I have been told and I have tried sprinkling red pepper flakes all around the vegetables I don't want the raccoons to touch. Apparently what happens is they go to clean themselves and they get the pepper in their eyes and it tells them not to go back there again.
You earned my sub just for telling the truth , how refreshing . It burns my hide when people think they are being kind when releasing a critter in a strange place . That poor animal will have to fight every racoon in the area to find its place . Plus the possible spreading of disease . Cheers
I'm in Kentucky, too. We just trapped 50 raccoons this summer. Between us and the neighbors. 3 years ago, they took down all our corn in the matter of 4 days.
I’m fighting voles for the first time ever! Ugh 😩 and all kinds of bugs I’ve never seen in my life of gardening and I’m 54 years old and been gardening since I was a kid. The struggle is real this year for sure.
People who think this is inhumane lives in a bubble, never had a garden or tried growing your own food.It takes a lost of effort to garden, juts so a raccoon or other animal comes and destroys every thing just when you are about to harvest. I tried many things get an electric fence sooner than later.
My racoons are actually friendly! (Which makes it harder!)- I was setting my trap one night; I turn around, and there's a racoon sitting not a foot behind me, watching! Sometimes they'll hang out on the porch with my cats! They can get pretty fierce when trapped though....
Your exactly right tho. We've lost whole corn crops to deer and raccons. We've lost so many chickens i lost count to raccons at night. We let the free range the weekends while were home. But a fox usually nabs 1 at least. Homestead attracts predators of all breeds. I dont even try to trap anymore. Guy down the road eats the raccons i get em and call him. He grills em somehow. Not bad eating really. Turtles in the pond is a whole another thing. We catch the big snappers and the same guy down the road loves those. Regular turtles. We set at the picnic table and pick em off. Homesteading. Everything is out to get ya. Including the government. Its hard work. But its nice when it pays off.
Yes it is. I love raccoon stew. Also, We used to eat turtle all the time growing up. Caught some really big ones in the Cumberland river catfishing. Ok I may have to take a fishing trip soon.
@@YSLRD a few turtles is a good thing. For pond health. But my place was neglected for a very long time. So the turtles had pretty much taken over. We tried trapping them and relocating with no success. The big snappers. Eat my ducks. And the other turtles eat my fish and fish eggs.
Opossums usually don't carry distemper but if you've got that many racoons running around it's a good possibility. Circling is one of the end stage symptoms. We've had some bad outbreaks in the trash panda population here in western NY. What makes your channel good is that you cover all the things.
@@CollegeHillFarm not a criticism at all, but have you thought of using an electric fence or poultry netting? I've seen several homesteaders use it because of deer, raccoon & ground hogs. True Grit Appalachian Ways YT Andy talks about his electric fence. He said deer can wipe out his corn & beans in one day! You did the right thing.
Good morning from a sunny and warm England. This is an excellent video. We don’t have the same animals eating our crops but on the small area in which I grow food I have to protect against pigeons that will quickly destroy a lot of young vegetables, by netting them until they reach a size when the pigeons lose interest. Badgers have destroyed my corn for the last two years but as they have strong legal protection here they can’t be controlled so I have given up growing it. I was brought up on a small farm and I think that one of the principal problems in both our societies is that most of the urban population is divorced from the means of production of the fruit, vegetables and animals that we consume every day. Keep up the good work!
Yes people who live in urban population centers have no idea about where our food comes from. We have pigeons too we call them morning doves. They love young plants.
It's basically the same almost all over the world. I'm a city boy, but i can understand farmers. Here we have Wolves now since maybe 5 years. Farmers with sheep or other smaller animals are of course not happy with them. It's crazy people from the cities who think it's a good idea to protect Wolves, or whatever idea they get in their head, maybe tomorrow something else.
Oh hun, I undertook the hurculean task of beginning to revitilizing my husband's family farm here in Abruzzo Italy and we have issues with an invasive species of wild boar from Eastern Europe called cinghiale. (CHIN-GEE-AH-LAY) I lived in Naples florida for 11 years before moving here so I had seen my fair share of wild boar running around the Everglades down there, but cinghiale are nothing like those little guys. These things are huge. They are almost like small cows. A momma sow can be 600-700 pounds unpregnant. They can and will eat all of your vegetables if you don't have good fencing. They get into your garbage. They are nocturnal and cause terrible car accidents when driving on country roads at night. In Rome where they have become so used to being around people, they have figured out how to go up to tables that haven't been bussed yet at restaraunts with outdoor dinning, they grab the edge of the tablecloth and pull everything off the table to get the table scraps. They are amazingly intellegent and have taught themselves how to get food from everywhere. We do have an official cinghiale season here to hunt them but it just doesn't seem to be enough. Now people are just resorting to fences that electricuit them to death when hunting season is over. This is why releasing non-native species into any environment is such a catastrophically bad idea. Sometimes reality bites. Hopefully people watching your channel with learn to do better. Ciao .
I don't know where you got the idea that wild boar are invasive in Italy. Their native range spans from Ireland down to north Africa and through the Middle East over to India, China, and Indonesia. Romans frequently depicted them in art and even wrote recipes for boar. What's true is that since the countryside in Italy was progressively abandoned from the 50s onward, their populations have grown out of control.
@@nickjohnson2367 there are different species. The species that Is out of control now here Is originally from Romania, which, WAS part of the former Roman empire, they have overtaken the smaller boar that are actually native to the Italian peninsula. This Is at least according to officials at the municipio here in Abruzzo that I have spoken to. Ran into One leaving the farm again last evening. Luckily I have a dog that escorts me out when I am leaving thought, I admit I was there too late last night. I really Need to get outta there before sunset. They come out at night.
I am a homeowner who gardens and I used to breed and show horses. These critters cause us so many problems! Even if you don't homestead, you still have to manage these problems. It's groundhogs that have done the most damage for me. They will not get in those live traps unless they are very young. I use the kill traps for groundhogs. Sometimes I get opossums and skunks in them.
Used kitty litter worked on the groundhog holes. Well one way to recycle litter. Have to repeat but less all the time then long breaks before they show up again. I won't use kill traps even though I have them. Don't want to hurt non target animals like small loose dogs, birds or cats.
@HYTELES Worked for groundhogs but not the raccoon dens under neighbors shed and they killed my birds. Saw the two dens under them after they removed them to sell the place.
I have wolves and stray dogs killing my goats regularly, birds of prey killing my free grazing chicken, small birds at the hundreds eating all the aronia berries and strawberries, mice and rats eating our potatoes in the cellar so I came to the conclusion that living in nature and farming means WAR. The strongst survives and I do whatever I can to not lose this game.
Sounds like you need a cat to watch your cellar and a dog to watch your goats. I’ve heard hanging a line with bright colored flags over where you keep your chickens will keep hawks away, never tried it myself though.
This is a really important video. It's hard to do these things (for people with compassion). I had an issue with porcupines destroying our pear trees this summer and we ended up having to kill two of them. I butchered them and turned them into food afterward so it felt less wasteful, but still it's really hard to do these things. Thanks for sharing this.
@@jswhosoever4533 It's not my favorite meat at all. But it's fine. The smell is a bit strong while skinning, and cooking it. But it's okay. The texture is a bit like beef and the taste is IDK, maybe a bit of sweetness in there, a bit of perfumey muskiness. Hard to describe. Perfectly decent food though. I canned up the two porcupines I had to kill to protect my orchard (they were DESTROYING my pear trees) and was able to make 6 pints of pretty meat-rich porcupine soup. I haven't done a video on it for my channel yet because I'm not sure how TH-cam will react to it. I have some video of the process though. I have a channel on Rumble and I might release it there.
Racoons do NOT lke climbing on loose material. Get some poultry fencing from "Premeir 1" and electrify it! Make sure it is well staked to the ground with garden tacks, or they will go UNDER it. Mine has worked well now for four years in a row. Good eating!
@@CollegeHillFarm but you'll be trapping coons for the rest of your life otherwise. How much do you value your time? Multiply that by every trap you set and every raccoon you kill for the rest of your life, and it might make up for the cost of some electric fencing and the couple days it takes for you to put it up. Plus, if like you said you don't like to kill them, wouldn't it be worth it falling a little short of breaking even just to not have to kill them anymore? I don't know if you'll agree, and if not that's fine I just want you to think about every angle.
