As you are building your new garden, you will have to start thinking about the animals that it will attract. Your flower, fruit, or vegetable gardens are like an all-you-can-eat buffet for them and you will be sure to get some harmful predators. That is why it is important to make sure your plants are safe and secure while they are growing, specifically your newer plants.
So how to protect your garden from these pests? While pesticides and herbicides will help protect your plants, they might not be enough. Especially because these are harmful in larger quantities, and you can’t keep adding them forever! That is why it is important to use methods that are both safe for your plants and your visitors.
The way you go about protecting your garden is by doing two things: identifying and setting up your defenses. As there are so many pests out there, it is important to identify who visits your garden and set up appropriate countermeasures. So get started on protecting your garden!
Key Takeaways
- The first step of garden protection is to identify the predators that will visit your garden. Make sure to study what types are near your area to best protect your plant.
- From fences to light sensors, here are 10 ways to protect your garden from pests.
- Traps are harmful to animals that might visit your garden so use more natural repellents instead.
Identifying Your Garden Predators
The first thing you want to do is see who is visiting your garden. This can range from small insects to as large as deer. Anything that looks at your garden as a food source will likely be your garden visitor and not the good kind. New plants that are just forming their bulbs are the most at-risk plants in your garden! So before protecting them, it is a good idea to find out what may visit your garden in your area.
Some of the most recurring pests in your gardens tend to leave behind clues. So let’s look at how to identify your predators from their clues:
- Deer: leaving behind large tracks and bite marks on your plants.
- Rabbits: small nibbles on the edge of leaves and regular pellet size droppings.
- Rodents: burrowing around the area, urine smell, and small bite marks.
- Squirrels: open nut shells and broken branches, bite marks on fruits.
- Raccoons: scattered garbage, claw marks, and destroyed structures.
- Birds: peck marks on hanging fruits and nesting near the area.
- Moths: scattered holes in leaves of vegetables and plants.
- Slugs and caterpillars: slime trails and irregular-sized holes in the middle of leaves.
- Mites and aphids: small holes, yellow and curled leaves, and dead shoots.
These are some of the more common ones. In places like Australia, kangaroos and wallabies are also regular visitors that might eat from your garden! So it is knowing what type of animals are common in your area. By identifying what garden predators will visit, it will become easier to sort out what to use to protect your garden.
10 Ways to Protect Your Garden
After identifying what will visit your garden, it is easier to protect your garden from them! However, more than one type of animal will come to your garden. So it is a good practice to make sure that you are protected from a variety of animals. Here are 10 ways that you can protect your garden from pests:
1. Fences
Fencing is probably one of the easiest ways for you to get rid of medium to large pests like rabbits and deer. Building a fence that is about 4 to 5 feet high deters these types of animals from entering the patch where you are growing. Make sure to make the fences sturdy. Mesh fences are fantastic ways to keep big animals like deer out, and if the mesh is small enough, you can keep rodents out as well. For rodents and other animals that burrow, make.
2. Plant covers
Plant covers are a great way to protect your new plants. For a row of root vegetables, adding a row cover of mesh grill can help protect the leaves on top and the vegetable in the ground. You have to make sure that the mesh grill cover is embedded into the ground so that animals that dig will not be able to dig through them. Nets are a good way to protect new plants from insects and help keep them away. Others like cloches and plant collars can also help to cover and protect the plant from birds. Make sure that the covers are not blocking the pollinators like bees. They are crucial for the garden ecosystem.
3. Repellents
These can be of two types; repelling plants and soap water repellents. You could buy store-bought repellent but they have a chance to harm the plant. Instead, plants like marigolds, mint, basil, and lemongrass are so smelly to animals and insects that they will avoid them. Growing these around your garden can deter pests from eating your plants.
Soap water repellents can be your at-home solution and are much better for plants. Mix a bit of dish soap with water and spray it on your plants using a spray bottle. You can also add some hot peppers like cayenne or mint and lemongrass to your soap water solution. These are effective ways of keeping pests away and are not harmful to the animals.
