I went to my plot over the weekend to pick the remaining corn and blow me down 7 of the 16 had been stripped! I was gutted. Talking to the other allotmenteers they reckon it was more likely to be squirrels than rats or mice as the leaves had been pulled back rather than eaten through. Hey ho ..... What can one do to protect against this?
There might be some answers for you on this thread....especially the plastic bottle protectors!![see davyw1 post]
http://www.allotments4all.co.uk/smf/index.php/topic,44525.msg445484.html#msg445484
Duke
I have seen magpies eating sweetcorn - protecting them with bottles seems a brilliant idea.
Yep it's that time of year again when everything with teeth, paws, beaks or a combination of these comes along and nicks the lot - I had two nearly full cobs from about 30 plants, the rest either didn't do very well (my fault) and those that did have been stripped in the past week.
Gutted!
The experienced guys on my site blamed pheasants, I think it might've been rats as my s/corn is close to my sheds and chickens.
Our neighbours used to have chickens and we started to see rats in our garden. Now they no longer have chickens the rats have gone! ;D
Duke
I'm guessing they are just hiding from you...... ;D You are never very far away from a rat! ;)
Thanks Deb lol! :o
Duke
annoyingly we have rat bait everywhere and in particular near sheds on plots with chooks, and the council plan to charge us chicken herders more next year to pay for extra bait... maybe they should also charge sweetcorn growers extra as well?