More Critter Trouble

All is NOT quiet on the Garden Front!

OK, It seems I pretty much have the Grove Gang Squirrels at a stalemate.  But to review:  They started by pulling up most my corn, bean, and cucumber seedlings (but not eating them) 2 plantings.  I attached the live cage on the top of my fence (their highway to my garden).  I caught one in the live cage and dispatched it.  A second one pulled up my 3rd planting, so I covered the trellis bed with a tent of 1" chicken wire and covered my block of corn separately.  Some squirrels penetrated the mesh tent and also got at the corn again (I had uncovered it for some afternoon sun and forgot to replace it).  I then caught a 2nd squirrel and dispatched it.

In addition, I had had 2 groundhogs move in under my toolshed earlier.  The first was live trapped and relocated.  The 2nd was driven away after I filled 3 different burrow entrances with used cat litter.  I thought I was done with them for the year (in the past, they have only showed up in the Spring).

So there I was trying to catch the 3rd garden attacking squirrel, but also having fixed the spots it/they got into through the mesh tent.  I thought I only needed to catch the 3rd squirrel and then protect my developing tomatoes in another garden bed.

After catching the first 2 squirrels in just a few days, I expected to get the known 3rd and possible 4th easily.  The peanut butter bait smeared on the trip lever was working well.  However, I have since found the trap tripped daily with nothing inside.

I have figured out that its mostly my fault.  There are 2 wires that need to be set in place after the doors are set open that lock the doors shut when snapped closed.  That may be confusing; what it means is that a frantic squirrel CAN push back out through the spring-shut doors if 2 wires down lock them down.  I HAVE found a couple of times where I forgot to set the lock wires.  I know a squirrel has been in the cage because the peanut butter is licked clean.

But I may have outsmarted myself on a few other attempts.  Trying to be clever, I put a small dot of peanut butter at the front of the cage to lure the squirrel in.  I realized that when the cage was closed and no squirrel was inside, the dot of peanut butter was missing.  What probably happened was that the squirrel grabbed the front of the cage to get at the dot on peanut butter hard enough to trigger the doors.

It must have gotten a wicked strike on the head, but was able to pull itself  out.  But it keeps coming after that peanut butter!

There is also a situation after I stopped putting the dot of peanut butter on the front of the cage and the cage is closed with the trigger lever still having the big smear of peanut butter on it.  I suspect that a squirrel is jumping onto the cage just to get over it, and triggering the doors to spring closed.  I may have to attach a circle of chicken wire around the outside of the cage to encourage them to go through it. 

But I have learned to make sure the door-locking wires are in place each time lately and that the only peanut butter is sure to get them at the door trigger lever.  In fact today, I smeared the peanut butter on a small stone and set it PAST the trigger lever.  If THAT doesn't work, I will try the mesh wire surround to encourage them to go through the cage instead of jumping on it.  I expect to be successful soon.

So what's the "MORE" problem?  Well, as I was quietly walking to check the squirrel cage this evening, I surprised a HUGE FAT GROUNDHOG in the back yard.  As expected, it ran to the toolshed.  I looked around the shed at the previous burrows.  None of the previous burrow entrances had been re-dug.

I wasn't surprised at THAT.  I use scoopable cat litter and the stuff is slimy when wet and cement-like when dry.  Plus it is full of cat pee and poop!  I doubt any herbivore is going to mess around with THAT!  But I looked around carefully (it's a bit overgrown with weeds and vines) and found the new burrow.  They all seem to like the same spot (NW corner for some reason.  It was dug this morning (I check around the toolshed every day at least once).  So I went back into the garage and took out 2 plastic shopping bags of used cat litter and emptied them into the burrow entrance.  I'll be able to tell if it digs its way back out (doubtful - not one has done THAT yet) or digs a new hole elsewhere.  If neither of those happens, it either suffocated or had a panic heart attack, LOL!

One last odd observation.  As I was walking back to the house, I noticed a 3' arc of eaten clover where I saw the groundhog.  I know they like clover.  If I thought that was all they would ever eat, I would leave them be.  But I have, in the past, caught them eating my ripening heirloom tomatoes.  And I love those at least as much as Hobbits love mushrooms!