There's a balance between stewardship and success. What's important is you care and try to solve problems peaceably, if you can. At the end of the day you gotta do what you gotta do.
We're also the only animal with the intelligence and means to eradicate all competition for resources beyond mere survival but also for purely trivial purposes if we so choose.
You have to do one or more of these: 1. Stop loaning things out 2. Keep a list of who has what. 3. Get a deposit. My dad had an auto engine rebuilding shop and when we started keeping a list AND getting a deposit - everything was returned. We finally stopped loaning things out.
I've been dealing with this issue, and it's at an emergency state now. They got thru a gap in my metal skirling, got under my Mobile home, and tore out insulation! Now, they got my corn this year, but I guarantee they won't get it next year! Now I've got to repair the insulation, but I need to get them out from under the mobile home, to do that. I have no problem doing what needs to be done! They are BIG too! Heard one out my window one night, and it was on the propane tank, trying to get the lid up! Then it went over to the electric box and tried to open the electric box! Yeah, they are extremely destructive! I can never seem to catch them at night, to send them to the raccoon heaven, lol. Thanks, for the info! I'M GETTING THE TRAPS!
I don’t have a homestead, just a backyard but the bully’s of my yard are the squirrels and they are tearing up my tomatoes!😢 they were the best this year too!
@@CollegeHillFarm I watch from my office all the animals. They all have personalities between the hawks and crows trying to mark their territory to the squirrels, chipmunks and birds sharing the bird feeders!
@baneverything5580 Exactly when life give you lemons , you turn your pest into high quality compost and next years harvest is even better. Thanks vermin! They are literally trying to outcompete you with your own food, but im top of the food chain buddy.
When we were growing blocks of sweetcorn, 12 rows wide, and 30 foot long, we had five blocks that we staggered at planting time we used to take and put five or six rows of winter squash around the whole five blocks and then when it was time to pick sweetcorn, we just carefully stepped in so we didn’t injure any squash, vines or leaves and the raccoons deer possums they all left our sweetcorn alone because they didn’t like pushing through the pokey leaves on her noses so they never bothered to get to the sweetcorn till after we were done and we picked the squash then it looked like it got hit by a bomb the next morning
Yup we planted squash around two sides and cucumbers around two. Then we planted marigolds on all 4 sides on edge of the garden. They couldn't smell the corn and didn't like going past prickles.
In real life situation, all we can do and ask for is to be respectful til the end. That’s really important. Cause there are dark things that need to happen. And respect brings light to that darkness.
I had 60 tomato plants decimated overnight by deer. They in 8 years never went to that tight area you'd think they'd avoid if they felt threatened and ran.
Our cats and livestock guardian dogs keep critters away. Had an area by my new shop that dogs didn’t have access to and woodchucks tried tunneling under my concrete. Put the dogs up by the building for a month and that took care of it
I do hope you get some fencing soon so you can get some hounds. They seem to be really effective at scaring away critters if not dealing with them if trained
Always had goats, fowl, friut trees and gardens till recently. You gotta end a lot critters. My trash panda count could be as high as 50 a year, 30 average, a couple dozen rabbits, half a dozen possum a few chucks and occasionally dogs gettting my chickens, my penned chickens they dug under the fence for and couldn't figure a way out (don't tell me anything about those dogs either), a rare coyote (they learned fast, neighbor said he sees them make a wide arc about 200 yards away but never closer. I looked, their tracks confirm). Most places are overpopulated from abundant food and few if any predators. It really just makes a vacuum that sucks the neighboring ones in more than anything. It never stops. Who is the garden for, you or them? Recommend flashlight patrols at night, like when you let the dog out, and the few hours after dark. If ya can, use clustered snap traps not 1, or 4 around bait or across the path. Live traps need to be baited with the peanut butter stuffed into an open pill bottle that they have to spend time on and wired to the back. We don't do antifreeze anymore we kept a fresh bowl of it in the barn loft for decades. Some like electric fences for corn but I've been tangled in them in the dark and didn't like that enough to repeat it. Squirrels would eat the seeds out of half-grown pears and always get away till I bought a driveway alarm. Those will let you know. They can be matched with one frequency when buying so one receiver is all you need, I used 3. Get a good pellet rifle that is hand cocking without any tanks or cartridges. Cheaper ammo and fine for up to a coyote (in .25, half that for .177) Good old boy told me about putting sardines in a small hole in a tree and driving a nail in from a little above at an angle. Raccoon can easily reach in, but in the morning it will still be there stuck when you run your line. Gramps ran 3 lines of 75 before and after school from the age of 7. They ate Everything and were still hungry often. He's the one that told me to use 4 legholds if I wasn't taking fur (only one gets a foot, the rest ...🙈).
Have - A- Heart makes many different size traps. I use the same kind that you have. They are the most common and are marketed as racoon traps. I have found that opossum really like peanuts and old corn tortilla chips. They like bird seed too.
I stopped trying to grow corn in my backyard suburban garden because the raccoons always destroyed it just when the ears where starting to get big but not yet ready to harvest. The worse thing is the raccoons don’t even eat it all, they just take a few bites and trash all the plants. So frustrating. Corn seems to be the worst for this. Things like tomatoes, beans, squash are attacked less.
Dose of reality. Too many people see just butterflies and roses in the homesteading and gardening videos, and wish they could do that. If they do try it, then they invariably get hit from all sides--wildlife, insects destroying your trees and vegetables, invasive and encroaching plants, biting pests with all sorts of disease, time to harvest and economic realities, weather, trees falling on your construction projects (cost me a month's worth of work), broken bones which can take you out of commission for an entire growing season, dangerous snakes, and on and on. Whatever you think you're starting, you need to set your expectations two notches lower and your time to sustainability an extra year or two. Thanks for the good talk.
33 years old from suburban NJ here I have 1/3 acre yard that I work everyday I had a problem with a mink that kept coming to my yard and murdring everything in sight. I live in a suburb of NYC Crazy to think
Currently battling a rat problem 😭 I don’t live anywhere with many owls or snakes and my best option is to trap them. My dogs are too destructive to be rat catchers 😂 they break all my plants.
I had a homestead in the Arizona high desert and had other troubles. ALL my vegetables would be eaten the second they came out of the ground for their moisture. Cottontails and jackrabbits were a small problem handled by dogs. But the desert rats- they were the worst. I eventually learned to plant at a time when there was a lot of of new growth. That way predation for moisture was far less of an issue. My corn would then grow large enough that the rats left it be. I still had to fence the rest of my garden to stop those buggers. I used small square wire around the garden to get anything out of it. It took me three years to master growing in the desert, but once I did it was easy. Dogs use to keep their numbers lower- they loved hunting them. And every once is a while, I would hold a hunting fest and invite friends over with 22 shot shells and high power pellet rifles for a free meal and then a night hunt... It was part of being able to grow my own food.
I’ve seen Possums take pellets between the eyes and just keep hissing and showing their huge fangs, don’t want to mess with them if you don’t have to! Good video, thank you.
Part of conservation is preserving numbers. If my choices are 1.) Allow the wildlife to subsist on some of my crops, allow them to never starve but need to cull their populations to maintain natural balance using humane euthanasia practices or 2.) Cage my crops off and let them struggle on limited natural resources and let nature conserve their numbers through their violent competition over limited resources and starvation, then I would like to think Option 1 is the kindest option from an animal lovers perspective.
They call us 'Blockies' in Queensland. I like your clever little traps, I just don't know I'm going to get a kangaroo into one! They can cause a bit of damage themselves. Very interesting, and good luck with your corn,😊
This is the ugly side to settling land. Is it bad? No. Is it necessary? Yes. But it is sad for the animals who are simply innocents doing what they do. We are the stewards of the land. It's up to us to not only keep it working for us, but good for them as well.
Going in circles like that? Ear infection most likely. I had a cat to walk with it's head also tilted to walk straight until the infection burst. They are all treatable and nature takes time to heal itself.
