbles on my hostas, they worked but i don't like putting rocks in the ground. now i'm using crushed oyster shells and i've had one lily not come up in 2 years. of course there is always this winter, but i'm hopeful. i think they might have a nest under my barn, it is pretty tough to get under a slab of cement. LOL
well i have only replaced a few of my lilies and inexpensive ones at that. this year i'm getting lily bulbs from 3 co-ops and i've found a source for 50 lb bag of oyster shells, for only $15.95. i'm feeling good.
i wish there was another way but killing them, but there isn't another way to control them and i've spent a lot of money and time to just let them eat away and do nothing. i have woods behind me and i never expect to be free of them, but i'll search for holes each year, put out my vole control system and poison and use my oyster shells. and now the lily beetle comes to the usa and i'm drenching my gardens for them, using castor oil sprays or pellets to keep them out, they don't like the smell, of course milky spore for the grubs, but the neighbors japanes beetles come and eat my plants. unfortunately the man who put down the new lawn told him that the grubs he rototilled in wouldn[t come back. of course they believed him.
so now i know more about moles, voles, grubs, and lily beetles than i ever wanted to know. ignorance sure was bliss. before they came visiting my yard. LOL

oops, missed this! The answer is yes, well almost all of them :) We used to use bark mulch but it became way too expensive as the gardens kept growing. A few years ago we started mulching with spoiled hay, definitely not as pretty but much cheaper! Not an ideal resolution as it's more difficult to see where the voles have been tunneling :( It sure would be nice if I didn't have to mulch at all but the disgusting clay soil is a mess if it's left uncovered, red muck when it rains and cement when there's drought, which we've had two years of :( I've started trying to incorporate the coarse grit into planting holes but I'm not sure that will help either as I already saw evidence of them in the newer areas last fall. I almost hate to see this thread again - reminds me of the damage I discovered in December in the new Heuchera planting :( They were all looking so beautiful last fall and on a walk through the gardens I realized there wasn't any bright color in that area, you know they're supposed to be evergreen! A closer inspection revealed that either rabbits or deer had chomped the heads off every single Heuchera!! I'm just keeping my fingers crossed that they didn't chew so far down on the crowns that they won't be able to recover - all that work AND all those plants :(

debi_z, sounds like you've been successful keeping the voles out! I wish I could use your method. Unfortunately, I'm still not willing to use the chemicals because I'm paranoid about the possibility of my vole hunter (our cat Lucky) eating one of the voles that has eaten the poison :( I've read conflicting reports of whether he would be affected but I'm not willing to take any chances.