Life Hacks- pest control

There's nothing worse than putting hours of love and labor into your garden, and then finding some lousy rabbit, or squadron of hungry snails has wrecked all your hard work.

Pictured: Hair? Yep, my Dad's hair.
There's a really good reason for it, read on...

You guys know I'm no expert when it comes to working in the garden, but my dad is. He told me a couple awesome pest control tips, that I just needed to share... He didn't call them life hacks, but they damn well are. Here you go:

- (First picture) Rabbits and deer: Make the garden smell like danger. This will work for any other furry animal- leave things that smell like you all over the garden. Take a look at that picture of my dad's hair again. It can be as simple as this: sprinkle your hair around the garden whenever you get a cut or shave. Animals don't like our BO. This will be more effective if you haven't washed your hair in a number of days. Dad also drapes a really sweaty work shirt on the trellis every few days....

Pee-EWW! Make sure you don't wear deodorant!

Now, this part might sound weird but if you really want to make your garden smell dangerous to rabbits and deer, just drop trou and take a leak around the fencing. (NOT pictured, for obvious reasons.) Dad told me that he does this... Thankfully, he has never given me a demonstration- ick.

By the way, Dad says all of these "stink" related hacks will work about a hundred times better if you use dog fur, and dog urine. Ours died a couple years ago, so its a no-go for us now, but apparently dad used to let Hermes sniff around the garden and mark it, specifically for this reason.

-Slugs getting you down? Me too, because they are gross and annoying: If you have no qualms about killing the fuck out of them, you probably already go out at night with a flashlight and a bag of salt. You can spot them real easy in the beam because they are active at night, then you just kind of do an aerial assault, sprinkle them to death. I don't like touching them because they are gross, but if dad finds them this way, he just picks them up and drops them in a jar of salt water.

But...
There is a better way to find them. Leave some plastic boards out overnight, then go out in the early morning, flip the things over, and salt any motherfucking slugs you find there. I like to think that sprinkling their corpses around your property gives other slugs the idea that you aren't to be fucked with, but I didn't ask dad whether that makes any difference. Bonus: you can use a scooped out water melon rind to attract them instead of plastic sheeting, you'll be pleased with the results.

Those slimy bastards like it moist

-Slugs part 2: Speaking of slugs, Dad says you can boost your gardens natural defenses by encouraging habitat for snakes. Leave a tarp in partial sun, and boom, your done. They won't harm your plants, and they will slaughter entire armies of slugs. Whenever we see frogs or toads on the property, we release them in the garden too- they help keep the slugs in check... At least until they die, via snake.

"Ribbit" means "Feed me slugs"

-Snails: They are easy to kill, just crush their shells with your spade, or boot (or drop them in my dads jar of salt water lol)... But they are hard to find in numbers. My dad lets the grass grow wild around the fencing, because he finds the snails will hide on the tall blades throughout the morning. The other day we found like 15 or 20 by gently sifting through the tall grass. It was a massacre.... BEHOLD:

THEY

FAST

AREN'T

ENOUGH

TO

ESCAPE!!!

-(Biting) flies: This is a DIY hack that will make your gardening life about a billion percent easier: fly trap hats. Just put some double stick tape, on the back of your hat. Black tape seems to work the best. Just wear them while you work, and after a couple hours you'll have a collection of deer flies (and other randoms) stuck in the goo, buzzing and twitching but utterly trapped.

Doesn't help the plants and vegetables any, but it will help you- and then you'll be able to better care for your garden.

OLD MAN SWAG

- June bugs: Hold a cup of soapy water directly underneath them and then touch them gently. Their defense mechanism is an immediate downward fall. They will land in cup, and the soapy water will kill them... horribly, by drowning as they will be unable to climb out due to the suds. Serves those fuckers right.

-Literally any bug that crawls, that you'd rather keep out of the garden: sprinkle some diotomaceous earth along the fence, or whichever growing areas the pests have targeted. It is a desiccant, meaning it dries things out. So any gross-ass bug which stupidly crawls through a line of this white powder will get coated in the stuff, basically turn into a mummy.

Best part? It is completely non toxic, so it doesn't matter if it gets on your vegetables. Downside? Any rain will easily wash it away...

So that's about all my dad told me for pest control. Dad uses a havahart trap to try to relocate rabbits... But that's not a hack by any means. You probably already read about the squirrel trapping...

Hello again, come here often?

What are your favorite tips for managing (or slaughtering) the various creepy crawlies that plague your garden? I'd love to steal your ideas lol.