Gardening Basics

Critters: Prevention Techniques and Suggestions

By Darren Sherriff

Deer

We will start with what some people consider, cute and fuzzy, I consider it a four-letter word, better known as deer. These critters can devour the vegetation in your yard in a matter of hours. Some of their favorite snacks are: hostas, daylilies, knockout roses, cucumbers, and the list can go on and on. There are products on the market to help stop them, or at least slow them down. Some work, and some don’t. I wanted to try a bazooka, but my H.O.A. frowned upon that, so I had to find an alternative.

I was told that Milorganite works wonders. If you are not familiar with this product, the Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewerage District manufactures it. It’s composed of heat-dried microbes that have digested the organic matter in wastewater. Sounds kind of gross, and it does have some smell, but to me it is not that horrible. How does it work wonders? It is first an organic fertilizer that will not burn the roots of plants. The greatest aspect of it is, it repels deer!

I was skeptical about this when I first heard it. I talked to a gentleman that grows feed corn for hunting purposes. Until he wants the deer to go into the cornfield, he keeps a steady supply of Milorganite around the perimeter. They will NOT cross that barrier. When he is ready to let the deer feed, he stops applying it, and in they go! I tested it after deer started eating my cucumber plants down to the ground, and it does work.

Birds

When it comes to those air-borne critters, birds, there are a myriad of products and out there to help. Some are really, shall we say, silly? Let’s take the old CD in the tree for example. The theory is, the sun reflecting off of it, scares the birds. What really happens is, the bird reads the CD, then laughs at you, because, depending on the genre of music it is, you actually owned this particular one. It can’t be any good, or you would not be using it as a bird scare tactic. You could try the bazooka approach, but then, that H.O.A. is frowning again.

Truth of the matter is, netting is really the only GOOD deterrent. If your plant that you are protecting is small, make sure the net is all the way to the ground, those birds are sneaky, and can get underneath it very easily. If you have a very large plant or tree, it is going to be very difficult to cover it completely. Hopefully, your plant will produce enough that you can share.

Caterpillars and Insects of the Sort

Next on the hit parade is a creepy crawly that, when it becomes an adult, most people want to see and protect. The babies are known as caterpillars, and of course the adults are butterflies or moths. There are a few ways to protect your garden from this critter organically, unfortunately I already mentioned one method, and they could be considered a bad critter. Birds. The enemy of my enemy is my friend? They do eat caterpillars, but like I mentioned earlier, they also eat some of your produce, so attracting them could be a double-edged sword. I won’t even mention the bazooka method here, as that would probably be considered overkill, even if the H.O.A. approved it.

So, what else can be done for these critters? Handpicking works, but is very time consuming and for the squeamish it is definitely NOT an option. The best organic approach would be Bacillus thuringiensis, or Bt. This insecticide is a natural occurring, soil-borne bacterium that has been used since the 1950s for insect control by organic farmers to stop crop-eating insects and by other world organizations to kill mosquitoes without using dangerous chemical pesticides. Bt is considered ideal for pest management because it produces poisons, which cause disease in insects or pests and because of its lack of toxicity to humans or the natural enemies of many crop pests. There are many different forms of Bt, make sure that you read the label and use it accordingly, it is the law.

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