Over the weekend I tried to put up a few protection measures.
First I purchased some bird tape and put that up. I have a mulberry tree that kind of put itself there. I’m interested in trying some fruit, but it’s not something I was intending to be there. There is some tape in that tree as well as the peach and nectarine. I think we get a fair bit of wind so it’s usually in motion.
Second I built a 10x10x6 PVC tree cage. I intended to make it 10’ tall as well, but I couldn’t make it work. Perhaps because it’s just 1/2" PVC and was too wiggly, or maybe 10’ is just too tall. I’m going to get thicker PVC. How thick should I try and get 3/4" or 1"? It’s kind of flimsy, but should do the trick. It is overlaying rebar in the corners to not move.
I covered it with bird netting to hopefully keep out squirrels. I secured it at the bottom with some ground staples, but think in the future I’d roll up the PVC and secure that so it’s a little harder to get under. As the trees are new I tried to scrunch both in it this year, but in the future would make separate cages.
I’ve also purchased a Havahart trap to try and start trapping raccoons. I know that the Organza bags don’t do much, but I had already put them up and didn’t bother taking them down.
I’m still looking into things like garlic, sulfur, or soap in the trees for scent or repellents like ultrasonic devices or motion activated sprinklers. I’m thinking that I should also get some kind of motion activated camera to try and check on which pests visit and what they do?
We have the gradepro E8 trail camera. Works well. Family likes watching the playback of racoons coming to eat the compost. Seriously though we used it to figure out what was getting into various garden beds or eating certain flowers.
The one fail I had is with a pawpaw. The clamshell was ripped open and the fruit was gone. After I noticed that, I added a strip of tape (duct tape size, but translucent) around the clamshells of the other pawpaws and had no further problems. My assumption is that the pawpaw was plumb, juicy and smelling really good, plus it is large, so it was a prime candidate for a critter to say “it will take me some effort to get in, but the reward is big” whereas it just passes the other clamshells as too burdensome to take on.
I have lots of experience with chipmunks and squirrels. They have stripped my trees of all fruit before they ever ripen. I’d lose most or all my Santa Rosa plums, Asian pears and peaches to them. Tried everything.
This and rat traps are the only thing that worked for me.
Nothing we’ve tried has kept the squirrels from out fruit trees. Last year they stripped all 3 peach trees of fruit. It was the 1st time in 8 years they were a problem and I think it may have been because we had a recent mast year which made the squirrel population explode.
Thank you all for the help! So far I haven’t lost any fruit to the squirrels, but neither is anything ripe.
Right now I have a mix of scare tape, organza bags, and bird netting over a frame. I’m going to switch to putting some irish spring soap and garlic in the organza bags and hanging them from the trees as well to deter the squirrels. As I get them I’ll try the plastic clamshells. Right now, thankfully, I see them in different areas of the yard. They mostly hang out in our back yard near the birdfeeder and run around the top of the fence that goes around some of the property. They don’t really spend much time in the side yard with the peaches/nectarines. Later in the year I do have pluots in the backyard which are right where they spend a lot of time though.
While Squirrels are my main concern, I have also seen Raccoons which I plan to trap as I don’t think many come through our area. I think if motivated they’d be a real nuisance and hope to just remove them before that happens. Possums I hope are less of an issue than the raccoons as I think there are more of them around here but don’t seem as bad. Chipmunks are not in our area, same with rabbits and deer.
I don’t want to resort to killing the squirrels just because I feel there are so many and some neighbors feed them. Hopefully they are content with what they get and leave the fruit alone.
I’m in a similar boat with high pressure of suburban populations of deer and squirrels, but also raccoons, opossum, chipmunks and rats/mice.
My backyard orchard is about 4 years old. I have espalier apples and peaches pruned low in a backyard orchard culture style. In hindsight I would have grown the trees taller to baffle them like Alan does but to do that I would have to start over.
One of my ideas is a “fortress fence”. Basically 8ft posts with 6 feet of welded wire fence for the deer. On the bottom, 2-3ft of buried hardware cloth for rabbits/voles.
On the top 1-2 feet above the deer fencing I would run alternating “hot” and “ground” electric fence wire with close spacing like 2” apart. I’m hoping to deter the climbing critters with this but unsure if it would be effective.
That looks quite secure if you can get your whole orchard fenced in like that. I don’t have a lot of experience with the same problems, but when I did live in an area with deer and groundhogs I had pretty good success with just a 6ft plastic fence. Deer never crossed it, and it was obvious when/where a groundhog came in. (side story I was growing jalapenos and the groundhog never came back after eating them).
I can’t comment too much on the electric fencing at the top as I’ve never used that. I’m not sure how close they’d need to be to each other to be effective.
If you have the ability to really fence in like that I think it would be quite effective, as long as you’re not trapping the wildlife inside.
