Do I just have to kill them?

June 1, 2010 9:37 PM

Help me solve my squirrel problem and save my peaches!

The squirrels are burrowing under the driveway and house. They're stealing my (unripe) peaches and soon they'll be stealing my tomatoes. I'd really like to get rid of them without actually killing them. We've already tried filling the holes with gravel and big rocks. They just dig a new entrance. The bastards! Have you used a squirrel repellent successfully? Should I pour water down the holes and flood them out?

I've seen the previous questions about squirrels, but they seem to be mostly about keeping them away from the bird feeder. I want them to stop digging under my house.

posted by stoneweaver to home & garden (10 answers total)

You could attempt a catapult...

But I would really recommend the water. I had a gopher a while back, couldn't get rid of it though. The only thing that made it disappear was a new dog. You could try that route if nothing else works. But your neighbors won't be happy with the migrating squirrels
posted by TheJehosephat at 10:30 PM on June 1, 2010

Might the water undermine your foundation and driveway?
posted by orthogonality at 10:37 PM on June 1, 2010

Yes, you have to kill them. I tried shooting them, but all I did was breed a race of
hyper-intelligent rodents, after I killed all the stupid ones.

Oats, dyed blue with an oil dye, doped with diphacinone or chlorophacinone,
have worked well for me when ground squirrels were destroying the foundations
of one of my outbuildings. You have to use a safe dispenser (I used the tee shaped
one made out of 4 inch plastic pipe, described in this article).

It's well controlled, and you have to prove that you know how to use it and sign
for it. It's often called "blue oats", like this stuff. Shop around. The price varies greatly,
and you would prefer local cash-and-carry.

They generally die in their burrows, and you have to keep bait in the dispenser
until the squirrels quit taking it/all die.
posted by the Real Dan at 1:01 AM on June 2, 2010

I shoot at my squirrels with a pellet gun. It's not powerful enough to kill them, but after a while they have learned that my yard is not a good place to hang out. They are persistent so you have to be as well.
posted by woodjockey at 3:49 AM on June 2, 2010

My 85 year old mother took on the squirrels in her garden with a Havahart 2 door model. It cost about $55, and she caught and relocated about 15 critters last year with it, and actually had a great time doing it ! Someone told her they will try to return, so she took them to a location at least few miles away No sign of them this year.
posted by lobstah at 4:21 AM on June 2, 2010 [1 favorite]

You can put down some heavy wire mesh along the side of the house, so that they can't burrow.

Here are some other good ideas....

http://www.urbanwildliferescue.org/humane/squirrels.htm
posted by orme at 6:12 AM on June 2, 2010

I don't have a solution for the digging problem, but I have read that chipmunks who had been stealing/taking single bites of strawberries stopped it completely when the gardener left out dishes of water for them.

You may not want to appease the little bastards like that if they're digging, but it's a useful trick to try if fruit theft was the only issue you were facing.
posted by maudlin at 9:42 AM on June 2, 2010

I agree with Best Dan's advice. If you're unwilling to do it yourself, having squirrels burrow under the house is the sort of thing one calls an exterminator for.

Discouraging future burrowing is worthwhile--even after you get rid of the current ones, new ones will arrive in the next year or two, regardless. I've found that river rocks/landscaping rocks create a surface that squirrels in my area don't like to dig in--sadly, it sounds like you've already tried this.

Regarding blocking the burrows with wire mesh: squirrels can get through remarkably small openings, and can chew through almost anything given the motivation, so you'll want to keep that in mind. Based on my experience, I'm not sure I'd trust anything less than actual sheet metal--even then you'd have to consider the ability of squirrels to dig/chew around it.

Also, effectively blocking the burrows may mean blocking them in, so if you're thinking it might be a "humane" approach, the end result might not be any different than poison.

My experience with live traps is that they're very efficient squirrel feeders. If you do actually capture one, I have been told that squirrels are very territorial, and that "relocating" them can mean placing them in hostile territory where the local squirrels will harass and try to kill them. So although trapping and relocating may look and feel better, my understanding is that it's not really that cruelty-free either.

Pellet guns are immensely satisfying, but may be subject to local ordinances. For similar reasons, always good to be careful with poisons to make sure you're getting rid of squirrels and not neighborhood cats or desirable wildlife.
posted by gimonca at 10:58 AM on June 2, 2010

It might not be feasible given the amount of linear space involved, but the best way to stop the burrowing would be to bury an L-shaped strip of hardware cloth 6"-8" down. The bottom portion of the L should extend away from the driveway/house by 6"-8". So, if the squirrel is standing near the driveway and starts digging down, it'll hit a horizontal stretch of hardware cloth. Digging towards the driveway, it would run into a similar wall.

Like I said, this might be more work than you want to invest, depending on the amount of space that's a problem. It works to keep critters out of my chicken coop, though.

Another note: I have in the past tried to dissuade a family of determined squirrels from picking the ripening figs from my tree. Anything I did to the tree itself or to the figs basically served not as a deterrent or impediment, but as a big neon sign indicating which figs made for the best eating. Keep that in mind of you decide to approach the problem from your peach tree or tomato plants.
posted by mudpuppie at 11:02 AM on June 2, 2010

My father-in-law has been trapping squirrels all spring, and marked each on the tail before releasing. I don't know how far he was going before he let them go, maybe a mile or 2 of suburbia, but he hasn't had any come back and has noticed a dramatic reduction in the local population.

I'd be prepared to handle non-squirrels too, though. I think he's also caught an opossum and a skunk. :)
posted by specialnobodie at 12:54 PM on June 2, 2010