Cats in your garden?

[b]where do you put the coffee grounds and if you put in the garden soil, does this affect the soil?

how did you make the critter cages?, and how are they removed to work in the garden? I have alot of stray cats around here, and rabbits, this looks like a good idea, my raised garden is not but 4' x 4'. thank you :scratch:

how did you make the critter cages, this looks like a great idea, my garden is 4'x4' thank you this is to llama mama--thanks again :scratch:

steelrfan57 - I had my hubby follow the directions in the All New Square Foot Gardening Book. It's made with four one inch by 2 inch boards, 4 feet long, chicken wire with 1 inch holes, (2 inch holes will let in more critters, zip ties, cutting shears for the wire, and a power drill. Pages 65-70 gives all the details and plenty of photos too. My husband makes the wooden square and I take it from there. When handling the wire, do wear long sleeves, don't wear shorts, and I use leather gloves to handle the chicken wire. Unless you like bleeding.....

The critter cages are a super easy project following the directions in the book. I am not at all handy and I made the entire thing myself in about an hour. My dog is a digger and they keep him off my square.

Anybody have some tips on how to keep the cats from digging in my gardens. It's very annoying to have plants come up where you didn't plant them and not come up where you did.

Try planting catnip in a different area in the yard to attract them to it instead of your garden beds.

Two things have worked for me to keep itinerate feral cats from using newly planted beds: plastic dinner forks pushed into soil tines up (mentioned elsewhere on forum) in the potato beds, and laying a strip of old chicken wire over a newly planted veggie bed. Cats don't like to step on the springy, rough stuff. For a 4-foot-square bed with young plants, I've surrounded it with a 2' tall strip of heavy green plastic 'chicken wire' fastened to 3' sections of PVC pipe pushed into the corners of the bed. Side note: if you have catnip planted, and cats love it to death, you can upend an old dish drainer over it. The cats get to chew the 'nip that grows through the mesh, but are unable to wallow it to extinction.

http://www.contech-inc.com/videos/scarecrow/crowloop_high.wmv

scarecrow

This Spring I had an unplanted bed warming up and put a double layered of chicken wire to keep out stray cats and my barn cats. They would not like the feel and the springy-ness.. My barncat Sabrina not only walked on the springy wire then lay down, then upside down and went to sleep in the middle of the bed, back legs stretched out and front paws stretched over her head. The silliest animal I've ever owned, everything is fun and games with her.

The plastic forks, tines up worked for me!

Are they your cats? If not, get a live-catch trap. Ransom them back to the owners and that'll teach them to keep the kitties inside.

G.

Hasselback wrote:Are they your cats? If not, get a live-catch trap. Ransom them back to the owners and that'll teach them to keep the kitties inside.

G.

LOL +1

We have two neighbor cats peeing in my box:( Not sure if I should just trash everything? How can I keep them away? They just jump over our fence. I have a lot of tall plants that would make it hard to put chicken wire over the box (green beans, peas, tomatoes, etc.). I appreciate any feedback:)

Thanks!

there are multiple threads about this subject that you can find using the search feature at the bottom of the latest topics list on the left.
here is one of those threads:

https://squarefoot.forumotion.com/t12712-cats-vs-gardens?highlight=Cats+in+box

I had that problem right after I built my raised bed. I used wire squares from shelves to create walls. Worked great. Also, they might not like the feel of wood mulch on their little paws.
There is a product on the market to keep them away if you use it outside the box it might work.

Good luck.

i haven't tried this, but it sure looks like it would work!! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A5D3GKlTkpY

Southerngardnener....I love that idea. Those motion-sensitive sprinklers can do the trick.
I also heard that sheets of aluminum foil on the squares here and there will deter them. They don't like the crinkling of the foil.
There's plenty of things one can try before giving up their gardening. I wouldn't let the cats defeat me if I really wanted fresh, tasty, food on my table.

I have had that problem for a few years with lots of ferrel cats that several neighbors fed/feed. This Spring and Summer I spent so much time trying to deter the cats and dig their poo out of the beds. I just got fed up with the neighbors lack of concern. I tried so many things but the cats were tenacious. I finally had to call animal control and use a humane trap they loan out. I set the trap in my garden area that has nine 4x6 beds. That was the only place I was concerned about. I caught nine cats and I know there are several more wandering close by. I don't know if they are still visiting the beds.

