The Message Board

RE: wild rabbits aaaargh please help

Posted 320 days ago

The only thing I have ever heard about to keep rabbits out is a wire fence. Sorry there isn't an easier solution.

Be thankful that it's not kangaroos that are eating your vegies because they can jump fences too easily.

RE: wild rabbits aaaargh please help

Posted 319 days ago

thanks for that info but i had a look on another website
and it said that if they are hungry enough they will chew through it
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its great watching vegies grow from scratch especially when you planted them yourself and if they survive the rabbits

RE: wild rabbits aaaargh please help

Posted 165 days ago

A solid wire/metal fence will keep feral rabbits out. We live in open woodland and have house garden and orchard garden fences which allows smaller lizards in but keeps rabbits out. They rarely cross cattle grids but will cross at the sides of them. - I here add small gauge mesh (old gutter guard) as well as at the bottom of any gate rather like a stiff skirt. This prevents small rabbits from gaining access. A mother rabbit will push a baby rabbit through a remarkably small opening in order to give it a safe environment - your garden.

I now use the bait Pindane out in the paddock in a very controlled way to knock the feral rabbit numbers down during the dry season. Ask your local council or the local ag store for advice on using it with wildlife species present. If you use wide mesh covering as per instructions then kangaroos and parrots are unable to get to it but rabbits will. It is a weak bait and rabbits need several feeds. Good luck.

RE: wild rabbits aaaargh please help

Posted 162 days ago

We have no fences & hundreds of rabbits which come from the adjoining bushland every evening, they drive us crazy too! I chickenwire surround everything now, it seems to keep them off. It looks ugly but I think its better than no garden at all. They have a go at absolutely everything otherwise, even almost ringbarking some young hakea, ribbon gum, native frangipani & banksias...it seems like nothing is safe from them, except weeds of course! The only thing I have known to chew through the chicken wire are foxes to get at my compost trench. The rabbits also eat all the mulch unless it is within the surround too. When we eventually get fences I am definitely going rabbit-proof!

RE: wild rabbits aaaargh please help

Posted 158 days ago

You could try one of the animal deterrents on the market. I also know blood and bone will put them off as they don't like the strong smell - two draw backs, need to re apply if it rains, if you have a dog he will love to roll in it.
You could also try a taste deterrent of chilli and garlic spray, there's a Beat -A- Bug range with these ingredients at the nurseries.

RE: wild rabbits aaaargh please help

Posted 155 days ago

Contact your wild life officer through the local council. Orgaise a community meeting and invite a Wild Life Officer to come to your community and educated you on the rabbits breeding habits,life cycle and how effective Pindone poisening is and precautions that need to be taken, so you don't poisen pets and other animals. The whole community needs to participate to make this type of poisening effective as rabbits are territorial, that is one dies and another will eventually take its place. Most of our neighbours participated and the rabbit problem subsided for 5-8 years and now numbers are slowly on the incline. Some people keep cats and Jack Russels as an effective deterant. Fencing the Vegie patch with chicken mesh,having a German Shepherd who had a taste for rabbits and using Pindone worked for me. Good luck.
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RE: wild rabbits aaaargh please help

Posted 152 days ago

Cats will deal with rabbits very satisfactorily. But rabbits won't eat through chicken wire. If you put up a fence be sure to bend a foot out so that if the rabbits try to dig under it they can't.

I lived in suburbia but close to wet lands where there were rabbits. I couldn't work out what was reducing the size of my rosemary bushes until I came home late one night and saw rabbits all down the street :-) You could ask your council or the ag board to release some Myx. or calichi virus in your area if they're that bad.
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