This spring I noticed that last year’s tiny raised strawberry garden had spread from a 2X4′ space to that and a nearby 4X4′ garden as well.
It appeared that I was going to have an amazing crop this year and couldn’t wait for them to begin turning red. In mid-May the first flash of red attracted my attention and I was anxious to start harvesting them. I found three rather large, perfect berries and they were excellent! But — there’s always a “but” right? I also found three half-eaten berries dangling on their stems. A large hole on the outside of the metal garden leading to the inside corner of the garden was clearly visible.
RODENTS!
Last Summer I just about gave up after some kind of critter ate just about all of my tomatoes. My dog Hoku, with her keen senses, let me know when something was in the garden. Cute little chipmunks? Squirrels? Mice? Oh, No, it was worse, the most disgusting type of vermin I can think of — rats!
So, after losing my first strawberries in May, and with my blueberries, tomato, and pepper plants showing a lot of promise, I did a little research and prepared myself for battle. I disregarded the suggestions of planting mint or marigolds nearby because for me, they don’t work.
What I found was that rats and other rodents hate the odor of garlic just about as much as I do. So, I immediately got to work finding a way to get the foul odor into my strawberry patch to deter the vermin from stealing the fruit and very importantly, not tainting the taste of the berries.
The solution was easy. I went to the dollar store and bought some small plastic containers with snap-on lids and a large jar of minced garlic on sale at ShopRite.
For less than $10 I had all of the equipment I needed. I took a screwdriver and poked about 5 holes into the sides of each container and put 1 or two tablespoons of garlic inside before putting on the cover. I couldn’t smell the garlic, but the highly sensitive noses of the rodents surely would be able to detect it.
I placed the containers throughout the garden, and in the first week, I only lost perhaps one berry a night. In the weeks that followed (I picked my last strawberry today), none were missing, and I was able to harvest a total of 5 quarts of fresh ripe berries from my tiny gardens in a month’s time.
The best part of this method, besides it working beautifully, is that there are No Chemicals, nothing that will harm the worms or insects that visiting birds would eat. After a month inside the containers, the garlic is still smelling strong (when I opened the lid) and the containers are portable. After putting bird netting over my ridiculously full blueberry bushes, I surrounded the ground area with garlic containers, rodents like to climb up and steal the berries from below.
After the blueberries are harvested, I will move my garlic containers over to the cucumber, pepper, and tomato gardens.
A few weeks ago, I posted my experimental solution on my personal Facebook page and quite a few people, two from out of state, and one from England included have privately messaged me that it worked for them too. Yes, I am working on a patent for this idea.
Happy Gardening!