I've been able to keep the raccoons in check for the most part, but this year I have had a time with the beaver. I have a creek down by my garden and this year they decided to use my corn stalks to build with. I took out 6 adults to just keep corn. Enjoyed video take care
I don't have a homestead but a large garden and birds which raccoons wiped out about 35. Have to do what you have to then rabbits and deer. It's a lot of money to fence in all that yard. Injured my leg in a knee deep groundhog hole. Used kitty litter drives them off if I keep up on the holes. Mesh and netting on a lot of things. I got one skunk now that was nerve-wracking releasing.
I always throw a tarp over to release a skunk. It he sprays it only gets on the tarp. A lot of people have suggested fencing it is just not cost effective.
@CollegeHillFarm I used a heavy duty garbage bag. Talked softly. It looked terrified. Literally scared the poop out of it too. Left a pile in the trap.
I live in the suburbs of a big city, My lawn was weeds, but it was nice green weeds, nice flat lawn. Now all churned up and full of holes. Tried many a device and concoction - never caught much in a trap. They are too smart.
Sounds like gophers or voles or moles. Get Caster Bean Plant. They hate them. They are beautiful but poisonous. They are an anual and you can just harvest the seeds and replant next year.
Like two ends of seesaw, pick one side you would like to weigh in. Then you treat the other side as enemy just because you want to defend your side, food or pets. Sometimes co-exist is just not possible.
33 raccoons in a solid year. We have chickens and they ruined an entire garden in a night just taking single bites out of large pumpkins and leaving them to rot while tearing down all the corn. Chipmunks got so bad they ruined the wires in our tractor. We had to depopulate them a bit.
I've never done anything outside of growing tomatoes, squash, beans and corn in my urban garden. For me the problem was the bugs.. They decimated my corn like you would not believe.. I have a question. It may seem like a dumb question but here goes: For someone that doesn't wanna delete the little critters, is it possible to feed them leftovers from your home and also cheap food such as popcorn, rice and beans and maybe even the fruits that are turning bad in the Asian grocery stores that are half off? I was just thinking if that would maybe deter them from touching the crops since the food that people make is much more tasty and desirable than what they get from the crops. I also realize that it may not be economically viable to feed a group of 30 raccoons but if you weigh it against amm, traps and other items, could it make sense to handle the problem this way as opposed to Deleting them.? Like I said, probably a dumb question but I was really curious about the viability of this approach and I see from your video and the comments that everyone here, REALLY knows what they're talking about. Great video. Thanks.
If you feed them they will reproduce to uncontrolable numbers and will start the diseases. You don't want diseased critters roaming the neighborhood. That is just what I have observed in the last 50 yrs or so.
Saw a moose do that once and got put down by warden it ended up being infested with ticks, this was back before ticks became common in Maine and i only knew of ticks from the Ren and Stimpy show.
I live in a big city- had chickens once upon a time... defending my half dozen girls from raccoons, hawks, dogs, skunks, rats etc became a full time job... long before eggs were $8 a dozen.
Sadly this is true. Fences can help but they are expensive, takes time put them up, and then there is maintenance of the fence line. But a determined racoon or bear will not be stopped by a fence. I've got lots of mended fence and damaged fruit trees to prove that.
I'd really like to build a network of public game fences so that wild animals couldn't even make it into town so we could garden the whole zone. And to keep them off the highway. It's one thing to kill something because you share a habitat and another thing to have to share a habitat so neighbors can live in a fantasy wilderness only to call the state when they inevitably cause property damage. Here in Montana almost all wildlife was driven to extinction by the early 20th century and had to be artificially repopulated using conservation, including relocation and stock breeding. Turkeys, pheasants, deer, elk, everything. Never gets taught in school, let alone that there are only a couple old growth forests in the whole USA. Doesn't mean it's not a good thing, but it's led to this false sense of connection with a natural world that doesn't exist (I say town but we live 55 miles from the closest city. So far from anywhere you can find it on a globe. And the animals are still livestock.)
I remember when good people didn't give two hoots about someone killing a varmint for killing your chickens or destroying your crops. But they did care about killing an unborn child.
Can't afford a fence. Wildlife rehabs do not accept perfectly ok animals. You have to deal with them. They will over populate and next thing you know diseases you don't want are on your property.
Trapping and releasing raccoons elsewhere should absolutely be illegal. They need to be dealt with where they are. I have been fighting raccoons for years, and I'm ready to move b/c there's nothing I can do that would actually help where I'm living now.
@@SelfTaughtArtist1 I've determined you have to teach them with lead, and where I'm at, I can't do it. So I need to move someplace where I can do that if I ever encounter them again.
Not a homesteader but love nature and love to grow (this is the first year). I think I found a juvenile rabid skunk attacking its sibling😢. I’m extra vigilant now but if anyone has similar experiences message me I’m concerned😔
Kangaroos attack my avocado and mango sapplings, stripping them of their leaves, and occasionally gnawing on the stems. I must enclose the plant sites with a robust wire mesh wrap to allow the trees enough time to develop unimpeded. I feel your pain!
That possum looked like it has an ear infection. The way it was walking and tilting its head was evident to that because dogs react similarly when that happens.
I have a good well trained dog to keep wildlife away that I dont want. I have a solar electric fence to protect my bees and crops. My dog does a fine job. Thats worked for 59 years on my Homestead.
@@CollegeHillFarm mine does and he only chases off varmints I tell him too except yesterday I was trying to relocate a venomous copperhead snake with my snake tong and he jumped up and shook it to death. Live traps and guns are only about a couple hundred years invented. Dogs were our farm guards for thousands of years. It worked then and it works now
@@paulsawczyc5019There's a big difference between living on a farm and farming. Most farms breed and manage animals. Certain responsibilities come with that. When you have enough of them, even if you don't use them for meat, it will eventually become necessary to put an animal down.
@@CollegeHillFarm Please don't waste your money. It may work for a few days, but NOTHING works except an electric fence which I am about to install. Tried everything including the noise maker which is now a nuisance whenever there is someone in the yard.
My little cousin started trapping for the farmers in his neighborhood when he was in middle school in the mid 00s here in Ohio. Mostly raccoons. He was interested in trapping and hunting as a hobby and he got to practice handling furs as a part of the process. Idk that he's doing it anymore tho. Jobs will do that to you 😂
Loĺ. This hit home. Lol. As i sit horrified by skunk on deck. Thought it was my cat out of corner of eye. I was pinned climbing over railing. 😂. He needs to be trapped and dipatched. We try everything before dispatch. We let deer have apples. Possums clean up garden, skunks in compost. Its when they get greedy. Lol. I tell them stay in your lane. Foxes dont bother chickens. Sometimes you just gotta make decisions sucky as that may be. ❤
I don't live in a farm but do you have barn cats? I also remember seeing a trap on tv that catches rats and stuff and it's designed for foxes to be able to open it, you get rid of the rat and the fox is fed and hopefully wouldn't go after your chickens.
Morally speaking, I think all of this is barely a drop in the bucket compared to what factory farming does on a daily basis. If people find this disturbing, then they should be prepared to lose their minds when they find out how much of their modern comforts are being upheld by truly hellish cruelty. At least this is stuff our ancestors had to do get us here. Now we're all just complicit in lining the pockets of investors who have never touched dirt in their lives.
Caught a huge raccoon in my trap. It bent that floor plate into a tight coil. Rolled it up like a sleeing matt..anyways it was impressive that i needed and anvil and hammer to straighten it and the critter did it with its hands. Tough.
I am for sure a city boy. Born and raised in what is honestly not a large city, but it's big enough. Homesteading is the end goal for me. Self sufficiency has its appeal, especially these days. I have zero illusions about the types of things I am going to have to do, from culling livestock to pest control, or defense of said livestock. Thanks for presenting it in this manner. People are way too sheltered these days, and far too reliant on corporate supply chains. I do what I can in my backyard presently. Learning as much as I can about gardening, collecting seeds, and food preservation. If it was legal to keep chickens here I would for sure have a coop. Unfortunately that is not in the cards as of now.
