How to Keep Rabbits out of Garden

[kat hass]

Hi, I wish my dog would keep some animals out of my garden. I have a greyhound and he is beautiful, but not a good garden guard dog! I am sticking to my liquid fence deer repellent. Maybe I could try to train him to spray it around the yard. I wish I could post his picture!

Oh well. Hope we all get rid of the pests in our garden.

[Jbest]

Rabbits keep eating the leaves off my tomato's, green beans & green peppers. Is there something I can do to keep them away?

From what is being eaten I would think it is a groundhog. In either case a 12 Gage with No.4 shot is most effective.

John

[opabinia51]

Try Cayenne pepper, it seems to do the trick, we tend to try to conserve wildlife here at the HG.

[crobi13]

I don't know if I was just lucky, or if the scent of my 2 male dogs kept the rabbits away, but I did not have a problem with rabbits. I had a pretty good sized carrot crop, too.
I don't remember where I read it, but I read that the scent of a meat-eating animal's urine will deter rabbits. Perhaps it is true? My dogs go potty around the perimiter of my property & my garden is in the center. The rabbits would have to pass by the dog's scent to get to the carrots.

[kat hass]

Hi I have heard the same remedies - give your husband a steak dinner and have him "mark" the yard, and cayenne -- but I didn't want to go either of these ways!

And sorry, but I don't believe in guns.

I do spray liberally with liquidfence deer and rabbit repel.

It works and my neighbor won't call the copy son my husband peeing in the yard.

[zone9garden.com]

Odd that your dogs sent doesnt keep the animals away! Right behind my garden is a wooded area, and I don't even see squirls on the fence! Maybe my dogs have a mean sent! LOL

[Sporthorse85]

I wish I could say my two male dogs keep the bunnies out of my garden.... they urinate all along the perimeter but those dang rabbits are persistent enough to squeeze through the fence between my house and the neighbor's and waltz right into my garden.

I do have a fence up, but because I hadn't seen any rabbits in over a year, thinking the dogs chased them away, it's not really a 'rabbit-proof' fence... looks like I need to fix that.... in the meantime I'll have to get some repellent and see if it works to save my carrots and cantaloupe!

[garden5]

This may sound nuts, but you can actually buy jugs of predator urine (fox, coyote, etc.) and dump it around the perimeter of your garden. The down side to this, of course, is that you must keep re-applying it after the rains. In the end, a strong fence is the best method to keep almost any animal out of the garden.

[JONA878]

I've found over the years that the best control is to place a small piece of lead just behind the rabbits ear.

Then roast, fry or bake in a pie....delicious.

I have never been completely successful in making my garden rabbit proof dispite much fencing and many trials of deterants from human hair to the contents of a foxe's midden.

So, if Brer Rabbit wants to share my table..fair enough...but he becomes part of it as well.........providing I can catch the little rascals.

[bdub653]

Take 6 hot peppers( I used jalepenos on sale) and 6 "bulbs" of garlic. Pop them in a blender with water to make a smoothie. Pour into 1 gallon of water for 1 hour, then strain. Apply over vegetable plants and around perimeter of garden once a week.

I noticed the rabbits and ground hogs suddenly dining on grass instead of my veggie plants.

[lovegarden]

I sprinkle Blood Meal organic fertilizer around the plants, this work for me this year. Last year I lost most of my vegetables to rabbit, deer and mole.

[mandipants]

Hey i just want to let everyone know that there is no reason to use outlandish procedures for keeping cute little bunnies out of your garden. As everyone knows there is an over population all over the country of stray animals. This is why everyone should spay and neuter their pets. There is also no reason to kill, hurt, or poison our wildlife. The solution is simple and it works perfectly. First get a small gardening fence, you can get these at any store that sells garden supplies for a couple dollars. Then put it around your most precious plants that you know the rabbits and such other animals love to eat( not sure if this plan will work for big animals such as deer). Then the thing that is the vital to this plan is MARIGOLDS! That is it. No crazy antics, just flowers. I have been a gardener for 6 years now and have never had any animals invade my garden, never! Try it for yourself and let us know if works for you. No reason to harm our wonderful earth and to promote over population of stray animals. Thanks, hope it works for you as well as it has for me!

[polarbearforge]

We used to have a lot of rabbits in our area. I think it was because we didn't have as many cats as the neighbors. Now that we have a few outside kitties, the visible rabbit population has noticable declined.

I live out in the country, and when I am in the garden, I can't see any roads or houses, so rather than run inside to go to the bathroom, I usually mark my territory outside.

A number of years ago, we watched a rabbit wandering towards my parents garden. At one point, he seemed to noticed a barrier and quickly went another way. It turns out my dad had been filling a sprayer and periodically sprayed the perimeter of the garden. I've employed a similar method around the garden with no rabbit damage.

Jamie

[BrianIllinois]

I have tried just about everything.

Spray-on chemicals. Bottled fox urine. Blended-up peppers.

Plastic mesh fencing? Ate through it.
Marigolds? Ate 'em.
BB gun? I swear they can tell when you're armed.
Dog? Mine has caught only one.

They're thick in my town, like rats. I've lost count of how many young plants I've lost.

But there's hope. There've been a couple reports this year of coyotes being spotted in town.
My brother, who lives in a nearby suburb, says he never has problems with rabbits in his garden. He thinks that might be due to the abundance of urban coyotes in his suburb.
I can only hope: That the predator becomes the prey.

[jal_ut]

If you can get some four foot wide 1" mesh chicken wire to put around your garden then bend a foot of it to 90° and put that portion on the ground, the rabbits will not get in. They won't dig under because of the part on the ground. They always try to dig right at the fence, and if that ground is covered by the net, they give up. They can't think to start digging a foot back. They will not chew that wire and make holes in it. This leaves a 3 foot high fence and the rabbits will not climb it. If you have trouble with climbers like raccoons or opossums, you could install an electric fencer and run a wire around the top 4 inches above the net.