The Official Farming Thread...

[Bill G]

It is call harvesting not harming.

 

[jakethesnake]

I have no desire to harm wildlife.
I have blinking deterrents hung up in my back yard and for the most part they work great - till they don't during cloud coverage and when wind hangs them up onto branches.

Also, a huge close by walnut is dropping its leaves and I have seen the bird sitting in its crown eyeing my yard.

Sorry buddy. What are these blinking things hanging? I have chickens too. Little bit of a fox problem as well

 

[nbbt]

View attachment 437105Planted some garden garlic no clue if I done right but gotta start somewhere

One of our local garlic growers put out a fairly good growing guide. And the U Of Minnesota has a pdf as well.

I'll share both of their guides here.

 

[Lnk]

Sorry buddy. What are these blinking things hanging? I have chickens too. Little bit of a fox problem as well

Anything that reflects light, mobiles made from CD ROMs, they make a shiny reflective tape. We have that stuff all over. Keeps the hawks nervous. If you let your chickens get close to the woods, fox will eat real good. You are going to lose one occasionally. It has been a while since we lost anybody, probably tomorrow now. This is the season of fattening before the leanest times. Hawk activity is pretty high right now. My attempts at befriending a murder of crows is so far unsuccessful. Crows run hawks off when they find them. Just got to get the crows to hang around.

 

[Wilhelm]

Sorry buddy. What are these blinking things hanging? I have chickens too. Little bit of a fox problem as well

Proven most successful in reflecting light over a very long period of time - the coated aluminum disks out of old computer hard drives hung high & freely on a piece of waxed nylon string.
Several of them all around the yard Your chickens are held in.
The reflections are like a light show and seem to irritate predatory birds in their attempts to hunt my chicken & ducks.
Giving those disks a slight bend increases the erratic reflection of light.
I can get a picture of the disks after work.

This won't bother ground moving mammals though.
We have to lock our chickens and ducks in over night or we'd have none left within a week.
Strong fox population in my area, as well as other small predatory mammals.

P.S./Edit:
Data CD's & DVD's work too, but they reflect less and UV fade fast.

Pieces of stainless steel sheet can be used, but those are heavy and rip off in strong winds.
And they are also less reflective.

Aluminum tape oxydizes fairly fast and is less reflective too.

But, anything reflective and moving works.