I was wondering if anyone has discovered a natural way to deter bunnies from going into certain areas of my yard/garden. I do not want to hurt the bunnies, in fact I feed them carrots to hopefully fill them up on that stuff and not my growing garden :) My husband and I are first time home owners, and inherited a fairly large garden from the previous owners, so do not know much about gardening and keeping critters away yet. We like the bunnies, but want to keep our veggies. I know they do not like Marigolds, but do they make a spray that smells like Marigolds perhaps that we could spray on our wooden barriers....instead of planting a bunch of Marigolds? We have wooden barriers that was keep out the one docile bunny, but there are 2 new very active bunnies that decided to figure a way to get past the wooden barriers. Thank you in advance for your wisdom :)
So we have successfully kept the bunnies out of the garden, we are still going to experiment, but for now we have not seen any evidence of them. We decided to not use any chemical options, as we were nervous about chemicals going into the soil and potentially into our veggies. But for now we have success, and I thank everyone for sharing of their experience and wisdom :)
More update: We used chicken wire as far as extra barriers around our garden, and it has worked. We were going to try moth balls around the perimeter, or some type of deterrent spray on the wooden dividers around our garden, but read the various ingredients, and warnings, and decided to not even mess with all those chemicals. Thanks for all the help guys!
you can get special fencing to go around the garden, like chicken wire type but it's green.
or
you can buy this stuff Invisible Fence and spray it on what you don't want them to nibble, but if it's a big area that is hard.
I put tabasco sauce in a spray bottle with some water and spray it on my plants and have no problem.
I have been told that if you put hair in the area it will keep animals out. I am a hair stylist and I have been asked several times for the days worth of hair for people to take home. They say for that very reason the bunnies. So I hope it works.
my mom puts rabbit lawn ornaments around her garden and has not had problems with bunnies since. the more realistic looking the better. go figure.
We use Rabbit Scram: http://www.rabbitscram.com/
We used fox urine at my old house. we sprayed it around the fence line and around the landscaping/flowers. One word of caution....my dogs loved to roll in freshly sprayed fox urine. and after a hard rain you need to respray. When I sprayed and we didn't get hit with a bad rain, the fox urine worked great. but eventually, I had smelly dogs, no flowers and lots of bunnies. G'luck.
We've had good luck sprinkling black pepper on plants. It's safe, natural, and you can buy really big bags at Sam's or Costco. Good luck
Bunnies are repelled by the scent of mothballs. Scatter some in the garden and they will stay away. I agree with the others' suggestions not to feed them; that only encourages them to come around--they view you as a *food source*!
So what worked for you??
a) stop feeding the bunnies. They don't know the difference between you feeding them vs them finding them naturally. Besides that, overfed bunnies tend to mate more and you will have more bunnies in your yard than you can deal with.
b) There is a spray that deters animals from eating your plants, but before you go out and buy them, think about what it is that you are spraying on the plants. Some of the chemicals will naturally be absorbed into the plant and you will end up consuming the chemical too.
c) There's coyote urine powder that you can sprinkle around the perimeter of your garden to keep out pests. It's made with real coyote urine so the believe is that once the animals smell it, they will automatically leave believing that a coyote is around.
d) if you can't find the urine powder, I'd try to fence off the areas that the bunnies tend to like.
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Hi K.!
Congrats on your new home! For my flower garden I use coco bean mulch, it does a fantastic job of keeping the bunnies away and it smells great! I have also tried liquid fence and have had great results. As far as my veggie garden, I suggest dried blood AKA blood meal. It is a little difficult to find, I purchase mine from Sids Garden Center in Bolingbrook. I also use chicken wire. I hope this helps, happy gardening! - M.
Hi K. - This might sound weird and I have not tried this myself seeing that I don't have a garden. I have heard that human hair helps keep unwanted animals out of gardens. When I worked at a salon there was a store owner next door that would ask if we would collect hair for her to use in her garden for this purpose. I hope this is helpful.
Good Luck!
C.
Good luck. Its very hard to get rid of them. Ive tried pepper, fox urine, hair, etc. The only thing that really works is chicken wire, which is a pain but it works. Ive had bunny problems for 15 years. They are relentless little devils. I have a large dog too and they have even dug holes and had their babies in her dog run!!!! How stupid are they? Its crazy. Good luck. If you find a cure besides the wire, let me know.
