Protecting Blueberries

[Diggin It]

I bought a pellet gun and used a hav-a-hart trap (same size used on ground hogs, fairly large) and baited it with some peanut butter on a paper plate. Caught a squirrel or two and shot them with the pellet gun. I'd normally give ground hogs lead poisoning with my 410, but the 410 kinda blows a squirrel apart. If you have the patience, you can sit with a shot gun (my dad would have used a 22, but they travel too far if not aimed towards the ground) and wait for the squirrels to come get them. Only need to take out 1 or 2, and the rest get the message.

And then he adds ....

"The natural gardener
God's original intent"

Unbelievable.

 

[Jstpssng]

Not blueberries but grapes; I never used to get much of a crop because of the birds and squirrels. I had a big piece of Remay Johnny's Selected Seeds worked for a while, but after a few years the sun took it's toll. About 6 years ago I moved my henhouse and built a fenced in run about 10 feet away, leaving just room enough to make a couple of passes with my mower. Oddly enough I haven't had a wildlife problem in my grapes since.

 

[mapper]

I use a couple of strips of flash tape run above the row, pulled tight with a couple of twists so any small breeze makes it flash. We have found that red and silver works better than just silver.
A bigger problem for us were deer and rabbits eating the tender shoots and twig ends. Solved that with a low board fence (24") lined with sheet metal topped with a five foot welded wire fence. The fence is good for tying off the flash tape.

 

[goeduck]

We have a row that's maybe 50', and after years of attempts using netting, we almost perfected it last year. I'll skip all of our 'failures' and get to what we'll do this year that I think will be our best and final solution. First, we now have 8' T-posts, driven approximately 1 1/2' in the ground, spaced 10' apart down each side of the row. The rows of posts are at least a couple feet wider than the widest berry plants so nothing interferes with the bushes and we can walk around them all. We leave these posts in permanently, but take down the netting at the end of the berry season.

I also would like to see some pictures. Sounds effective. :thumbsup:

 

[Molalla1]

I've used a fiberglass, real-looking, owl that I put up on a post. It seems to deter the birds. Don't really get much damage by birds.

Also put out a lot of rubber snakes. Something that flies has attacked almost all my rubber snakes and ripped their heads off in some cases. Hoping maybe it's something big enough to catch the squirrels, which are the real pests. Below are some pics capturing them with the wildlife camera. The camera is a good thing for nailing down what is eating your stuff. Of course, it has caught me a few times, too, but you do not want to see me.

Ralph

Ralph those pesky vermin, no wonder we decided to eat them (shoot them to keep them out of the garden) and well . . .

on edit: have not had one of grandma's squirrel stews, well for ages and ages . . .

 

[jgedmond]

Wow, lots of good ideas. Thank you to all who responded.

Because we have several varieties, the fruiting season extends over 6 - 8 weeks. I should have mentioned that the bushes are within a 6' wire fenced area that keeps out large critters like deer and hogs, so I am more concerned with rodents and birds. I have not noticed any squirrels bothering the bushes, perhaps because they are in an open area and we have a healthy hawk population. Mice could probably hide out in the ground or mulch and do some robbing without the hawks getting them.

I guess that I was mainly wondering if the flashy or rotating or predator / raptor decoy stuff worked. Those would sure be easier to deploy than the netting over T-posts like last year.

Well I have some new things to try this year!

 

[goeduck]

^^^^ I also planted for a long season. Early variety, Mid season, Late season and Late, Late season.

 

[dragoneggs]

We have 4 mature plants. Transplanted from our old place about 10 years ago and are now about 15 years old. They are flourishing in their current locale against the house. Good heat (western exposure) lots of water from roof runoff. Lots of peat moss and we throw down young fir branches as mulch (for the acidity) in the fall.

The four plants arranged in a square, yield plenty of fresh berries for our family and we freeze a bunch over winter. Since it is against the house we use only two 8ft T posts and wrap the sides and top with bird netting and zipties. Around the base we use some heavy duty plastic mesh to dissuade the rabbits. I fabbed a somewhat rigid partial frame that allows us to enter the anti-aviary for picking.

For some reason the chipmunks/squirrels don't bother that area. I guess they are busy on the other side of the house with plenty of cones/seeds from the fir trees.

We occasionally catch a clever bird that somehow finds it way through the mesh but are almost always able to free it before it dies. The one odd bird gets a feast and then panics until we liberate it. We don't notice a dent to the harvest.

 

[forgeblast]

What I did is make a blueberry cage. Drove tposts into the ground. Then bought some tpost brackets at tsc. I then took 3/4 emt and made an A flattened the ends of the emt and bolted them to the tspost brackets. I have 6 A's that are then bolted to each other to make it a sturdy structure. Bird netting will go on top, I then took hardware cloth that I hand and burried it about 6-8'' into the ground and then above that chicken wire. I have had deer, rabbits, groundhogs eat the small bushes so we went and bought a bunch (10) large ones from Blueberry Plants For Sale | Buy Blueberry Bushes excellent product btw.

 

[forgeblast]

You can see it on the right of the greenhouse.