One of my neighbors bought an ultrasonic deterrent to try to solve the problem after Animal Control had a talk with her. It worked sporadically and I saw one cat walk right next to it, almost touching it and the deterrent didn't go off. I didn't use a water deterrent because I didn't want to have to have the water on all the time and also risk the hose blowing out and flooding the yard. Since that didn't work, when I was done with my garden in the Fall I left the garden gate open and let the dogs chase after the cats. This may have worked but I don't think the cats are permanently gone if the dogs don't keep after them.

I was thinking of setting up an electric fence on my side of the wooden fence that divide the yards. I don't know much about them but it may be something to check into.

Someone I know got a humane trap. When they caught their neighbor's cat, they took it to the owner's house and told them what they did. They told them that this time it was free, the next time it would be taken to animal control and they would have to bail it out.

I had success with plastic forks in the Spring but just recently had 2 cats that kept going in my beds and it didn't work. Pecan mulch didn't work. I ended up renting a live trap from the feed store and had animal control come get them. I hated to do it but I have spent too much time and money to have it all ruined because people let their cats run roam loose.

I did try the dried peppers. I crushed them and sprinkled them around. Maybe they were too old because those were scratched into and partially buried with the cat poo when they visited that night. I tried sticking wooden skewers and sticks into the soil. I tried chicken wire on the beds where there were not plants growing. They found the spots where the skewers, sticks and wire were not and did their business there. I nailed nails into the top of the fence. I saw them climb over and it seemed like they just spread their feet out and around the nails. I sprayed the repellent spray on the fence that is supposed to keep animals away from areas. I draped chicken wire strips to the top of the fence thinking they wouldn't want to walk on it. They didn't mind it at all.

When I set the traps I used a half a can of tuna, mashed it up a bit to get the smell strong and left some of the liquid in with it. The other half I put into a plastic container with a lid for the next time. Baiting with cat food to me was too expensive. I would catch a cat within 5-30 minutes of setting the trap. I didn't enjoy having to resort to the trapping but after catching nine and more still out there, I knew that I didn't have a fighting chance otherwise.

Lo and Behold, I went to check my garden this morning and found a 12 x 12 inch mound. At first I thought perhaps an ant hill in the making but upon further investigation, I found a pile of you know what. I removed the deposit, along with the seedlings that were dug into it.

My questions are three fold. Is there anything besides a cat that would cover its business? It seemed kind of large for a cat - unless it was a very large cat. Second, do I need to do anything to the bed to "denature" it? Finally, is there a spray or something to keep the critter out in the future?

Thanks!

I found a poop log right on top of my compost pile the other day. Just one laying there on the center of the tippy top right out in the open. I was wondering if someone put it there. Seems unlikely but ... what else could it be???

Could someone who was walking their dog put the poop in your bed and buried it? Or are there animal foot prints?

CC

I can't think of any animal besides a cat that would do that. I have seen - much to my dismay - my neighbor's cat repeatedly deficate in my flower beds (as such, I am developing VERY strong feelings about roaming cats) and I must say, I was pretty shocked at how large the, um, pile was.... I have a 35 pound dog and the cat's fecal bundle was as large as my dog's.

You could try sprinkling spent coffee grounds to help deter cats as well as many other garden pests (just be careful where you put it, as too much can alter soil pH). Good luck!

We didn't see any footprints which was why I thought originally a large ant hill. It is in our backyard behind a gated six foot fence. The fence wasn't locked but would someone really go to the trouble of sneaking in and digging and then covering a hole? I didn't think so, but it looked as big as a dog pile but under four inches of raked up MM mound. I didn't think we had lived at our house long enough to get someone mad at us - we are pretty much live and let live types but who knows?

The fence has a little clearance under it at the gates (about five inches), so an animal could cram its way under. We don't know of anyone with an outside cat but we do live within four blocks of a creek so maybe a stray. We have inside only cats so we are familiar with the size of the deposit, so to speak. This was at least two times the diameter of what we have seen before and we have a couple of big cats.

I don't know why a dog would chose to pick a bed and dig and cover rather than just doing it where ever but I don't know much about dog habits. I live in McKinney just north of Dallas and I don't know if there are wild animals that might have scaled the fence but I would hate to come face to face with something big enough to have deposited the treasure.

I don't know if the bed needs cleaning out more than removal of the poop and I'm probably not going to replant the square this spring just in case our visitor returns.