So the new groundhog has to go too.  I HOPE it leaves from the offense of the used cat litter.  But if not, I will live-cage and dispatch it too. 

Fourth Of July

I Caught A Squirrel

WARNING:  Squirrel death ahead...  Read or not, your choice.

Yeah, it was one of the Bad Grove Gang, at least from the direction it entered the live trap.  I baited the center release lever with a smear of peanut butter, but I also placed a small dab on both ends  assuming it would lick that off before going for the large smear.  So I know the direction it came from.  It has gone to Happy Squirrel Acorn Acres...

Peanut butter works...

I don't really want to kill any animals.  I stopped hunting 40 years ago because causing unnecessary pain seemed wrong.   If the squirrels had limited their hunger to fallen sunflower seeds and acorns, I would have just admired their antics and left them alone.  I even forgave them stealing all my apples.  I didn't spray the apples so none were ever really worth eating anyway.  When they started taking my heirloom tomatoes last year I got angry about it.  But when they wouldn't even leave bean, corn, and cucumber seedlings to grow this year, I drew the line.  I have a right to a garden.

I have read many websites about the lack of success of relocating squirrels and humane killing methods.  Relocation doesn't work well.  First, most anyplace suitable to a common animal like squirrels is filled to capacity.  Most young resident squirrels are driven out to unsuitable places and starve.

Second, any newly introduced squirrel that does succeed means that just one more resident squirrel won't.  It's a zero-sum game for the squirrels.

Third, relocation of varmints is generally illegal.  The idea is that you can't transport your problem to someone else.  Its like trying to get rid of a color on a Rubik's Cube by moving the pieces around.

I am vaguely disturbed by the idea that I am actively eliminating the MOST successful and adaptive squirrels.  I LIKE evolution.  But I suppose that is entirely the point of this effort.  I want DUMB squirrels here...

The live trap allows me to catch varmints with causing them the pain of a snap trap or the danger of catching a cat.  That doesn't mean I use it to let them live.  I can't shoot them through a small mesh cage, I can't inject them with a forever-sleep drug, and I can't stab them fatally fast

My wheelbarrow holds JUST enough water to cover the live trap.  The squirrel was gone in 15 seconds.  Its the fastest way I can use and they don't seem to know what is happening until a very sudden end.  It didn't even move around.

I don't want to draw this out and I probably won't give details again.  I know I can't kill all the squirrels; I don't want to.  I just need to eliminate the few squirrels who have learned to attack my garden.  I would be perfectly happy just to have new squirrels who live off the acorns from the 2 massive old oaks and the nuts from the beech tree on the property.

I've given this post a lot of thought (1.5 hours).  Best I can do...

UPDATE:  7 am 7-3-13..  Make that 2 evil squirrels.... If I can find the smallest bit of good news, they apparently breathe fast.  The 2nd was dead in less than 10 seconds.  I force myself to watch this so that I know what I am doing.  The faster the end, the better, and they go fast!  But the live-trap is reset with fresh peanut butter...

Squirrel Games Again

Well, the bad news is that I uncovered the block of 9 corn seedlings in the afternoon yesterday (an opaque plastic bin) so that they could get some sunlight (the squirrels seem to stay away in the afternoon), and I forgot to put the cover back on them last night.  7 of the 9 seedlings were pulled up and most uneaten this morning.  I meant to form a cover for them out of leftover chicken wire, but I got distracted by housework and putting the recycle bins out by the street, etc.

So I put the cover back over the surviving 2 plants and set 7 more seeds soaking overnight to replant tomorrow.  I will use the bin I am covering the block with and use it as a form for a chicken wire cover BEFORE I replant them  the 4th time.  I should have done that the 1st time.  But one time is happenstance, and the 2nd time can be coincidence.  3rd time is "enemy action" and I am at 4th.

Other bad news is that the squirrels are not going for the dried corn cob chunk in the live trap near the birdfeeder (I placed it there so I could easily see if, and how fast, it worked).  It didn't get any attention.

