Major groundhog problems

[digitS']

Dynamite under the garden shed, @Carol Dee ?! Well, it sounds like fun ...

I've heard of cherry bombs. I do think harassing them helps. Life might get tough for them. With kids in tow, it may be time to move on .

Really, harass the dickens outta them. I'm not sure I'm doing more with the rocks and sledgehammer. Likely, they just dig out somewhere. It must be painfully obvious to them that they haven't taken up residence on Easy Street. It isn't as tho' they have a mortgage. No need to contact a reality - pack up and clear out -- for the neighbor's yard down the street.

I don't know groundhogs altho' they are the same genus as marmots. Ground squirrels are smaller but will absolutely lay the ground bare of any vegetation within 20 yards of their burrows! Bare.

Gardeners and their plants are in this together. Don't even give those varmints a first chance!

Steve
Ya double-crossers! I’m a-comin’ back, and I ain’t comin back to play marbles! No more gentleman’s stuff, from now on you fights my way … dirty! ~ Yosemite Sam

 

[majorcatfish]

anflo mixed with a little diesel injected throughout the borrows will get rid of them once and for all, including that stump in the garden....

 

[Smart Red]

'Knock on wood'. No problems since a year or so after we got the lab. She seemed to convince everyone to move on. Someone else's problem now.

I just saw the holes of one digging up the road at the neighbors. Sure hope they find a different direction to move once they are escorted off that place. I do not want those rascally varmints back. So destructive!

 

[catjac1975]

Home depot sells a mole and groundhog poison . It works. I gave up the kind treatment of these voracious p;tests.

 

[Ridgerunner]

I had groundhogs set up a burrow in the garden this year, right in the corn. They did not bother the corn but ate a lot of other things, especially beans and bean leaves.

I managed to shot one but that was all. They are tough. If I had known they were out only in the daytime I'd have set up a blond and waited on them but I thought they were mostly nocturnal. OI just read that in the article linked above. You can learn a lot on this site.

Collapsing the burrow entrance doesn't even slow than down. I tried a live trap. according to Hav-a-Hart's website cantaloupe is the best groundhog bait. Didn't work, even with the boards to guide them in. Caught a few rabbits with the cantaloupe though. I'll have to remember that one. One time I butchered chickens I buried the offal in the burrow entrance but probably buried it too deep. They didn't seem to notice.

I tried to get a poison at the Ace Hardware but they did not have anything. It's good to read that Home Depot has a poison that works. I don't like to use poison but I will if I feel I can use it safely.

I got some coyote urine at an Ace hardware and sprinkled that around the opening. I thought it might work but they were back in two days. After I harvested the corn and cleared the area I dug up the burrow entrance and mixed a lot of that coyote urine in that dirt. They never did open the burrow back up but I don't know if it was that high concentrate of coyote urine or that I removed the cover around their opening.

I'm waiting to see if they come back next spring.

 

[Lavender2]

The beast I had took out an entire perennial bed as it was emerging, bee balm, astilbe, hosta, columbine, phlox... if it could chew it, it ate it! It would rise in the morning, stretch in the morning sun and then lay out on the deck like it owned the place... I kid you not ...


The second I would open the door it would zoom under the deck. DH thought it was real cute, told him I would not put in a veg garden until it was gone!

Here is one pruning up the potted plants for me ... ... then it started on the roses ... it was war!


A friend down the road took care of the traps for me, he said they are tough, it takes a shotgun to take them down.
I tried every veg and fruit recommended by anyone, hung that tomato in the trap and had the beasts within an hour or so. No boards to guide them in, just the trap placed directly in front of their entrance under the porch.

 

[PhilaGardener]

If I had known they were out only in the daytime I'd have set up a blond and waited on them but I thought they were mostly nocturnal.

 

[thistlebloom]

Are they attracted to blondes in particular Ridge? Or can you sometimes lure them in with a redhead?

 

[Ridgerunner]

Yeah, I saw that misspelling and thought I'd try to ignore it. Fat chance with this crowd, you're too observant.

Lavender, was that a red tomato or yellow? Or maybe it was Seed's favorite's, a Brunette.

 

[thistlebloom]