6 Proven Ways to Keep Rodents Out of Your Garden (Without Poison)

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* Fall 2025 Gardening – Plant These Now Before It’s Too Late – https://youtu.be/11WhEmSovdc
* How to raise chickens in your backyard (10 tips) – https://youtu.be/8G8cH740_TQ

Items mentioned in this video:
Rodent Trap – https://www.vulcanpest.com/products/vulcantrap
Chicken Feeder – https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07MQW8MQK?tag=cityprep-20
Larger Trap – https://www.amazon.com/dp/B001UFLIA0?tag=cityprep-20
Squirrel Trap – https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0046VJ8RU?tag=cityprep-20
Repellent – https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B002ITKVKU?tag=cityprep-20
Fox Scent – https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B084P39WFX?tag=cityprep-20
Rat Traps – https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0D8FM1LSX?tag=cityprep-20

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How tall is your garden fence? Are you SURE that it's tall enough to deter deer? 6 feet is the absolute minimum. It's hard to tell how tall the fence is in the video. I recommend adding some extension poles and wire to the top of your chain link. Here, deer are the biggest concern, followed by moles, gophers and voles. I see you have hardware cloth for your chicken run. You can put that down on the ground to keep them from digging under the fence. We line the bottom of our raised beds with hardware cloth and it has helped SO much in keeping burrowing creatures out of the beds. It can help in your chicken run, too.

I suppose for small area city gardeners these options might work, but they are expensive, labor intensive…..and I hate to tell you this….only short termed.
I live in the high desert, California. My nearest neighbor is a mile away…I probably have five neighbors in a 5 mile area.
I have been growing my own food for 40 years.
Please be advised that not all cats are interested or have the genetics to hunt successfully. City cats hand down city personalities. All my cats are feral.
I went thru a lot of methods in all these years and eventually just built 1/4" hardware cloth enclosures….even the ground inside is covered..in some areas I added polycarbonate panels that go all around the enclosure at ground level….to prevent them chewing thru the hardware cloth….the wave pattern on polycarbonate panels is hard for squirrels to climb.
In one area I bought those 48×48 inch dog carrying crates and attached hardware cloth to them.
While your video isn't about this, I will mention it anyway.
Insect barrier cloth. It will not even let the smallet pest to get into enclosures…not even whiteflies or thrips.
Now, to some these expenses might seem overkill or just too expensive….but if you are a serious gardener, think about how much money and crops you will lose over the long run, with pest and rodent problems.
Turn trees into bushes instead. The whole tree concept was invented by commercial farmers to make harvesting easier. The average gardener doesn't need treed fruit and nuts.
Bushes require less water (I get a heck of a lot of peaches on my 6×6 foot peach bushes) are easy to cover to keep birds out, and can also be put in hardware cloth cages.
One area, all figs…I built 3/4" EMT canopies and attached fencing around them, then attached hardware cloth all around…the top of the canopy has 30% Aluminet shade cloth. I rarely have any rodent problems…what they can't see seems to work fairly well.
If you lay 48" hardware cloth on the ground, stake it down, all around the perimeter of chicken coops, they can't tunnel in. Don't build chicken wire coops, rats can eat right thru it.

The farmer's friend is 1/4" hardware cloth 🎉😂

Poison-free is key. Always ask yourself whether poison will always be available/affordable, and whether it's worth your time to stockpile hundreds of pounds of poison.

Wow no one’s even considered the nocturnal light deterrents. We have them attached to each side of our home at ground level and on posts and trees surrounding garden. They work and our neighbors think we have an alarm system surrounding our yard. We only let a few in on the secret.

You forgot to mention rats as a great source of protein when the SHTF!! 😂
And on a more serious note, use wifi cameras to monitor rat/pest activity. I have a few cameras in my attic and my garden, so I always know what the rats and other critters are up to.

There are also sacrificed plants that you can put on the border to protect your food garden.