Nothing we've tried works. We planted marigolds here & there, & they eat the flower right next to the marigold. We put human hair around the garden (people told me this works), it did not work. We used coyote urine. We bought something called rabbit scram (you spread it 18" around the garden). None of it has worked!! We are tired of the bunnies eating our beautiful flowers that cost both time & money. We are at our wits end. I don't know how things work for other people but nothing works for us. I tell my husband to put all the flowers that bunnies like together & put a little fence around it, but he says no b/c it won't be aesthetically pleasing. <sigh> Good luck!
Head to your salon and ask them to save a days worth of cut hair for you. I worked in a salon for years and tons of people came with this request!
Hi K.,
I have heard that blood will do the trick. Ask a bigger garden center what kind. I had no success with marigolds but animal hair plugs stuffed into the soil around the base of the plant seems to be working for us. We use my neighbors dog and our four cats fur. My chipmunks stay away.
L. L.
Budding gardener and mom of Sarah, 4 1/2 and Devin, 2 1/4
There are sprays out there, but I haven't found them to be that helpful. We put in a chicken wire fence around our garden, and we dug it in about a foot and a half. It's a lot of work but it works. I have tried all the sprays and have found that with a determined bunny nothing works.
You have gotten so great suggestion. You can also deter bird and rabbit with sound. Take to pie plates attach them to string and tie them to a pole and when the wind blows they will bang together and make a noise that scares the animals.
Good Luck
Yes - You may try the different sprays & stuff too, but a layer of the chicken wire is your best bet. Especially when next spring comes again. The very small baby bunnies can really get through small openings. Some sprays are pretty good, but if it rains a lot & you forget to reapply or go on vacation or something, you could end up losing your crop. Good luck.
If you have a dog that sheds, brush the dog and collect all the fur. Spread it around where you don't want the bunnies to go. They are naturally afraid of dogs. As well, you can go to any sporting goods store and purchase Coyote pellets. Works the same way. Good luck!
I don't know how large your garden is, so this might not be feasible, but since it sounds like you've got a wooden barrier around the base of the garden, you could go by a roll of chicken wire. Attach it to the bottom of the barrier (flush with the ground) all the way around the garden.
Here are a few that work most of the time:
1.) Old, sifted kitty litter.....has the kitty urine in it, but no poop. The amonia smell of a predator keeps them away.
2.) Cut human hair sprinkled all around.
3.) Make a concoction of a little lemon dish soap, hot sauce, vinegar, and water in a spray bottle....spray plants after each watering. Is time consuming, but it typically works. Good amount of hot sauce in the mix...the soap will help with bugs as well.
All of these have to be reapplied as rain washes them away.
They also make commercial products too, but I've never heard of any working well.
We used Fox Urine Crystals from Home Depot. They come in a container that you shake.
Also somethings are more tasty to the bunnies. Read up on that.
my mom alway's put out a lawn owl or snakes
Close the garden off with chicken wire tall enough to keep them from jumping over and not close enough to the plants that the little critters can eat the leaves. You can step over the fenced part or have hubby build a wire gate. Make sure you feed them in an area the are safe...under my shed is where I put the bunny nibblets.
You can go to your hairdresser and ask for a bag of hair that they've swept up off the floor. You can sprinkle the hair around your garden or around areas that you are trying to protect. It smells like humans and the bunnies will stay away. I used this method on my flowers for the last few years and it worked like a charm. Now we have a family of foxes in the neighborhood and I have not seen one bunny this year. So if the hair doesn't work, you could always get a family of foxes! lol
I have 3 options.
-Take hair from your brush and put it in the garden. Bunnies don't like the human smell.
-use hair my dog has shed since she's put the fear into all the bunnies around our house. They stay away.
-Put some dish soap in the watering can when you water the plants. it doesn't hurt your plants.
Good Luck!
Jenny
Go buy a bottle of fox urine at BassPro Shop in the camping section. Comes in a spritzer bottle. Spray it around the perimeter of your garden. The bunnies smell it and think that there are fox around. Obviously being a predator of rabbits they stay away.
We had the same issue until a momma fox and her kits came to the neighborhood. Her urine did seem to scare them away, or maybe it was her using bunny parts to feed her babies...sorry, that's gross, but I could have killed them myself after all of the damage they did. I have continued with fox urine now, and they are gone.
