bob haller wrote:
On Jun 20, 3:59�pm, (Jack) wrote:
On Sat, 20 Jun 2009 19:17:16 GMT, "brooklyn1"





wrote:
Jack wrote:
The east side property line is a paradise for woodchucks -- which are
called groundhogs here -- because it is defined by a line of about 50
mulberry and black cherry trees.
You have a woodchuck population only because you have all those mulberry and
cherry trees, they play a major part of their food supply. �Even if you do
away with some woodchucks new ones will arrive so long as those trees are
there. You cannot have those trees if you don't want those woodchucks. �The
only reasonable solution is to make that area a woodchuck sanctuary, pile in
lots of big rocks and build lots brush piles under all those trees... the
woodchucks will be happy, you won't need to mow there, and the woodchucks
will not encroach to where there is no food supply. �I have some woodchucks
but they stay near the brush piles I made way out in my woods alongside some
old rock walls... wood chucks like to burrow under large rocks. �Of course I
don't have 50 fruit trees there either. �Your fruit trees are what's known
as an attractive nuisance... if you harvested all that fruit most of the
woodchucks would leave. �Most mulberry trees produce fruit all summer, how
can you in good conscience complain about woodchucks when it's you who are
feeding them.
Well, these mulberries, black and white, �ripen in June and attract
all kinds of creatures, even the carnivorous fox, but by July the
fruit on the ground doesn't seem to be in great demand. �They
certainly do not produce fruit all summer. Cherries are later and are
ubiquituous like weeds, all over the property, not just the east
property line.

I'm not inclined to pile rocks or harvest the fruit but will continue
as in the past to rely on the shotgun as well as a suggestion from one
of the posters he soaking fruit in anti-freeze. �

That seems to be an excellent strategy.- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

so how many birds and other animals will die a horrible painful death
with your anti freeze fruit?

geez just live and let live, groundhogs are at most a nuisance.

Mine keeps the volunteer saplings and broadleaf weeds in the planting
bed around my deck trimmed back pretty well. He doesn't seem to like the
groundcover plants or ferns very well. (No idea what the groundcover is-
it has 2-tone green leaves.) Hey, not like I would ever get around to
cleaning the bed out. I suppose he is also responsible for the mound of
dirt at the back corner of the slab holding the old dog pen my shed sits
in- guess I oughta attack that with a shovel before frost season, so the
corner of the slab doesn't break off....

All in all, as neighbors go, I could do worse.

--
aem sends...