Get some hounds or even Heinz 57 Lab /and any of the terrior breeds , i used pitt / labs ...now i use lab/ boston terrior mix ..keeps coyotes, raccoons, possums, ground hogs , pretty much any small preditor animals at bay or get a couple.old car battery's an some cheap wire an go to er !! Some fresg cut garlic with cheyanne pepper on it or around the bases will stop deer an some others also
I live in NYC with 6 chickens in a small backyard. I already have to "manage" rats, mice, and raccoons, along with the poison ivy that came with the house. Im currently looking for land in the country. Id rather deal with the headaches of homesteading than this overpopulated prison yard of a city.
Predator population control is a thing that I deal with every year. Raccoons are dispatched but young possums get released down by the river 20 miles away from any populated area
Hi how do you catch gophers?? I have a little acre farm and they're destroying my land 😢 We have various traps for moles, squirrels and raccoons but gophers are new to us. Have you any advice?
I have never tried to catch gophers. We don't have them where I live but we have ground hogs which are similar. I would imagine you need to use a conibear trap to catch them. I did a video about the different kinds of traps in a video I called Barbaric II th-cam.com/video/3DzOABKYHh4/w-d-xo.html
Living out in the rural areas, my parents would have us kids help make some traps that work the same way as the have a heart traps. We used a thick gauge fencing wire bent around rebar. Those got used for trapping all sorts of wildlife that was causing problems somehow or another.
@@CollegeHillFarm Yeah, sounds like you had a big infestation to deal with. Sadly, those leg hold traps are probably the worst kind to use. Not harshing on ya, I get it. It's just that the animal is likely to chew through its own leg, or become a target for other predators in the area instead. Or both. I reserve those as a 'trap only used if the world has hit the fan' kind of trap. Basically, survival only.
@@CollegeHillFarm Yeah, 45 years ago you could get away with a lot more in regards to this sort of thing, without having people get all up in arms about it. Not that they shouldn't... the leg hold trap is pretty bad in its own right. But when the vermin need to go, they need to go.
I have been told and I have tried sprinkling red pepper flakes all around the vegetables I don't want the raccoons to touch. Apparently what happens is they go to clean themselves and they get the pepper in their eyes and it tells them not to go back there again.
Wow I just looked that up and it seems you are right. Cool!
That is harmful to bees and other pollinators though, just a heads up
That works for the neighbor's cats in your herb garden too😂
Works for all mammals
Cheyanne also ...but human piss around the crops also helps
Thanks for being the adult in the room
Thank you
You earned my sub just for telling the truth , how refreshing . It burns my hide when people think they are being kind when releasing a critter in a strange place . That poor animal will have to fight every racoon in the area to find its place . Plus the possible spreading of disease . Cheers
Yes, not to mention don't put your problems off on somebody else.
ditto 👍
Mey mister. I can't believe you fell for that.
The possum was just "playing possum"
LOL! Give me a thumbs up
I subbed cause I like him.
Wish he was my neighbor.
I couldn't agree more
I'm in Kentucky, too. We just trapped 50 raccoons this summer. Between us and the neighbors. 3 years ago, they took down all our corn in the matter of 4 days.
They will do it. They are greedy and won't share.
That's a lot of stew!
Eat them, racoon jerky right there
I’m fighting voles for the first time ever! Ugh 😩 and all kinds of bugs I’ve never seen in my life of gardening and I’m 54 years old and been gardening since I was a kid. The struggle is real this year for sure.
There are always those years.
This man is speaking TRUTH. Thank you, sir. Thank you
Yeah people who don't live this lifestyle don't understand.
People who think this is inhumane lives in a bubble, never had a garden or tried growing your own food.It takes a lost of effort to garden, juts so a raccoon or other animal comes and destroys every thing just when you are about to harvest. I tried many things get an electric fence sooner than later.
If you plan to get anywhere toward subsistence farming it has to happen.
@@CollegeHillFarm did that critter have the rab? sure looked like it you were brave as hell getting that close
@@billylion3073 many things can cause an animal to circle. From neurological damage (car injury) to a simple ear infection in one ear.
@@billylion3073 Opossums are immune to rabies, so probably not
@@onegrapefruitlover for real? wow thats cool!
I’m proud of you for addressing this subject. Raccoons in my area kill for the fun of it!! They have to go, like you said. Because I love my chickens.
Yes, I have seen them kill 4 or 5 chickens and eat only parts of them. Minks are even worse.
My racoons are actually friendly! (Which makes it harder!)- I was setting my trap one night; I turn around, and there's a racoon sitting not a foot behind me, watching! Sometimes they'll hang out on the porch with my cats! They can get pretty fierce when trapped though....
I'm in a city an not I watched 3 racoons gang end and rip apart a live rabbit .
@@DollaHowsMyDictate Yeah, they can be NASTY when they're hungry, cornered or their babies are in danger...I mean SCARY nasty!
We are in the city and had 8-9 chickens killed for fun by raccoons. They also break eggs without eating them.
Your exactly right tho. We've lost whole corn crops to deer and raccons. We've lost so many chickens i lost count to raccons at night. We let the free range the weekends while were home. But a fox usually nabs 1 at least. Homestead attracts predators of all breeds. I dont even try to trap anymore. Guy down the road eats the raccons i get em and call him. He grills em somehow. Not bad eating really. Turtles in the pond is a whole another thing. We catch the big snappers and the same guy down the road loves those. Regular turtles. We set at the picnic table and pick em off. Homesteading. Everything is out to get ya. Including the government. Its hard work. But its nice when it pays off.
Yes it is. I love raccoon stew. Also, We used to eat turtle all the time growing up. Caught some really big ones in the Cumberland river catfishing. Ok I may have to take a fishing trip soon.
Turtle??? How far away do you live 😁
@@CollegeHillFarmThanks Pal. ☹️.......now I got the Itch2Fish...
Why would you kill regular turtles?
@@YSLRD a few turtles is a good thing. For pond health. But my place was neglected for a very long time. So the turtles had pretty much taken over. We tried trapping them and relocating with no success. The big snappers. Eat my ducks. And the other turtles eat my fish and fish eggs.
Opossums usually don't carry distemper but if you've got that many racoons running around it's a good possibility. Circling is one of the end stage symptoms. We've had some bad outbreaks in the trash panda population here in western NY. What makes your channel good is that you cover all the things.
There are several diseases that they get. Poor little guy was suffering.
So, raccoons are also called trash pandas?
@@BornFreeFilms Yes, trash pandas are raccoons. 🦝🛢🐼
@@CollegeHillFarm not a criticism at all, but have you thought of using an electric fence or poultry netting? I've seen several homesteaders use it because of deer, raccoon & ground hogs. True Grit Appalachian Ways YT Andy talks about his electric fence. He said deer can wipe out his corn & beans in one day! You did the right thing.
It could be rabies
Good morning from a sunny and warm England. This is an excellent video. We don’t have the same animals eating our crops but on the small area in which I grow food I have to protect against pigeons that will quickly destroy a lot of young vegetables, by netting them until they reach a size when the pigeons lose interest. Badgers have destroyed my corn for the last two years but as they have strong legal protection here they can’t be controlled so I have given up growing it.
I was brought up on a small farm and I think that one of the principal problems in both our societies is that most of the urban population is divorced from the means of production of the fruit, vegetables and animals that we consume every day. Keep up the good work!
Yes people who live in urban population centers have no idea about where our food comes from. We have pigeons too we call them morning doves. They love young plants.
It's basically the same almost all over the world. I'm a city boy, but i can understand farmers.
Here we have Wolves now since maybe 5 years. Farmers with sheep or other smaller animals are of course not happy with them. It's crazy people from the cities who think it's a good idea to protect Wolves, or whatever idea they get in their head, maybe tomorrow something else.
