I have an arbor with muscadine grapes growing from both sides, a purple one on the one side and a green one on the other.
The green one bore a few bunches of grapes which were either ruined by leaf footed bugs or devoured by the raccoons.
The purple grape produced quite a few bunches and I was counting my chickens before they hatched. I awoke one morning to discover the raccoons discovered my grapes. The climbed up the inside of the arbor on the trellis and grabbed every single grape they could lay their claws on, sucked out the inside and left all the skins for me to pick up.
In order to prevent them from picking the last few bunches, I took some carpet tack (some of which I kept after removing the worn out carpet from the stairs), thin strips of wood with vicious nails and tied them to the inside of the trellis at the points where they have to step in order to climb higher.
So far so good.
A few days ago, I was standing at my guava bush and contemplating if I should pick the only guava borne on a limb that is not variegated and looking different than all the other guavas. I decided to let it mature one more day, the next morning it was gone, along with 4 other almost ripe ones.
In order to protect the last few remaining guavas, I removed the thin metal mesh from a used air conditioner filter and tied it around the guavas. The raccoons managed to get to the bottom one and ate away half of it. They tried to open the wire mesh and sort of succeeded in one end, but were unable to get to the guavas - so the remainder is a little scratched but intact.
Soon there will be all kinds of new treats for them to devour (sugar apples, star fruit, pomegranates, papayas, jujubes), so my battle will get more intense. I might have to consider installing electrified wire at the places where they enter my yard.
I am now almost a the point where I am planning a trip to Home Depot to buy a trap.
If anyone has some good ideas to share to ban these rascals from my yard, please post some comments here.
 Carpet tacks tied to inside of arbor |
Grape skins left for me  |
Guavas covered with used air conditioner filter wire mesh  |
Here in West Tennessee we had a mother racoon and two babies (really quite cute for a while). They became a topic at the neighborhood association meeting, although some of the solutions involved illegal shooting. But after two months of them eating my cats' food, they seem to have moved on.
ReplyDeleteThey certainly can drive you insane !
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