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Bambie almost killed me

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petect:
Mary
I'm very careful when using any chemicals to avoid injuring any animals - mice excepetd.

XP
I'm planning to do that. I have some scrap 2" dia.pvc pipe I'm going to cut into about 6" lengths lengths and fill with some fabric stuffing sprayed with permethrin. I'm hoping to find some that is red, or some other non-natural color so it might help me spot some of their nests. The mice ate a bunch of holes in an expensive boat cover I had hanging in my metal "boat house". The little bastards must have magnets in their feet!

Frank
I'm sure that burning the grass would help a lot, but my yard is surrounded by woods on all sides. If the grass fire got into the woods it wouldn't be pretty.

I'm going to get some chickens (free ranging)  and see how much of a dent they put in the tick population. That should be interesting as I'm sure they will immediately catch the attention of the hawk and owl that are almost daily visitors to my yard.
Thanks to all for the suggestions.
Pete
 

wine_guy_3:
Chickens are probably the best and easiest solution for the ticks,
and they provide side benefits of eggs and meat.

As for the mice .....
I use a "farmers" mouse trap at my cabin in the woods.

5 gallon bucket with a few inches of of liquid in the bottom.
Small plastic water bottle with a hole in the cap and the bottom suspended across the opening by a wire.
Put some peanut butter on the outside of the bottle.
Tape a "runway" board from one edge to the ground so they can get to the top.

Once at the top they jump to the bottle, which spins, and they fall into the bucket.
I use antifreeze as the liquid. This prevents them from stinking up the cabin while I am gone for weeks.
Not sure how good this will work outside, but it works great inside.

Hope this helps

MattM:
Beautiful idea

Ungrounded Lightning Rod:
To keep bambi out erect TWO tall perimeter fences about 6 feet apart.

Bambi will jump one fence - even if it's like 12 feet high.  But he doesn't want to jump in between two of them, apparently for fear of becoming trapped between them, or at least slowed down in escape if there's a predator hanging out in there.

(Or at least that's what they tell me.)

My wife and I are raising Bantom Dominique chickens - part of a project to keep them from becoming extinct and/or repopularize them.  VERY friendly, very busy.  Little guys (about 1/5th the weight of a normal-size Dominique or other "large (i.e. normal sized) fowl").  Eat only about 2 oz of feed per day.

(Pretty much NO chickens can subsist on foraging, except in food-filled areas like Key West.  They've been bred for laying so many eggs that they can't scrounge up enough to eat from the wild to make up the loss and need a supplemental food source.)

Crockel:
Sorry for replying to an old topic, by I had to add my two bits regarding ticks and deer.

I used to live in Kansas where ticks were bad. We had a little plastic spoon like tool for prying them out. After a few uses, I considered it a better invention than the wheel.

As for keeping deer away, I would urinate on the deer paths leading into the yard every time after it rains. It didn't take long before they stopped raiding my garden. I used to also urinate a few times in the late summer around the neighbor's deer blind that was too close to my property.

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