How to Protect Your Lawn and Garden from Wildlife

Fresh fruits, vegetables and flowers are wonderful. Humans, however, aren't alone in their appreciation of fresh produce and greenery. Deer, rabbits, raccoons and other critters also have a taste for fresh garden produce and lawn flowers and shrubs.

Most garden and landscape wildlife visitors aren't dangerous. They can be a real nuisance. Animals are attracted to lawns and gardens because they provide an easy source of food and/or shelter. Your beautiful lawn or wonderful garden can become a buffet catering to critters.

If animals threaten your landscaping or your garden, there are several methods of discouragement. You may have to try different methods or even a combination of methods to find what works.

Lawn and Garden Protection: Natural Methods

Consider using plants that animals don't like. Natural animal repellants include marigold, iris, pungent herbs, and bitter tasting trees and shrubs. When natural methods fail, there are three other options: repel, remove or exclude.

Lawn and Garden Protection: Chemical Repellants

Repellants are usually chemical or mechanical in nature. Chemical repellants often have an odor or taste that animals do not like. Scents like rotten eggs, garlic, ammonia, humans or predatory animals will repel wildlife.

Sprayed on or sprinkled on chemical repellants give the plant or fruit a bad taste. Commercial products are available at many lawn and garden centers and farm supply stores. Choose a repellant that can be sprayed directly on the plant or fruit and is non-toxic to people and animals.

Home recipes for chemical repellants can be found in books, online and in garden and lawn publications. Some gardeners swear by raw garlic cloves scattered around the garden.

Chemical or topical repellants usually have to be re-applied after rain or long periods of time.

Lawn and Garden Protection: Mechanical Repellants

Mechanical repellants include loud noise, flashing lights, mild shocks and sprays of water. Motion detectors can be utilized with these repellants. Check with local lawn and garden or farm supply stores to see what's available. Store staff can often tell you what's already been found to work in your area.

Low-tech mechanical repellants include that good old standby, the scarecrow. Flapping aluminum pie pans, fake owls and fake snakes are other low-tech repellants.

It isn't unusual for wildlife to grow accustomed to repellant methods. When one method stops working, it's time to try another.

Lawn and Garden Protection: Exclusion Methods

Dogs are often an excellent means of keeping wildlife out of the garden and off the lawn. Other excluding methods involve the installation of a barrier such as a fence. The design and height of the fence depends upon the type and size of critter to be excluded.

Deer can jump quite high, requiring either a 7-foot fence or an electric fence if they are to be excluded. Other wildlife, like groundhogs and moles, can burrow and require a barrier sunk at least 12 inches into the ground.

Nylon netting helps protect ripening produce from birds.

Protecting your lawn and garden from wildlife isn't always easy but it can be done. If one strategy doesn't work, try another or combine strategies. Help is available at local Cooperative Extension Offices and at Federal agencies such as the Game and Fish Commission.