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Destructive foxes
Nicky4
Posts: 1
My daughter moved house last summer and spent a long time clearing elderly plants and bushes so that she could start again. Last autumn she planted a range of young plants and bulbs and all went well until the early spring when she gave the garden a good weeding and turned over the soil. Almost immediately the foxes arrived and dug up everything that she had planted and even started to dig up the lawn. She knows it is foxes doing the damage as she has seen them doing it and they then laze in her garden as if proud of their handiwork! Any suggestions on how to keep the foxes away?
0
Posts
when i planted all my bulbs last autumn they started disappearing almost straight away and holes dug making a right mess. so i looked up online and found spice to the answer, sprinkling chilli powder !
I combined this idea with a sort out of my spice cupboard where there was lots of out of date spices so i just combined them all and added a bit of chilli and sprinkled it about where i had planted, no more digging from foxes
until that is i planted my climbing roses and added blood,fish & bone powder in the hole (forgetting my staffordshire bull terrier has a super sleuth nose) i thought he's taking ages out in the garden for his late night pee, went out in the morning to find he's dug them all up obviously thought there was a juicy bone under there (he never usually digs up things lol ) so i won't be using that again
I regularly get foxes visiting my garden with holes dug and buried food which I scout for and remove every morning to keep my dog from consuming it
They haven't fully dug plants up but I have had to plant bulbs more than once and damage to fully grown plants such as ferns missing half the fronds they should have due to being clawed off, presumably while they look for a good place to bury stuff
I use blood fish and bone mixed into deep holes without much damage but I understand the risk when I do use it, these creatures are obeying their natural instincts, you won't keep them out, I've seen foxes jump my six foot fences no problem and believe me, there is no other way to get into my garden.
One tip might be to supply an area of soft soil away from precious plants for their burying habits, my old raised veg bed was ideal for them
Good luck
We have foxes live here, but they seem to content themselves with the rabbit warren we also have.
Could she mulch up the surface of any bare soil with something? Even grass clippings over a layer of newspaper might be enough to dissuade them. Or bark over landscape fabric? Fresh exposed dirt looks so inviting, they find it hard to resist. Or is it possible to fence off the yard? It has to be quite high, they're good jumpers.
well the fox had a busy evening last night, i had been out slug collecting late and then went to bed, this morning my big bulb that i can't remember what it was from my pots was on the step, my garden croc shoes i had left out to dry had had the strap chewed off with bits everywhere, and they had been digging in my strawberry bed where there are daffs & tulips
i'm in a semi rural village and keeping them out with netting would be great but impossible here unless i made it like a tennis court. My garden runs parallel with the road and gardens behind and then fields, they seem to come in over the wall from the road but also over the sheds,office & workshop roofs, we have a high garden wall and behind that is a low wall that they also run along at night driving my dog insane but as soon as we go to bed and the dog is safely out of they way they have free reign.