Pest animals have in many areas become much more of a nuisance in the home landscape than are pest insects. Pest animals are becoming way too common in suburban areas where development is rapidly eliminating the normal habitat for these critters.

In these files we offer detailed advice about dealing with over 20 pest animals. As we note in those files you really have only four choices in dealing with a pest animal:

You can find some material that repels the animal from your yard.

You can set up some kind of barrier to prevent the animal access to your yard.

You can trap and kill the animal.

Or, you can live with it being part of your yard’s ecosystem.


Be Sure You Have The Right Animal
When you have a problem, and you suspect an animal is the culprit, it is important to get an accurate diagnosis of which animal is causing the problem. The steps to take to deal with deer will be very different from those steps required to deal with woodchucks; both can wipe out a vegetable garden in one night.

Repellents vs. Fences???
While there are usually a number of approaches to take in dealing with most pest animal problems, in the majority of the cases, your challenge will be to choose between repellents or some form of fencing. In Yardener’s Tool Shed, we give you detailed information about each approach to help you make the best decision; see the Pest Animal Products section where you will find “Choosing A Repellent” and ”Choosing A Fence”.

Here Is Our Opinion
If you have a pest animal problem and the population of that particular pest is not excessive for your area, then a repellent may very well do the trick because the problem is not a function of overpopulation which makes the animal so hungry, it is immune to any repellent. If you have a situation where the population of a pest animal is indeed becoming excessive because of loss of habitat from development, then you have a permanent problem and a proper fence is the only permanent solution.

Multiple Pest Animals
If your landscape is being attacked by several critters simultaneously (deer, raccoons, and rabbits are a common combination) there are two products which can effectively deal with a number of pest animals all at once.

For a repellent, see Scarecrow which is a physical water spritzing repelling device.

For a fence, see the description of the Ultimate Fence Combination.

All of the most common pest animals are discussed in the following files. As with the pest insects, we try to give you a range of potential solutions so you have some choice in terms of how much trouble you are willing to take to deal with the problem. 

Book Review by Jeff

February 7, 2009

Jeff Ball 

Book has excellent ideas to help fight pests

I've been reading an excellent new book called "Deer-Resistant Landscaping" (Rodale Press, $25). The writer, Neil Soderstrom, not only is the author but also shot most of the superb photography for what is one of the most extensive books published that deals with the most common animal pests, including deer.

Soderstrom offers good information on virtually all the remedies one can use to deal with each of the pests he covers. He is particularly interested in identifying garden and landscape plants that are resistant to each of the pest animals, especially those plants allegedly resistant to deer.

There are two serious issues ignored in this book that I feel the need to be addressed in any effort to help yardeners protect their landscape from foraging animals. The first issue is that each animal is covered, thoroughly in all cases, as if it stands alone in the landscape. In fact, most of us have six or seven animals in our ecosystem, each perfectly capable of wrecking almost any part of our landscape plantings. I have to deal with deer, raccoons, squirrels, chipmunks, voles, woodchucks and sometimes a skunk. Someone needs to begin helping yardeners face what sometimes might feels like an army out there, rather than just addressing techniques for each individual animal. I will try to address that issue soon.

The other issue, more serious in my view, is Soderstrom did not deal in the extensive discussion of controlling deer is any recognition that overpopulation is now a key variable in any control strategy. In my experience, when the deer population reaches the astronomical numbers found in most developed urban and suburban areas of the country, there are no plants that are resistant to deer. The only guaranteed protection in this case is an 8-foot-high deer fence that Soderstrom describes in excellent detail with really good drawings and photos to help the reader understand how the fence works and what it looks like.

The information offered in this book is technically sound and very extensive, at times giving more information than you might feel you need. As a basic resource for addressing the problems of pest animals, "Deer-Resistant Landscaping" is a good investment.

Of course, I would be remiss if I didn't point out that my own Web site, www.yardener.com, thoroughly covers most of the animals discussed in Soderstrom's book. Beavers, black bears and armadillos are not common problems for the average yardener in Michigan. On the other hand, my Web site covers bats, blue heron in water gardens, dogs and cats from the neighbors, opossums, pigeons, and snakes, all not covered in Soderstrom's book.

When you are struggling with controlling the damage of any pest animal, there is no one source of information that gives you every detail you might need. Neil Soderstrom's book is a good addition to your library.

Jeff Ball, a Metro Detroit freelance garden writer, has a yard care Web site at www.yardener.com. E-mail him at jeffball@starband.net.