How To Rid Rabbits From Your Garden

Don’t let their cute faces fool you; rabbits can do a lot of damage to your garden when your back is turned. Here are a few ideas how to stop rabbits from getting to your garden…

 
Rabbits leave clean–cut damage. If you walk out into your garden one morning and notice that it looks like someone took a pruning shear and snipped off the stems of young plants with clean, angled cuts, mowed your lettuces and beet foliage to the ground, your garden has likely been visited by a rabbit or two.

These low mowers graze close to the ground and sniff out the first tender young shoots and crop them short.

Rabbit Deterrent

The most effective way of keeping out rabbits is fencing. A 3/4–inch wire mesh fence should work; bury it 8 to 12 inches deep and it needs to be only about 30 inches high.

As their twitching noses indicate, rabbits sniff a lot. Try sprinkling dried sulfur around or on your plants.

Spread blood meal, cayenne pepper, manure or dog or human hair around plants.

Rabbits also dislike the smell of onions, so try planting these around your garden to further deter the furry creatures.

Irish Spring soap shavings placed in little drawstring bags around the garden will also help to keep rabbits away.

Spray your plants with a mixture of 1 teaspoon Lysol and 1 gallon of water.

Some people protect plants with individual “collars” of tin cans or screening so that the plants may reach a less vulnerable size. Put the collar around each stem for protection.

Some of the deer techniques related to odor, such as manure of a predator and rotten eggs, are also said to work against rabbits.

Install automatic sprinklers that are triggered by a motion sensor. If rabbits are sprayed with water every time they enter your garden, they may stay out.

Spray your plants with a solution of hot sauce and water. Reapply the solution after each rain.

 
Have any of your own ideas? Leave a comment and let the rest of us know!