So I decided to follow the advice of one website and use peanut butter smeared on the trap release lever.  I put the trap on top of the fence the squirrels use as their highway from the tree grove to my garden.  I attached a wire from the trap to the fence so that if one was caught it wouldn't fall into the neighbor's yard.  Then I put some peanut butter on the release lever and tiny amounts in front of the trap and just inside of it.

The good news is that a squirrel followed the peanut butter, but tripped the trap while outside of it.  But there are 2 wire bars that keep the doors from being pushed open from inside and I might not have secured those.  And when I approached the trap, there was a squirrel right there, and it WANTED that peanut butter.  So that bait might work if I set everything up correctly.  I reset the trap before coming inside for the night.  I hope to see a squirrel in there tomorrow morning.

I have high hopes for the peanut butter.  And I really hope it works, because my tomatoes are starting to produce fruit and I don't want them stolen.

Enclosing each raised bed in chicken wire would be ridiculous, might prevent pollination, and be hard to access each time I needed to weed or harvest.

The alternative is to redesign my raised beds into one single large bed and enclose the entire thing with chicken wire, sides, and top (with a door of course).  That would be a lot of work, it would be a bit ugly, and expensive.  1"  mesh chicken wire isn't as expensive as some other garden fencings, but it isn't free.

So those individual talented garden-thieving squirrels just MUST go...

More Squirrel Games

Determined to grow some flat italian style beans (Romano), I ordered some seeds from Burpee.  The shipping cost more than the seeds, but it was the principle of the thing.   They arrived yesterday and I soaked 12 seeds overnight. 

I planted them today.  The chicken wire covering the trellis soil wasn't too hard to lift.  I had some garden clips (like round clothespins) to hold it up while I planted the new seeds.  I also planted 5 new cuke seeds.  The previous 6 came up but there were still gaps, so I filled them. 

The squirrels don't seem to bother seedlings more than a few inches high (why they don't, I have no idea).  Well, I'll make a guess that the new seedlings still have most of the growing seed and that's what the squirrels are after.  But pure guess.  I can't really know how squirrels think.

But under the 1" chicken wire cover, the beans and cukes should grow.  The beans should begin to ripen in 60 days  (sept 1st), so I could get 2 months of harvest even at this late date. 

Now I have to figure out how to protect the tomatoes.  That's trickier.  I'll try draping  the tomatoes in row cover cloth I think.  If they chew through that (and they can), I will have to get more serious and lethal.  I don't like "more lethal" things but anything that kills rats ought to kill squirrels...

Of all the plants I grow, I want the heirloom tomatoes the most.  Last year, I didn't get a single one; the squirrels took them all before they were ripe.  That will not happen this year if I have to trap and drown every squirrel within several properties.

I am considering a few designs to rebuild the garden beds and enclose them in chicken wire if I can't eliminate those few squirrels who have learned to depend on my garden for food.

If I redesign the garden beds to get them smaller and eliminate the spaces between them to make one large bed, I could build a frame to enclose the entire garden bed with a door for entry.    I want a garden THAT much.

OK Squirrels, Game ON!

I've had it with the squirrels pulling up my romano bean seeds, cucumbers, and corn.  I LOVE those flat Italian beans and they are harder to find fresh than Giraffes at the North Pole.  So after the squirrels pulled up most of the bean seeds again a 3rd time, I decided, as Bugs Bunny used to say "This Means War".

I went to the local hardware store and bought 50' of 3' wide chicken wire (aka "poultry netting").  I cut two pieces of it 20' long.  It loves the way it is rolled up so I manually bent it flat and that took some effort.  Then I made a tent of the two pieces along the trellis to shield my seedlings and the newly-planted new seeds.

"But", I hear you say, "they will find a way in".  I'm EXPECTING that!  Where they find a way in, THAT'S where I will cut a small opening and set the live-trap to just fit.   And then I'll drop the live-trap in a trash can of water and drown the little %$@*#s ...  And then I'll feed them to the cats!

Bwa-ha-ha-ha...

But seriously, for 20 years the squirrels and I mostly lived in peace.  I put 2 baffles on the pole where I put sunflowers seeds for the birds and they can't get at the feeder.  They were welcome to the seeds that the birds spill on the ground. 