Oh hun, I undertook the hurculean task of beginning to revitilizing my husband's family farm here in Abruzzo Italy and we have issues with an invasive species of wild boar from Eastern Europe called cinghiale. (CHIN-GEE-AH-LAY) I lived in Naples florida for 11 years before moving here so I had seen my fair share of wild boar running around the Everglades down there, but cinghiale are nothing like those little guys. These things are huge. They are almost like small cows. A momma sow can be 600-700 pounds unpregnant. They can and will eat all of your vegetables if you don't have good fencing. They get into your garbage. They are nocturnal and cause terrible car accidents when driving on country roads at night. In Rome where they have become so used to being around people, they have figured out how to go up to tables that haven't been bussed yet at restaraunts with outdoor dinning, they grab the edge of the tablecloth and pull everything off the table to get the table scraps. They are amazingly intellegent and have taught themselves how to get food from everywhere. We do have an official cinghiale season here to hunt them but it just doesn't seem to be enough. Now people are just resorting to fences that electricuit them to death when hunting season is over. This is why releasing non-native species into any environment is such a catastrophically bad idea. Sometimes reality bites. Hopefully people watching your channel with learn to do better. Ciao .
Wow! that would be tough to deal with. People need to understand that invasive species are just that. Thanks for watching.
I don't know where you got the idea that wild boar are invasive in Italy. Their native range spans from Ireland down to north Africa and through the Middle East over to India, China, and Indonesia. Romans frequently depicted them in art and even wrote recipes for boar.
What's true is that since the countryside in Italy was progressively abandoned from the 50s onward, their populations have grown out of control.
@@nickjohnson2367 there are different species. The species that Is out of control now here Is originally from Romania, which, WAS part of the former Roman empire, they have overtaken the smaller boar that are actually native to the Italian peninsula. This Is at least according to officials at the municipio here in Abruzzo that I have spoken to. Ran into One leaving the farm again last evening. Luckily I have a dog that escorts me out when I am leaving thought, I admit I was there too late last night. I really Need to get outta there before sunset. They come out at night.
I am a homeowner who gardens and I used to breed and show horses. These critters cause us so many problems! Even if you don't homestead, you still have to manage these problems. It's groundhogs that have done the most damage for me. They will not get in those live traps unless they are very young. I use the kill traps for groundhogs. Sometimes I get opossums and skunks in them.
If you put a clear tote over the opening where you put the trap you get only groundhogs.
Used kitty litter worked on the groundhog holes. Well one way to recycle litter. Have to repeat but less all the time then long breaks before they show up again. I won't use kill traps even though I have them. Don't want to hurt non target animals like small loose dogs, birds or cats.
@@JNoMooreNumbers I tried using plenty of used cat litter and repellants and they always dug right through it like it was nothing at all!
@HYTELES Worked for groundhogs but not the raccoon dens under neighbors shed and they killed my birds. Saw the two dens under them after they removed them to sell the place.
I have wolves and stray dogs killing my goats regularly, birds of prey killing my free grazing chicken, small birds at the hundreds eating all the aronia berries and strawberries, mice and rats eating our potatoes in the cellar so I came to the conclusion that living in nature and farming means WAR. The strongst survives and I do whatever I can to not lose this game.
yes it is a real struggle sometimes.
... the ground is cursed...
The bobcats are eating my raccoons.
Sounds like you need a cat to watch your cellar and a dog to watch your goats. I’ve heard hanging a line with bright colored flags over where you keep your chickens will keep hawks away, never tried it myself though.
@@johncasey1020 Good kitty.
This is a really important video. It's hard to do these things (for people with compassion). I had an issue with porcupines destroying our pear trees this summer and we ended up having to kill two of them. I butchered them and turned them into food afterward so it felt less wasteful, but still it's really hard to do these things. Thanks for sharing this.
You are welcome. Some times you just have to do what has to be done.
You ate porcupine?!? Was it good?
@@jswhosoever4533 It's not my favorite meat at all. But it's fine. The smell is a bit strong while skinning, and cooking it. But it's okay. The texture is a bit like beef and the taste is IDK, maybe a bit of sweetness in there, a bit of perfumey muskiness. Hard to describe. Perfectly decent food though. I canned up the two porcupines I had to kill to protect my orchard (they were DESTROYING my pear trees) and was able to make 6 pints of pretty meat-rich porcupine soup. I haven't done a video on it for my channel yet because I'm not sure how TH-cam will react to it. I have some video of the process though. I have a channel on Rumble and I might release it there.
@@PraxisPrepper that's awesome. I would try it but we don't have any around me. There's a couple by my mom's place but I'd be afraid of those quills!😆
@@jswhosoever4533 Yeah, you have to be serious about the quills. The skinning took way longer for me because of that concern.
Racoons do NOT lke climbing on loose material. Get some poultry fencing from "Premeir 1" and electrify it! Make sure it is well staked to the ground with garden tacks, or they will go UNDER it. Mine has worked well now for four years in a row. Good eating!
Thanks for the tip.
This exactly, instead of fighting them tooth and nail just keep them away in the first place.
Very expensive for 2 acres worth of garden
@@CollegeHillFarm but you'll be trapping coons for the rest of your life otherwise. How much do you value your time? Multiply that by every trap you set and every raccoon you kill for the rest of your life, and it might make up for the cost of some electric fencing and the couple days it takes for you to put it up. Plus, if like you said you don't like to kill them, wouldn't it be worth it falling a little short of breaking even just to not have to kill them anymore? I don't know if you'll agree, and if not that's fine I just want you to think about every angle.
Time is what I have more of than money. The raccoons will be spread out over years. The fence is an all at once expense.
There's a balance between stewardship and success. What's important is you care and try to solve problems peaceably, if you can. At the end of the day you gotta do what you gotta do.
Yes, This is my last resort. I don't mind to share a little just not all.
Thank you for being honest and kind. It is so refreshing to see a farmer on youtube who is honest! Following you now!
Thank you. We try and show everything warts and all.
Humans are the only species that feels the need to apologize for surviving.
To be fair we don't know that. Haven't learned to speak to other animals. But it is a fair assessment based in the information we have.
@CollegeHillFarm I mean cats get off to torturing stuff so I don't think it would be too far off to say animals don't think twice about killing
@gidpumps6548 wow that was a huge jump in logic
We're also the only animal with the intelligence and means to eradicate all competition for resources beyond mere survival but also for purely trivial purposes if we so choose.
@@ThyCorylus Mann were humans
I've never misplaced anything and thought I had loaned it out and hadn't got it back... 😂
I get where you are coming from
I loan stuff out all the time. Then forget who has is and have to start texting around.
You have to do one or more of these:
1. Stop loaning things out
2. Keep a list of who has what.
3. Get a deposit.
My dad had an auto engine rebuilding shop and when we started keeping a list AND getting a deposit - everything was returned. We finally stopped loaning things out.
I've been dealing with this issue, and it's at an emergency state now. They got thru a gap in my metal skirling, got under my Mobile home, and tore out insulation! Now, they got my corn this year, but I guarantee they won't get it next year! Now I've got to repair the insulation, but I need to get them out from under the mobile home, to do that. I have no problem doing what needs to be done! They are BIG too! Heard one out my window one night, and it was on the propane tank, trying to get the lid up! Then it went over to the electric box and tried to open the electric box! Yeah, they are extremely destructive! I can never seem to catch them at night, to send them to the raccoon heaven, lol. Thanks, for the info! I'M GETTING THE TRAPS!
yeah they are hard to get in the crosshairs. The traps do great and they are destructive little buggers.
@@CollegeHillFarmcarry lots of disease, too
You are speaking the truth sir. It's reality. It's not all fancy and fairytales.
Yep if you are gonna do this lifestyle get ready.
I don’t have a homestead, just a backyard but the bully’s of my yard are the squirrels and they are tearing up my tomatoes!😢 they were the best this year too!
They make squirrel size traps. I love to watch my squirrels.
@@CollegeHillFarm I watch from my office all the animals. They all have personalities between the hawks and crows trying to mark their territory to the squirrels, chipmunks and birds sharing the bird feeders!
Yeah I have a herd of black birds that vie for my catfood.
HATSAN 22 breakbarrel.
@baneverything5580 Exactly when life give you lemons , you turn your pest into high quality compost and next years harvest is even better.
Thanks vermin!
They are literally trying to outcompete you with your own food, but im top of the food chain buddy.
Just subscribed. I really appreciate the truth being told….rare to see a video that goes into this.
Welcome aboard. Thank you.