I tried a castor oil and garlic spray to deter the groundhog in my yard. Thus far it is seems to be effective. In fact have not seen a rabbit since I sprayed.

Baking soda mixed with corn meal. Rodents can't burp, so they blow up inside. No poison..

CHRIS,
GREAT JOB !
🎉🎉🎉
GOOD INFORMATION.
Cynthia

I use Jiffy Mix or Flour with baking soda. Worked like a dream as long as it stayed dry. So I placed it in a covered container with a hole cut in the side or under the steps. None toxic to animals but ends mice/rats.

Your Right about Rats on what they can destroy

Cats, YES. Small dogs, one or two. Dachshunds for digging animals, terriers for running animals. My cat tried to catch squirrels, but she just couldn't. My dogs, when not on the patio, laid in front of the patio door, watching. Only 2 or 3 squirrels were ever caught, but they never tired of trying.

Repellant don't work. I've tried them all. Since I can't get cats, I've had to use snap traps. Also, rats do not like potatoes, tomatoes, asparagus, and carrots. I'm making losts of things they won't eat and planting them.

I think my biggest problem is my neighbor across the street who put out corn in pans to feed the animals constantly. He keeps the pans full day and night. So there are squirrel, rabbit, skunk, racoon, rats, birds, and who knows what else over there eating and multiplying like crazy all the time. He is straight across the street from me and then the critters come over here. UGH

I only live in a city, but using the method of used cat litter has worked great for me.

Thanks for the tips! I found that peppermint is a natural defense against ants.

For rodents inside the house we use chewable vitamin D tablets. They smell and taste delicious and the vitamin D shuts down their kidneys. Worked beautifully in this antique home for years. Put the tablets where you know they run. As the tablets disappear replace them until they no longer disappear. Do not place them where pets can can get them, though, or use them outside. Even though vitamin D can be beneficial to humans, not so with creatures.

👍🐾😎👋

Do not rely on cats alone to keep rodents under control, even a multitude of cats. And cats do carry nasty parasites, which can be helped with Frontline and worm medicines, but few people want to handle their outdoor cats that much. Where we used to live, in California, people were constantly dropping off cats. And we did have a lot of mice, rats, gophers, squirrels, rabbits, and voles for them, as well as an 8 foot chain link fence around 4 acres to keep out predators. But owls love to eat cats, and the cats tended to prefer eating fence lizards, which we also had an abundance of. So the rats and other rodents were not at all controlled by cats.

I miss the surveys. I want to know if I am properly or overly freaked out compared to other preppers.

I was watching a guy dealing with a plague in a kinetic fashion, and that's when I learned FLIR Thermal can pick up reflections like a mirror.. That's crazy what even is that technology..

There is a product you can you that encourages a cat to use the litter.. works like a charm… got it from a pet store can't recall the name.

Sadly I'm not aloud any cats or any animals which don't help 😰🇬🇧

One trick when you get a cat: put butter on their paws. They lick it off and in the process, get the scent/flavor of the dirt which helps them orient to the property as home.

I have my neighbor give me some of her kitty litter when she is cleaning there box’s. And I spread it were I know I have seen them around my yard and it works perfect.

Kris, when I had a house and was doing planting I was told by an old guy next to me to use ground cinnamon on my tomato and potato plants to keep small bugs and ants away from them and it did work. I never had leaf or root issues either. I did try it on other plants like beans and corn and it didn't work as well. I used human grade diatomaceous as well to keep slugs and other bugs away. Just remember after a hard rain it's not as good but I was ok for a few lite showers. I so miss have a yard to dig my hands down into mother earth and get my hands all dirty from her. Blessings! Sherry

Cats 🐈

Flaming hot cheetos will kill mice and rats

Something I've heard about recently that seems to have worked in several scenarios is a product called Senestech that is supposed to work like birth control for rats/mice (two different products). It is meant to be used as part of an Integrated Pest Management program that includes exclusion and trapping. I'm considering giving it a try, and will follow up if it seems to work.