A few years ago, some squirrels in one tree grove started taking all the apples.  I didn't mind that much because I never sprayed the apples and insects ruined them.  Besides, it was funny watching them running along the top of the fence with apples in their mouths. 

But then 2 years ago they started taking my tomatoes.  I don't grow heirloom tomatoes for squirrrels...  There are few enough fruits on an heirloom tomato as it is.  Last year, I only got 2 ripe tomatoes from 8 plants.

This year they started pulling up the corn and bean seedlings for the tiny remnant of the planted seeds.  I WILL have a garden.  If I have to completely redesign the garden so that it can be enclosed with 1" mesh chicken wire and I have to pollinate the plants manually, I will do that!  But killing those few squirrels who have learned to take my fruits and seedlings will (I hope) be easier.  And I will not stay up nights unsleeping worrying about a few drowned squirrels...

Watering Trees

A neighbor has an orange bucket next to a tree he planted 2 years ago.  I had wondered about that.  Then today, I remembered a watering trick from a gardening magazine.  Its funny how the brain can dredge up old information.

The idea was to slowly drip water from a small hole in the bucket onto the roots of a tree so it wouldn't run off.  AHA!  I have a few 5 gallon buckets around for various uses.  So I took a green one (blends better into the background), drilled a very small hole into the bottom and set it next to the Sourwood tree I an trying to bring back to growth.

I love the Sourwood Tree.  It has red and gold seeds and leaves in Fall.  I planted 3 when I first moved here.  1 remains and it is only 3 feet high.  I don't water the front yard as well as the back.  Well, I live in the back and don't care about the front much (I'm changing that). 

So I placed the 5 gallon bucket just uhill from the tree, filled it up with a hose, and watched what happened.  It took 2 HOURS for the water to drip out the tiny hole.  RThat means every drop went down into the root zone.

I LOVE this idea and will use the bucket all around the front yard plants.  The advantage is that the bucket has a 5 gallons of water, but no more.  I used to leave a hose dripping water out very slowly but I never knew how much it was getting (and forget it was going overnight sometimes.)  THIS way, its 5 gallons and no need to remember it later.

What a great idea!

Plagues?

I'm beginning to get a bit suspicious at the series of "troublesome critters" this year.  First there was the groundhog.  I seem to get a couple each year for the past few years.  I usually live-trap and relocate them miles away, but that is tiresome (and possibly illegal), and replacements always arrive for a while.  This year I decided to just start dumping the bags of catbox scoopings into the burrow entrances.  This groundhog dug 2 more new burrow entrances that I kept filling up before it gave up and moved away.  At least, I can't FIND any new entrances and I haven't seen it out on the back lawn at dusk.

But perhaps it made a deal with the squirrels.  As soon as IT vanished, the squirrels started pulling up my new bean, cuke, and corn seedlings.  I've tried to live-trap THEM, but no luck yet.  I attached the live-trap to the top of the fence they use as their personal highway, but I think they just run over top of it.  I may have to encourage them to go THROUGH the live-trap with a small chicken wire wall above it.

Meanwhile, I was invaded by small ants.  As mentioned in a previous post, they don't seem to be coming FROM anywhere or going TO anywhere in particular, just wandering around near the deck door and the kitchen backsplash.  No trail of ants going back and forth, no food being targeted.  They don't even bother the cat's food!

I think that the invasion is over, because I didn't see one for 2 days and then just one this morning.

But perhaps they all turned into houseflies!  Yesterday morning, I woke up to find a dozen of them all buzzing at the living room window looking for a way out.  The source baffles me.  I haven't had any windows open, there are none in the garage where I keep the garbage, there are none in the small compost collection bin, there are none in the basement where some mouse might have gotten in and gotten killed by the cats.

They are easy enough to kill against the windows, but I found just as many there again TODAY!  Killed those too of course.

What's next, a rain of frogs?

Da Squirrels, Da Squirrels!

Well, I have pretty well confirmed that it's squirrels that have been pulling up my bean and corn seedlings.  The past 2 mornings, I have slipped out of the house quietly in the morning and rousted several squirrels from my garden at the right spots. 

