Posting this in the Pests Section.

Well, there's no need for the after dark shotgun vigil near the popcorn bed. It wasn't the raccoons! Inspection of the popcorn bed confirmed 5th Gear's report of devastation. But there seemed to be an absence of pulled over stalks and lots of ears were still on the stalks but husks totally peeled off and cobs mostly totally stripped.







As I approached the bed yesterday afternoon to take pics I heard rustling among the stalks. Locating the source of the sound, I finally saw a squirrel, busily stripping narrow pieces of husk off a cob! He looked at me, I looked at him and he went back to work. Then I caught sight of another one emerging from the other side of the bed with a piece of corncob in his mouth. At that point I hollered, the squirrel dropped the piece of cob and they both beat feet for the nearby pecan tree.

That explains the couple of empty corn cobs I saw at the base of that tree two days ago. It seemed strange but I just blew it off and went about my business. So after chasing off the squirrels I went to that same tree and found more stripped cobs, including some freshly shredded husks.



Then when I went to the house and told Pickles about it, she said, "Well, since this morning all the green tomatoes on the four plants in the Annex are gone. There's not a green tomato on them. And when I got near the plants a squirrel ran away from the plants." There are three groups of tomatoes here. One at the bottom of the garden, one beside the house and four plants we call the "tomato annex", extras that were just stuck in the ground on the other side of the house.

Tomato mystery solved too! In thirty years of gardening I've never run into this before. Never. So the question is... why?

We got to thinking about it and this year there's been one change. Pickles feeds the birds black sunflower seeds because they don't like mixed bird seed. The squirrels also love the sunflower seeds and gorge on them. A while ago 5th Gear quit refilling the feeders so that the birds would go back to eating the insects that are now abundant. Well, I guess the squirrel population got hungry and decided to go after whatever was easy pickin's!

This morning Pickles put back up the regular feeder behind the house and added one in the vicinity of the four plant Tomato Annex. So far there have been no more tomatoes lost in the group that is growing beside the house. And there have never been any lost in the group at the bottom of the garden. Hey, why eat those tomatoes when you can gorge on corn?

If restoring the sunflower seed doesn't work I might get out the .22 for some furry target practice and thinning the herd which has gotten way too large, too bold, fat and happy. Time to change all that.

Wow, those are some mighty hungry squirrels! I hope that you explained to them that fresh tomatoes and corn do not store well for the winter.

After enjoying feeding the birds for years, I quit. I started having too many mice, chipmunks, rabbits, raccoons and deer dining in my yard. I was so happy when the coyotes moved in. I did resort to the pellet gun and would leave the carcass out as an offering to feed the coyotes. After the rodents were in check, the coyotes moved on.

My neighbor had problems with squirrels eating his corn last year. I have been lucky andn ever had that happen. He does have large trees near his corn patch though and I do not.

I wouldn't have hollered at the squirrel... Ida force fed it a bullet. Squirrel tastes like duck...
My cats love them some squirrel...
Nope, don't believe I'd put out sunflower seed... unless I put it in a trap... I've had them go down my rows and dig up every single nut... Can't grow nut trees like that!
Nothing I could do except put a nut in a trap.

Such a drag to have all your hard work go for naught! I am setting 4 traps for one very wiley rat and it's offspring. 2 down, so far.

I'm glad the raccoons are off the hook.

I don't mind the odd squirrel in the garden, it's the ones that come prepared that annoy me....

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Squirrel taste like duck? That must be a Southern thing...I swear they must change their flavor on the way down. Puddle duck breast pulled and seared in a cast iron skillet in butter with kosher salt until rare, rested just a few minutes, beats the heck out of any squirrel I've ever had. The legs after a long braise are fantastic as well, better than pheasant, but steel shot makes them dangerous to eat, especially for guests.

Someone on a non-gardening site recommended using rat traps. Use peanut butter on the trigger and mount the trap to the tree with the trigger pointed up the tree. Move traps between trees on a three day rotation. I'm going to try that. First I have to get a few of the rat traps. All I have are the smaller mouse traps I have for catching the occasional "toy" the cats sometimes bring in and lose.

You afraid you might trap a cat?

I caught a bird in a snap trap once by its leg. Now I cover them with milk crates on the ground with no more innocents caught.
Don't know what I'd do using them on trees.
Arm them only at night and keep the cat in?

I would never use snap traps out in the open because I do not want to injure other animals.

I would use a live trap if necessary and then kill the squirrel.

The thing about killing squirrels to protect crops is that they never stop coming. Think of your area like a hole you dig at the beach. You clear it out, but sand and water always flow back into the low pressure area. Other squirrels will move in almost instantly.

You can't ever let up. It's total war or no war. It can mean a lot of dead squirrels if you're vigilant, and if you aren't going to be vigilant there's no reason to start the killing. And it will take an awful lot of killing. One year I lost 90% of my tomatoes to squirrels. Next year I declared war and didn't lose any toms, but the squirrel body count got a LOT higher than I'd expected it to. Luckily the neighbors were on board, and we all had good gardens that year. Was it worth it? Seemed like it at the time, but probably not.

The next year I moved from the Houston area, where there are predominantly grey squirrels, and lots of them, back to the Austin area where I'm from, where there are mostly fox squirrels, and not as many. Fox squirrels don't bother my garden at all, so I let them pass by in relative peace. My viszlas are displeased by this, but I think the squirrels prefer it.

I'm not worried about catching one of the cats. Only Lester climbs and he only climbs trees under 6" in diameter and goes up maybe 10' or to the first lower branch. Herman is too fat and lazy to climb and the other two are very elderly ladies, waaaay past their climbing days. The trees I''d be setting the traps on are huge old oaks, over 2' in diameter with no low branches. They're squirrel hotels. I've never seen Lester ever attempt to climb one of those.

Is there any way to put a cone around the tree trunks to stop squirrels from climbing them? Or would that only move them into people's attics etc?

Ahh, memories of corn and raccoons. My raccoons had table manners, as they would first steal the ears, and only shuck and eat the ears after climbing up onto the picnic table.

And the squirrels, they are mostly a back variant of the grey squirrel, here. They bring the same problems, just in a cuter package.

I'm in the same camp as Travis. Once you declare war, it becomes never ending. There will be acts of war in retaliation if your measures are not 100% successful or if any favorite things are left unprotected.
Mostly the emotional investment in anger and frustration takes a toll that is not worth it, for me.
The feeder distraction is the kind of solution that avoids the all out war scenario.
But since they already did a terrible thing, you certainly need to let them know your limits. I hope whatever you decide to do will succeed in putting them in their place. Because this is really the issue here, it's not that they don't belong on your property, in the trees and so on, but that they severely overstepped by ravaging the corn.
Squirrels are definitely one of the hardest pests to deal with, since they can climb pretty much anything.

GoDawgs wrote: ↑Mon Jul 19, 2021 11:22 am Someone on a non-gardening site recommended using rat traps. Use peanut butter on the trigger and mount the trap to the tree with the trigger pointed up the tree. Move traps between trees on a three day rotation. I'm going to try that. First I have to get a few of the rat traps.

I would NOT use a rat trap.
Those small havahart traps work fine, allowing the release of bycatch... and... there is always bycatch.

AND... peanut butter just gets you fire ants.

I would put the trap in the garden... where I was trying to protect. I don't care about the ones in the tree... just the ones in the garden!

You just had to go there, Worth...

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