4. Raised beds and pots
For small animals like rodents and rabbits and insects, a raised bed or pot plants are very good at protecting your plants. A raised bed in a wooden structure will make sure that the rodents will not be able to burrow down into the plants. The same goes for pot plants. You can also add an extra layer of protection by adding fencing on top of your raised beds. This ensures that larger deer and raccoons are not able to eat them.
5. Adding mulch
Sadly, animals are not the only dangers for your garden. Nature is also brutal to plants, especially in the winter. Adding about 3 to 5 inches of mulch to your garden helps in two ways. First, they help keep the soil intact and deter animals from digging at them. Second, they prevent the growth of weeds and diseases from entering the soil around your plant. So be sure to add some mulch to help protect the soil of your garden.
6. Closed compost bins
Raccoons are known scavengers and love to go through garbage bins in our home. And what better garbage for raccoons than food composts that you are trying to prepare for your garden. That is why it is important to keep your compost bins locked because those raccoons can open your bins or knock them over. Lock them up during the night as that is when raccoons and rodents are most active.
7. Cleaning your garden
Regularly cleaning your garden not only makes it look better but also helps protect it from diseases and pests. Rake your garden so that insects don’t gather near the plants and get rid of the fallen leaves too. Make sure to clean your structures in your garden as well. This can be where pests might make their home so cleaning them often would help get rid of them.
8. Getting rid of hiding spots
Cleaning up your garden also doubles as a way to get rid of hiding spots in your garden. The last thing you want in your garden is to have a rat den in it. And with your garden, you have to also think about the structures that you have and your house. Structures, especially ones in that you have to make a hole, would be the perfect place for rats to crawl in. Any small crevices in your home leading from and to the garden are also potential hiding spots for pests so make sure to get rid of them by closing them up or adding repellents inside to scare the pests away.
9. Creating a relationship with birds
Natural predators of small animals and insects are birds of prey like owls. The trees near your garden can be the perfect place for them to make a nest and you can help by placing bird feed in your garden to deter them from eating your garden plants. In this way, the birds are kept away from your plants and they help chase away rodents and rabbits from your garden.
10. Noise and light sensors
These are a bit expensive, but a great way to scare away any animals entering your garden. A noise sensor that activates by sensing movements inside the garden will definitely spook the animals. This might be a problem for your neighbors at night so another less disturbing alternative would be light sensors. Raccoons and rodents are nocturnal animals so a bright flash of light will definitely help keep them away from your garden.
Thus, this will help keep the pests away from your garden. This will not only ensure that the garden is safe but also the pest. This way of protecting your garden is also better than using traps.
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Avoiding Using Traps
Traps are another way that you can keep pests away from your garden. Mouse traps, rat poison, and capture nets are just some of the ways you can capture and get rid of pests. But these would bring harm to the animals and that is not what you would want. Some animals could be considered as endangered in your area and you wouldn’t want to get in trouble with the authority for harming them. Not to mention disposing of the pest afterward could be problematic because you would have to know the proper way. Otherwise, you risk harming the environment or introducing the pests to other areas when you let them go after capturing them.
My advice will always be to avoid traps. Instead, follow the steps mentioned above to protect the animals as well as your garden.
FAQs
They will keep bees away if you are using a plastic cover or a cover that does not have holes. That is why make sure to use mesh grills that are large enough for bees and other pollinators to enter and see the plants but small enough to keep rodents and rabbits away.
Water features like fountains are okay because they are able to have running water. A pond has still water, which is a breeding ground for insects to lay eggs. You can either clean them regularly or introduce some fish to eat the insects.
To tell if a plant is sick, make sure to look out for yellow leaves and stunted growth. A sick plant will not grow properly and die, and this could be an indication that the soil is carrying the disease.
Final Thoughts
Overall, you will want to protect your garden from pests and make sure that they grow properly. Pests will harm the growing process and also destroy your wonderful garden. By safely protecting the animals and your garden, you are ensuring a balanced ecosystem all in your garden. So protect your garden and enjoy the fruits of your labor!
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