Backyard Pests

Nicole Avedon | By Nicole Avedon | Staten Island Advance
on July 07, 2008 at 1:50 PM, updated July 07, 2008 at 5:37 PM

After hearing about the McCullough family of Sheffield Lake, Ohio, who had to temporarily flee -- and repair -- their house after skunks made themselves at home-stinky-home in the crawl space, people may be giving the stink-eye to the various critters and varmints lurking around their home.

For some, you can go the Terminator route and call in professional exterminators.

If you're looking for a nonlethal solution, humane trapping is one option. But some animals, such as raccoons and skunks, can't be released anywhere else. And it is illegal to release any animal in the Metroparks.

There are other ways to drive out and/or keep out pests, but the best result you're going to get is a peaceful coexistence. Here are some suggestions from a variety of yard-care experts.


Squirrels may be cute, but they can also be a nuisance. They chase birds away from bird feeders and eat the seeds themselves. They eat planted seeds and bulbs.

They're also smart and learn to work around obstacles. Varying your tactics may help.

Baffles of smooth metal around the trunks of fruit trees and bases of bird feeders are one deterrent. Squirrels don't like safflower seeds, so use those in the bird feeder. You can also scatter mothballs in the garden or spray a cayenne pepper spray around plants.


Pepe Le Pew doesn't eat many plants, but he does dig a lot of holes looking for yummy grubs.

Skunks also eat a lot of small rodents, which is good for your home and garden.

But few people delight at the sight of a skunk and its potential to pollute. The McCullough family had to hire a professional trapper after skunks nested beneath their house and caused a chain reaction of damage.

Eliminate their source of food, and you'll see a lot fewer skunks. recommends spraying milky spore disease or applying beneficial nematodes onto lawns and flower beds to reduce the amount of grubs. Skunks also hate the smell of ammonia. Soak old rags in household ammonia, and place near their hangout.


Where you have lawn, you'll have moles -- and the ugly, dangerous holes they leave in their wake. Moles are also territorial; their personal space is around 3,000 square feet. The problem is, once you get rid of one, another will come.

Putting used cat litter into a burrow can scare off moles. But moles often just make a new burrow. Grubs and earthworms are major parts of a mole's diet. If you can get the moles to burrow deeper, they can live under the yard without creating the dangerous holes.

Check out different grass options and practice good lawn care to develop deeper roots, which would keep grubs and worms deeper below the lawn's surface. Eliminating earthworms with an insecticide like Sevin is a drastic idea, but if the mole infestation is so bad that it's destroying your lawn, it may be the only solution outside of trapping.


Does your yard have more holes in it than a golf course? It's likely the handiwork of chipmunks, who burrow and create an ugly, hazardous mess in your yard. They can even damage the foundation and brickwork on porch steps by burrowing under and around them.

Repellents aren't effective, trapping and killing them is. If you don't want to do that, try putting mothballs down the holes. Pouring animal urine (available at nurseries and yard-care stores) may also work. But it can stink on humid days, which means you don't want to use it near the house.


Bunnies frolicking are adorable. Bunnies eating up your plants? Not so cute. Myles Bader, author of "1001 All-Natural Secrets to a Pest-Free Property," recommends sprinkling wood ashes around plants and planting a border of wormwood. But you have to sprinkle the ashes again after every rainfall and every time you water your plants.

Vary any repellents every few weeks.

An electric fence around the vegetable garden can be the most effective deterrent. Some run on solar power.


Raccoons eat virtually anything, with sweet corn being their favorite snack. They're nocturnal.

Prevention is the best method for dealing with raccoons. Bring in any bowls of pet food and water at night. Put either ammonia, hot sauce or Lysol on the lid of trash cans to repel them. Store bird seed inside. Spread dog hair where you have raccoons.

Other solutions include dusting plants with cayenne pepper, spreading hydrated lime around the garbage cans and hanging some dirty clothes outside.


If deer are hungry, they're coming out of the woods to dine on your garden and landscaping. A single deer can eat 5 pounds of greenery a day. In addition to that being costly, it's dangerous. The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety estimates that 500,000 crashes and at least 100 deaths are caused by deer-car collisions each year.

Human hair, dog hair, predator urine, soap, blood meal and rotten pepper are commonly used to deter deer. Bader's book has a recipe for a concoction of 1 tablespoon cayenne pepper, 3 tablespoons kelp, 3 tablespoons liquid hand soap, 1/2 teaspoon oil of peppermint and 1 pint of warm water as a deterrent.

Another recipe is a mixture of 3 tablespoons finely ground kelp, 1 cup smelly fish emulsion and 3 tablespoons dish soap. Mix well, and spray on plants where the deer hang out. But don't use them on anything you'll be eating.

Deer fences should be 7 feet or taller around an entire property to be effective. Electric fences are another kind of deterrent. A sprinkler system called Scarecrow has a motion detector that, between the noise and the water, can repel deer.

Melissa Hebert is a staff writer for The Plain Dealer of Cleveland. She can be contacted at