I use metallic ribbons, apx 1/4" wide, usually silver color, which helps keep the squirrels, rats, birds, etc. away as they move with the breeze and the movement scares the pests away. There are also electronic boxes that emit a signal not audible to humans but make it undesirable for pests

all of these things are so much easier to learn & fix now. dealing with these issues when resources are limited & problems are abundant would be much harder. Every oroblem we mitigate now, regardless if how small, is one less issue we have to handle in an emergency. during energencies our time, energy, and stress level will need to be managed & how well we manage these things will determine our success level. thanks for the info.
voles are the bane to my existence right now. tried many different things, most recently dafodils. apparently they wont cross them & they will look great next Spring😊

Good video, useful, thank you so much!

This is a knowledge gem for those who can do it legally. What a lot of people and unknowing squirrels don't know is, if you shoot enough squirrels, they can be made into a delicious Brunswick stew. Also, if you shoot enough of them, they stop showing up despite the fact that you have developed a taste for Brunswick stew with squirrel meat in it, and you want them to show up. Other meats can be substituted, but none of them are the same. A decent .22 or .25 caliber pellet gun works well on squirrels and rats, but I refuse to eat a rat unless absolutely necessary. You can all thank the redneck part of my upbringing for the above knowledge gem.

Shotguns and nightscope….lol

If you have chickens, you will have mice or rats. You might want to move the chicken coop out of the garden. In my case, my neighbor has chickens and I have rats. At first I had mice. But then the rats came and killed the mice. Rats are territorial.
What I did: First I screened off all the vents and crawl space vents around the house. Then I set up traps. The good old spring traps worked the best. I also had a few electric traps. I propped them at an angle so the electrocuted rat would tumble out. A couple of times I found 2 dead rats outside one trap.

I see that you have T-111 siding on your house. Monitor the lower edge of that siding. If it rots or warps it will allow the rodents to get in. That's what recently happened to me. I had to remove a panel from the side of the house to reach the area behind the fireplace insert. Physically chased the rodents out. After replacing the panel I screwed a trim board along the lower edge to pull the siding tight up against the framing and block the gaps. Next summer's project will be replacing the siding on that side of the house. Zip board and Hardieplank. That should keep the rats out. And also deter the woodpeckers. Peck on this you stupid bird.

Cats are the best. My feral cat I care for eats all the mice outside. She’s the best. My four indoor cats take of the inside. The squirrel Mafiosa is another story. Since I have a large food forest. I generally just accept the fact that they eat half along with the birds. But I find leaving water bowls out for them to drink helps out tremendously. But nothing beats the cats.

Urin only works if the pest is familiar with the carnivore

LOL. Wait for the Raccoons and Possums. They can rip right through your roof into the attic. Talk about some expensive damage.

Thanks for these suggestions, Chris. I've not started a garden because I've been afraid of attracting rodents. Yet another practical and humane report.

Clean that litter box. No one likes a dirty bathroom, especially cats. Even the outdoor ones.

I typically use rat traps for squirrels, I’ve caught ground squirrels, mice, and a couple other kinds of rats I’ve never seen before

I've eliminated 20+ squirrels this year so far. I use a live trap to make sure I've got the correct critter. Then it goes into a trashcan full of water. Next is a suppressed air rifle. The air rifle is as quiet as a brad nailer, so my neighbors have no idea about it. It's especially useful since they feed these disgusting tree rats. The air rifle has taken more than the trap.

I grew up in and owned homes that were more than 100 years old. If peanut butter isn't working on your traps, try fig newtons. Grape jelly has also been effective. Great channel!

I will be in the yard on Sniper duty with a pellet gun and night vision scope. Hey, you got to have some fun. 😂

I’ve used the snap traps to good effect in the past

I have 2 indoor (cats), small game hunters. They have been very busy lately as the weather turns cooler here in NY.

I like how at 1:08 the cat realized he was in frame 😂

Mice don't like mint either.