When we were growing blocks of sweetcorn, 12 rows wide, and 30 foot long, we had five blocks that we staggered at planting time we used to take and put five or six rows of winter squash around the whole five blocks and then when it was time to pick sweetcorn, we just carefully stepped in so we didn’t injure any squash, vines or leaves and the raccoons deer possums they all left our sweetcorn alone because they didn’t like pushing through the pokey leaves on her noses so they never bothered to get to the sweetcorn till after we were done and we picked the squash then it looked like it got hit by a bomb the next morning
That was always the way we planted it too. The wide row plantings that I do sure cuts down on some of the hoeing and lets the tractor do the work.
Yup we planted squash around two sides and cucumbers around two. Then we planted marigolds on all 4 sides on edge of the garden. They couldn't smell the corn and didn't like going past prickles.
So maybe this is from an earlier time , cuz I have heard stories of Indians planting corn and squash together .
@@gerdberg4188
Three Sisters is corn beans and squash
In real life situation, all we can do and ask for is to be respectful til the end. That’s really important. Cause there are dark things that need to happen. And respect brings light to that darkness.
People are just people warts and all we have to be able to get along and respect goes a long way.
Have more trouble out of deer than any other critter here in Kentucky where I live
We have lots of deer but they seldom bother my garden.
I had 60 tomato plants decimated overnight by deer. They in 8 years never went to that tight area you'd think they'd avoid if they felt threatened and ran.
Our cats and livestock guardian dogs keep critters away. Had an area by my new shop that dogs didn’t have access to and woodchucks tried tunneling under my concrete. Put the dogs up by the building for a month and that took care of it
I don't have an adequate fence around my garden but that is a great suggestion.
I do hope you get some fencing soon so you can get some hounds. They seem to be really effective at scaring away critters if not dealing with them if trained
Thank you for sharing your honest experience.
I try to be truthful about the good and the bad.
Live in harmony, protect your farm.
yes and protect the wildlife. Correct Management is the key.
Always had goats, fowl, friut trees and gardens till recently. You gotta end a lot critters. My trash panda count could be as high as 50 a year, 30 average, a couple dozen rabbits, half a dozen possum a few chucks and occasionally dogs gettting my chickens, my penned chickens they dug under the fence for and couldn't figure a way out (don't tell me anything about those dogs either), a rare coyote (they learned fast, neighbor said he sees them make a wide arc about 200 yards away but never closer. I looked, their tracks confirm).
Most places are overpopulated from abundant food and few if any predators. It really just makes a vacuum that sucks the neighboring ones in more than anything. It never stops.
Who is the garden for, you or them?
Recommend flashlight patrols at night, like when you let the dog out, and the few hours after dark.
If ya can, use clustered snap traps not 1, or 4 around bait or across the path. Live traps need to be baited with the peanut butter stuffed into an open pill bottle that they have to spend time on and wired to the back.
We don't do antifreeze anymore we kept a fresh bowl of it in the barn loft for decades.
Some like electric fences for corn but I've been tangled in them in the dark and didn't like that enough to repeat it.
Squirrels would eat the seeds out of half-grown pears and always get away till I bought a driveway alarm. Those will let you know. They can be matched with one frequency when buying so one receiver is all you need, I used 3.
Get a good pellet rifle that is hand cocking without any tanks or cartridges. Cheaper ammo and fine for up to a coyote (in .25, half that for .177)
Good old boy told me about putting sardines in a small hole in a tree and driving a nail in from a little above at an angle. Raccoon can easily reach in, but in the morning it will still be there stuck when you run your line.
Gramps ran 3 lines of 75 before and after school from the age of 7. They ate Everything and were still hungry often. He's the one that told me to use 4 legholds if I wasn't taking fur (only one gets a foot, the rest ...🙈).
I loved the trap line days.
Have - A- Heart makes many different size traps. I use the same kind that you have. They are the most common and are marketed as racoon traps. I have found that opossum really like peanuts and old corn tortilla chips. They like bird seed too.
Also, groundhogs like biscuits and honey buns. Raccoon do too and cats leave them alone. Birds though will hit them pretty hard.
I stopped trying to grow corn in my backyard suburban garden because the raccoons always destroyed it just when the ears where starting to get big but not yet ready to harvest. The worse thing is the raccoons don’t even eat it all, they just take a few bites and trash all the plants. So frustrating. Corn seems to be the worst for this. Things like tomatoes, beans, squash are attacked less.
Yes corn is attacked worst. I can control the raccoon population but when the bears find it there ain't much I can do.
Dose of reality. Too many people see just butterflies and roses in the homesteading and gardening videos, and wish they could do that. If they do try it, then they invariably get hit from all sides--wildlife, insects destroying your trees and vegetables, invasive and encroaching plants, biting pests with all sorts of disease, time to harvest and economic realities, weather, trees falling on your construction projects (cost me a month's worth of work), broken bones which can take you out of commission for an entire growing season, dangerous snakes, and on and on. Whatever you think you're starting, you need to set your expectations two notches lower and your time to sustainability an extra year or two. Thanks for the good talk.
Reality can really be a kick in the teeth
T 3:28 thank you for softly saying what needs to be said . Thank you sir .
yeah it just has to be done
Thank you so much for posting this. I am in Lexington, KY.
You are welcome. One of my boys lives in Lexington.
It's part of farming that is necessary, thank you sir, new sub😊
Thanks, welcome aboard
Good information,thankyou. Subscribed for more. Best wishes.
Thank you and welcome aboard
GREAT INFORMATION THANKS .. MANY BLESSINGS....❤❤❤❤
Thank you
33 years old from suburban NJ here
I have 1/3 acre yard that I work everyday
I had a problem with a mink that kept coming to my yard and murdring everything in sight.
I live in a suburb of NYC
Crazy to think
Wildlife have adapted. They didn't have any choice.
Good content. Thank you sir.
Thank you
The last time I had an opossum like that, he had been in my old mash corn 😂 what you got in them woods over there 😂
Lololol
We had an old mule that did that on mash.
Currently battling a rat problem 😭 I don’t live anywhere with many owls or snakes and my best option is to trap them. My dogs are too destructive to be rat catchers 😂 they break all my plants.
We us boxes with a number 1 victor and apples as bait
40 years ago I worked with a guy that hunted raccoons , he brought the cooked meat to work and shared it.
It's good. I like it best in stew because it can be a little stringy and a lot greasy.
Didn’t know people ate raccoons!
I had a homestead in the Arizona high desert and had other troubles. ALL my vegetables would be eaten the second they came out of the ground for their moisture. Cottontails and jackrabbits were a small problem handled by dogs. But the desert rats- they were the worst.
I eventually learned to plant at a time when there was a lot of of new growth. That way predation for moisture was far less of an issue. My corn would then grow large enough that the rats left it be.
I still had to fence the rest of my garden to stop those buggers. I used small square wire around the garden to get anything out of it. It took me three years to master growing in the desert, but once I did it was easy.
Dogs use to keep their numbers lower- they loved hunting them. And every once is a while, I would hold a hunting fest and invite friends over with 22 shot shells and high power pellet rifles for a free meal and then a night hunt... It was part of being able to grow my own food.
I had an uncle in texas and he had those big rat, Nutria, he say they were aweful.
I’ve seen Possums take pellets between the eyes and just keep hissing and showing their huge fangs, don’t want to mess with them if you don’t have to! Good video, thank you.
I generally let all the opossums go. They don't bother the garden.
Part of conservation is preserving numbers. If my choices are 1.) Allow the wildlife to subsist on some of my crops, allow them to never starve but need to cull their populations to maintain natural balance using humane euthanasia practices or 2.) Cage my crops off and let them struggle on limited natural resources and let nature conserve their numbers through their violent competition over limited resources and starvation, then I would like to think Option 1 is the kindest option from an animal lovers perspective.
I would agree. Overpopulation leads to disease and additional suffering.
They call us 'Blockies' in Queensland. I like your clever little traps, I just don't know I'm going to get a kangaroo into one! They can cause a bit of damage themselves. Very interesting, and good luck with your corn,😊
Thanks, I would love to see a kangaroo up close.
This is the ugly side to settling land. Is it bad? No. Is it necessary? Yes. But it is sad for the animals who are simply innocents doing what they do. We are the stewards of the land. It's up to us to not only keep it working for us, but good for them as well.