They all run away in the same direction.  There is a grove of trees in the east neighbors' yards that direction that don't seem to produce much that a squirrel can eat.  They seem to be aspen and birch.  The trees on the west side are oaks, and I never see squirrels from the garden run in that direction.

Squirrel families are territorial, so I gather that the East Side squirrels are outcasts who are starving.  I ALMOST feel sorry for them.  Still, they pulled up 10 of my 12 bean seedlings, 18 of my 18 corn seedlings, and 6 of my 12 cucumber seedlings.  It may also explain why most of my crocuses on the east side of my lawn have been dug up.  Maybe I've been blaming the voles overly much (not that they are innocent either).

But the point is that there seems to be this one group of squirrels that have learned to get their food from my garden.  I have been here 26 years  and only started having a problem with squirrels 3 years ago.  At first they only took the green apples from my 2 dwarf espaliered trees.  I didn't mind that much because I never remembered to spray them and the insects always ruined the apples anyway.  Last year, they started taking the green tomatoes.  This year, its even the various seedlings.  I have to stop this group before they teach others squirrels these damaging habits!  I know that sounds silly, but local groups animals do learn successful feeding strategies not common throughout the species.  So I am after one small group of squirrels.

I tried using a live trap several times, but I haven't caught a squirrel yet.  I tried it on the ground next to the beans, on the ground just before the beans, and finally on the top of the fence where the squirrels run along.  No luck!  Well, I caught a young possum, and it won't be tripping my trap any more...

Well, maybe my bait was bad.  I tried cashews, I tried a slice of peach, I tried a small apple picked from my tree.  A couple of times the bait was simply gone with the enclosure doors closed, but most times the doors were shut with the bait still inside.  I assume the squirrels ran over the top of the live trap and triggered the release lever.

So I went to a site that discussed the right bait for attracted squirrels into live traps.  It said the best was peanut butter with peanuts in the shell stuck down onto it.  I didn't have any of either.  But I did had some dried corn on the cob.  I bought a cheap bag of it to bribe the squirrels away from my garden, but hey if they like it that much, it should get them in the trap, right?

I sure hope so.  One web site I found said that squirrels are gluttons and easy to trap.  Right...  I'll settle for ONE first.

Those Darn Ants!

For 2 weeks, I have had very small ants wandering around the TV room and adjacent kitchen.  They show up just inside the deck door, the kitchen windowsill, and on the backsplash board on the counters.

OK, ants seek food and sometimes they find their way into the house, but they aren't acting normal!  There is no trail of ants going anywhere.  There is no sign of them outside the house.  There is no paricular entry point I can detect.  There are never more than a few at a time, but there are ALWAYS a few any time I look.

They aren't in the pantry at some loose food box (I moved everything around and looked with a flashlight), they aren't at the cat food bowls, they aren't in the cabinets (flashlight again), they aren't even at the compost bin which is the main thing I would think would attract ants. 

They aren't in the ceiling of the basement below the kitchen or the TV room. 

Hey, this is vaguely sounding like a Dr Seuss poem...  I'll have to work on that idea!

I sprayed only once right under the base of the deck door inside and out (and then cleaned the exposed floor because the cats found the smell interesting).  I'm not too worried about the effect of the (organic) ant spray on cats because the stuff won't even annoy wasps and wasps evolved FROM ants (or vice versa) so they are very closely related, but why take chances.  But the limited spraying had no effect on the few ants visible at all times.

The point is that I can't figure out WHERE they are coming from, WHY they are in here, WHAT is keeping them searching around, or WHEN they are most commonly seen.  It seems completely constant, yet completely random.

I've probably killed over a thousand by finger and shoe.  It doesn't seem to make any difference if I kill them or not.  When I crush all the visible ones, there about as many in 10 minutes.  Yet after not bothering them all night, there are still ONLY as many in the morning.

ON THE OTHER HAND, I haven't yet had a fruit fly (aka fungal gnats) yet this year, and I usually have problems with them by now.  I'm pretty sure the ants aren't catching the fruit flies, but bigger theories have been proposed on such coincidental observations, LOL!

I expect the ants will simply stop appearing in a few days and I will never know why they where here or why they left.  It will be one of those mysteries of nature; those "Ants In My Midst".