Subscribed. $1.25! Wow. I guess Daniel Boone hats aren't selling anymore.
It is necessary. They make them from fake fur now. I live about 30 minutes from Fort Boonesboro and bought one for a grandson a few years ago.
Going in circles like that? Ear infection most likely. I had a cat to walk with it's head also tilted to walk straight until the infection burst. They are all treatable and nature takes time to heal itself.
Maybe or some more dangerous neurological disease.
I've been able to keep the raccoons in check for the most part, but this year I have had a time with the beaver. I have a creek down by my garden and this year they decided to use my corn stalks to build with. I took out 6 adults to just keep corn. Enjoyed video take care
Thank you gotta do what you gotta do.
Oh gosh. Bet they did a lot of damage quickly. Ugh
I don't have a homestead but a large garden and birds which raccoons wiped out about 35. Have to do what you have to then rabbits and deer. It's a lot of money to fence in all that yard. Injured my leg in a knee deep groundhog hole. Used kitty litter drives them off if I keep up on the holes. Mesh and netting on a lot of things. I got one skunk now that was nerve-wracking releasing.
I always throw a tarp over to release a skunk. It he sprays it only gets on the tarp. A lot of people have suggested fencing it is just not cost effective.
@CollegeHillFarm I used a heavy duty garbage bag. Talked softly. It looked terrified. Literally scared the poop out of it too. Left a pile in the trap.
I live in the suburbs of a big city, My lawn was weeds, but it was nice green weeds, nice flat lawn. Now all churned up and full of holes. Tried many a device and concoction - never caught much in a trap. They are too smart.
Sounds like gophers or voles or moles. Get Caster Bean Plant. They hate them. They are beautiful but poisonous. They are an anual and you can just harvest the seeds and replant next year.
@@CollegeHillFarm Thanks. I know that plant. Worth a try.
My brother swears by it. Plants it in his garden every year.
@@CollegeHillFarmBe careful if you have dogs or little kids. All parts of the plant are poisonous.
Like two ends of seesaw, pick one side you would like to weigh in. Then you treat the other side as enemy just because you want to defend your side, food or pets. Sometimes co-exist is just not possible.
yes it is a balancing act.
Yes that is true and what they do to chickens also they will clean out your hen house!!
yes they will.
33 raccoons in a solid year. We have chickens and they ruined an entire garden in a night just taking single bites out of large pumpkins and leaving them to rot while tearing down all the corn. Chipmunks got so bad they ruined the wires in our tractor. We had to depopulate them a bit.
People don't realize how destructive wildlife can be.
Ya I tried a radio, all they did was change the station.
I have never tried it but this is the side of my property with neighbors and that would seem just rude.
I've never done anything outside of growing tomatoes, squash, beans and corn in my urban garden. For me the problem was the bugs.. They decimated my corn like you would not believe..
I have a question. It may seem like a dumb question but here goes: For someone that doesn't wanna delete the little critters, is it possible to feed them leftovers from your home and also cheap food such as popcorn, rice and beans and maybe even the fruits that are turning bad in the Asian grocery stores that are half off?
I was just thinking if that would maybe deter them from touching the crops since the food that people make is much more tasty and desirable than what they get from the crops. I also realize that it may not be economically viable to feed a group of 30 raccoons but if you weigh it against amm, traps and other items, could it make sense to handle the problem this way as opposed to Deleting them.?
Like I said, probably a dumb question but I was really curious about the viability of this approach and I see from your video and the comments that everyone here, REALLY knows what they're talking about.
Great video. Thanks.
If you feed them they will reproduce to uncontrolable numbers and will start the diseases. You don't want diseased critters roaming the neighborhood. That is just what I have observed in the last 50 yrs or so.
Saw a moose do that once and got put down by warden it ended up being infested with ticks, this was back before ticks became common in Maine and i only knew of ticks from the Ren and Stimpy show.
Ticks are a major thing her. Our game warden, when I was a kid, died of rocky mountain spotted fever from a tick bite.
I live in a big city- had chickens once upon a time... defending my half dozen girls from raccoons, hawks, dogs, skunks, rats etc became a full time job... long before eggs were $8 a dozen.
it is just a fact of life that everything wants to eat rabbits or chickens.
@CollegeHillFarm well ultimately- who doesn't like a chicken dinner?
It's a flaw in the matrix everything tastes like chicken
I grew up that way. You do what you have to do. That was one purpose of trapping in the winter when pelts were almost worth the work. .
Yeah when I was a kid a coon hide was $10 today $1.25.
A connibear trap is best for groundhog. Put it right over the hole, I rarely have a failure if set it right.
That is what I generally use
Sadly this is true. Fences can help but they are expensive, takes time put them up, and then there is maintenance of the fence line. But a determined racoon or bear will not be stopped by a fence. I've got lots of mended fence and damaged fruit trees to prove that.
I never knew a raccoon who didn't ignore a fence. I have seen then scale an electric one.
I'd really like to build a network of public game fences so that wild animals couldn't even make it into town so we could garden the whole zone. And to keep them off the highway. It's one thing to kill something because you share a habitat and another thing to have to share a habitat so neighbors can live in a fantasy wilderness only to call the state when they inevitably cause property damage. Here in Montana almost all wildlife was driven to extinction by the early 20th century and had to be artificially repopulated using conservation, including relocation and stock breeding. Turkeys, pheasants, deer, elk, everything. Never gets taught in school, let alone that there are only a couple old growth forests in the whole USA. Doesn't mean it's not a good thing, but it's led to this false sense of connection with a natural world that doesn't exist
(I say town but we live 55 miles from the closest city. So far from anywhere you can find it on a globe. And the animals are still livestock.)
Like Kentucky during the time of Daniel Boone extincted the deer. Repolulation efforts brought them back. Wolves are still non existent here.
There will be blood. 😆 salute. He aint lying
Yes there will
I remember when good people didn't give two hoots about someone killing a varmint for killing your chickens or destroying your crops. But they did care about killing an unborn child.
Thanks
We’re still here waiting for Jesus to act.
Still waiting.......
@@Watchoutforsnakezsome people think the human population is in decline, so don't hold your breath.😂
@tracy419 the globalist (ultra rich) wants to depopulate by 90%. Bill gates been on video saying it.
You should put up a fence or take them to a wildlife rehab.
Can't afford a fence. Wildlife rehabs do not accept perfectly ok animals. You have to deal with them. They will over populate and next thing you know diseases you don't want are on your property.
Trapping and releasing raccoons elsewhere should absolutely be illegal. They need to be dealt with where they are. I have been fighting raccoons for years, and I'm ready to move b/c there's nothing I can do that would actually help where I'm living now.
They can be such a pain.
We tried everything. We trapped the same raccoons over and over again. It was like a cosmic joke.
@@CollegeHillFarm there is no critter I hate more than raccoons right now.
@@SelfTaughtArtist1 I've determined you have to teach them with lead, and where I'm at, I can't do it. So I need to move someplace where I can do that if I ever encounter them again.
That's just a thing in the country. But, most urbanites don't think that way.
It's not just urbanites.
No one ever says it's the stuff they are spraying in the sky... but that's what it is. Like it or not.. that's what it is.
I just don't believe that. But we are entitled to what we believe.
Don't forget about the notorious farm vet. We're so sorry Johnny. Wilbur didn't make it. But look the vet gave us all this bacon.
Who could argue with glorious bacon
Not a homesteader but love nature and love to grow (this is the first year). I think I found a juvenile rabid skunk attacking its sibling😢. I’m extra vigilant now but if anyone has similar experiences message me I’m concerned😔
gotta protect yourself from that kind of stuff.
@@CollegeHillFarm yes, was able to get the aggressive one and talking with others it was best to remove him. Very sad but best for everyone
You made me laugh at “Henrí”.😆
Yeah I love naming em special stuff
On the plus side you can eat racoons, make a stew
I love raccoon stew
Good video btw.
Thank you
Kangaroos attack my avocado and mango sapplings, stripping them of their leaves, and occasionally gnawing on the stems. I must enclose the plant sites with a robust wire mesh wrap to allow the trees enough time to develop unimpeded. I feel your pain!
When we plant young fruit trees we have to put them in wire cages too keep the deer off them too sometimes.
That possum looked like it has an ear infection. The way it was walking and tilting its head was evident to that because dogs react similarly when that happens.
I would say some sort of neurological disease.
I have a good well trained dog to keep wildlife away that I dont want. I have a solar electric fence to protect my bees and crops. My dog does a fine job. Thats worked for 59 years on my Homestead.
If I had a fence that is what I would do.
@@CollegeHillFarm A well trained dog doesn't need a fence.
@inharmonywithearth9982 I have never met a dog that will stay on it's own property without a fence or a invisible fence.
@@CollegeHillFarm mine does and he only chases off varmints I tell him too except yesterday I was trying to relocate a venomous copperhead snake with my snake tong and he jumped up and shook it to death. Live traps and guns are only about a couple hundred years invented. Dogs were our farm guards for thousands of years. It worked then and it works now
Nobody can live 100 percent of the time with nature. We do what it takes to survive
yes we do.
Wrong.
I lived on a farm for years without ever killing anything - not even bugs.
@@paulsawczyc5019Guess you never mowed a lawn then
@@paulsawczyc5019There's a big difference between living on a farm and farming. Most farms breed and manage animals. Certain responsibilities come with that. When you have enough of them, even if you don't use them for meat, it will eventually become necessary to put an animal down.
I use a noise maker, every night i plug it in, deer stay away, it works ., maybe give it a try.
I would try that but the hill garden is on the side of my property with neighbors.
@@CollegeHillFarm Please don't waste your money. It may work for a few days, but NOTHING works except an electric fence which I am about to install. Tried everything including the noise maker which is now a nuisance whenever there is someone in the yard.
Thanks agreed
thank you
When an animal walks in circles like that, they are usually blind.
I would say he had some disease that was affecting his brain.
Rabies
Generally opossum body temp is too low for rabies. There can be an exception though.
Most definitely Rabid ...
Distemper
My little cousin started trapping for the farmers in his neighborhood when he was in middle school in the mid 00s here in Ohio. Mostly raccoons. He was interested in trapping and hunting as a hobby and he got to practice handling furs as a part of the process. Idk that he's doing it anymore tho. Jobs will do that to you 😂
Yeah that work a day world eliminates a lot of the stuff we loved in our youth.
@@CollegeHillFarm Facts. Only so many hobbies we can mantain with a jobbie job. Godspeed to you sir.
Children sometimes cut through my yard.
I have had a few folks cut through mine too.
You will need a bigger trap😊
Loĺ. This hit home. Lol. As i sit horrified by skunk on deck. Thought it was my cat out of corner of eye. I was pinned climbing over railing. 😂. He needs to be trapped and dipatched. We try everything before dispatch. We let deer have apples. Possums clean up garden, skunks in compost. Its when they get greedy. Lol. I tell them stay in your lane. Foxes dont bother chickens. Sometimes you just gotta make decisions sucky as that may be. ❤
I even plant more so the wildlife can get some if they need it but raccoons don't share. They want it all!!
Foxes will get chickens. It is during the day if you let them out to roam.
I don't live in a farm but do you have barn cats? I also remember seeing a trap on tv that catches rats and stuff and it's designed for foxes to be able to open it, you get rid of the rat and the fox is fed and hopefully wouldn't go after your chickens.
That sounds awesome!!
Morally speaking, I think all of this is barely a drop in the bucket compared to what factory farming does on a daily basis. If people find this disturbing, then they should be prepared to lose their minds when they find out how much of their modern comforts are being upheld by truly hellish cruelty. At least this is stuff our ancestors had to do get us here. Now we're all just complicit in lining the pockets of investors who have never touched dirt in their lives.
Agreed, the chemicals in our food is tremendous.
Caught a huge raccoon in my trap. It bent that floor plate into a tight coil. Rolled it up like a sleeing matt..anyways it was impressive that i needed and anvil and hammer to straighten it and the critter did it with its hands. Tough.
They are tough. I have to fix my trap almost every one.
I am for sure a city boy. Born and raised in what is honestly not a large city, but it's big enough.
Homesteading is the end goal for me. Self sufficiency has its appeal, especially these days. I have zero illusions about the types of things I am going to have to do, from culling livestock to pest control, or defense of said livestock. Thanks for presenting it in this manner.
People are way too sheltered these days, and far too reliant on corporate supply chains. I do what I can in my backyard presently. Learning as much as I can about gardening, collecting seeds, and food preservation. If it was legal to keep chickens here I would for sure have a coop. Unfortunately that is not in the cards as of now.
Little things at a time. Homesteading is just that do what you can when you can.
Used the first model with my grandfather. Good man. Fat raccoon that turned at us to snarl before turning tail.
My first catch as an 8 yr old kid was a big fat opossum. Let her go. It was so cool.
Get some hounds or even Heinz 57 Lab /and any of the terrior breeds , i used pitt / labs ...now i use lab/ boston terrior mix ..keeps coyotes, raccoons, possums, ground hogs , pretty much any small preditor animals at bay or get a couple.old car battery's an some cheap wire an go to er !! Some fresg cut garlic with cheyanne pepper on it or around the bases will stop deer an some others also
without fences that puts even more problems on my neighbors from my dogs. I tried the pepper thing and it has never worked for me.
I live in NYC with 6 chickens in a small backyard. I already have to "manage" rats, mice, and raccoons, along with the poison ivy that came with the house. Im currently looking for land in the country. Id rather deal with the headaches of homesteading than this overpopulated prison yard of a city.
I would agree with that.
Predator population control is a thing that I deal with every year. Raccoons are dispatched but young possums get released down by the river 20 miles away from any populated area
Yes that has to practiced. Ky makes it illegal to transport wild animals. I turn the possums loose to. But right at the trap.
Very interesting post. Thanks “chicken farmer”!
I’ve had to put a few raccoons and mink down from killing my flocks of chicken and ducks.
Almost everyone who had tried farming has. The broader public has no idea.
2 dogs allowed to stay outdoors from time to time also solves this issue.
Because I don't have a fence that would create more problems. Especially for my neighbors.
Hi how do you catch gophers?? I have a little acre farm and they're destroying my land 😢 We have various traps for moles, squirrels and raccoons but gophers are new to us. Have you any advice?
I have never tried to catch gophers. We don't have them where I live but we have ground hogs which are similar. I would imagine you need to use a conibear trap to catch them. I did a video about the different kinds of traps in a video I called Barbaric II th-cam.com/video/3DzOABKYHh4/w-d-xo.html
Living out in the rural areas, my parents would have us kids help make some traps that work the same way as the have a heart traps. We used a thick gauge fencing wire bent around rebar. Those got used for trapping all sorts of wildlife that was causing problems somehow or another.
We did that too. I had a about 200 leg hold traps too.
@@CollegeHillFarm Yeah, sounds like you had a big infestation to deal with. Sadly, those leg hold traps are probably the worst kind to use. Not harshing on ya, I get it. It's just that the animal is likely to chew through its own leg, or become a target for other predators in the area instead. Or both.
I reserve those as a 'trap only used if the world has hit the fan' kind of trap. Basically, survival only.
When we used leg hold traps was 45 yrs ago and lots of traps set every day.
@@CollegeHillFarm Yeah, 45 years ago you could get away with a lot more in regards to this sort of thing, without having people get all up in arms about it. Not that they shouldn't... the leg hold trap is pretty bad in its own right.
But when the vermin need to go, they need to go.
What was that noise at 8:45.Maybe raccoons sounding a war horn..
I don't know probably a tractor on the road. Last I knew the opossums were the only army around here.
It was a phone notification, haha! I used to have that same sound on my phone when someone texted me. Sounds just like you said…a war horn 🤣
I have caught 9 feral cats, 13 raccoons and two opossums with that style of trap.
They are great
After a few years, I just gave up on sweet corn. Nothing bothers the hominy or popcorn. 🤔
As a kid we grew indian corn and jewel corn. Also our only sweet corn was golden bantam. The raccoons seem to go after these super sweets even worse.