I don't know how to get rid of them, but I've been trying to solve a similar problem for my in-laws. They have a groundhog condo in their yard, and an ongoing battle between husband and wife as to the best way to deal with the problem. In the meantime, the groundhogs are enjoying the salad bar.

Try the following link:

http://landscaping.about.com/cs/pestcontrol/a/groundhog_day_2.htm

Spraying epsom salts on your plants seems like a pretty good possibility, since it will make them unpalatable to the little b&*%ards, and it will do no harm to the crops, and the ammonia option seems reasonable too, but there doesn't seem to be any way around it... the battle will be ongoing unless you choose to deal with them in the most drastic way.

Annie, I understand what you are talking about. We have several in the neigbhorhood. Seems like about 8 homes each have their own groundhog home as we all see one at the same time.

They have their certain tastes of plants in my yard, but eat different things in other yards.

My neighbor tried a haveaheart trap with no luck getting the groundhog, but did collect all other critters in them. Rabbits, squirrels, chimpmunks, and worst of all skunks, but so far in the past month never gotten a groundhog.

I dream of all kinds of torture that I can do to what my hubby calls "the beast", before it is exploded into a hundreds of pieces, but, no, if I could catch it, it would have a very tortorous death.

Anyway, I have read the link posted above and a friend and I started thinking about some of the possibilities to keep the "beast away from at least most of the plants.

After reading things like, groundhog is timid, afraid of motion, loud noises, we started thinking about things to combine to keep it away. We hit on the idea of lots of small, cheap windchimes.

Hit the dollar tree store and found about 12 fairly small and not bad looking windchimes, $1.00 each.

Hung one right outside the damn things hole and others around the plants, the gate to the fenced in yard and various other places around the yard. Placed them very low to the ground so the "beast" can see them or bang in to them as it moved around.

So far so good. Haven't seen the thing roaming around my yard, haven't had any damage to any plants in about 3 days.

We tried cheap inflated balloons too, but they didn't stay inflated for more than a few hours.

So far, so good with the windchimes. I just hope it lasts. You might want to give the windchimes a try.

Fran

Bombs or lead poisoning are the best way to go.
I better not catch you relocating them to anywhere near my home. :-)

We bomb or shoot also, but we live in a rural enough area that we can't see our closest neighbor. Find a buddy with a gun? If you have access under your porch by removing some lattice or something similar, you might still be able to block up the secondary holes and bomb them. Also, how do they get under the porch? Can you block that access with a buried wire fence?

One of the things about woodchucks that really bugs me is that they damage as much as eat stuff. The deer at least eat everything, but often the woodchucks will shred half the garden, but just take a nibble here and there!

A good fence around the garden that is buried a couple feet down and then angled outward at the bottom as well as going up and topped with a strand of electric fence might discourage them. I've also found that blood meal, liberally applied especially after each hard rain will discourage most plant eaters. It does have a bit of a "dead" odor when fresh, but that fades from my ability to smell it within a few days. For ornamentals, I spray it on mixed with something to make it stick to the leaves, but with veggies or berries I just sprinkle it on the ground. It will slowly release nitrogen.

Other ways to create noise and motion: mylar strips attached to stakes at groundhog level, old CD's hung so they move and catch light, a shower radio (waterproof) playing softly in the garden and moved around periodically, or one of those motion-activated sprinklers.

Good luck! Woodchucks are the most frustrating garden pest I know!

All I can say is "GOOD LUCK!" We had them living under our detached garage in our old house. They excavated enough dirt (mounded in small mountains on the side of the garage) to eventually cause the concrete slab floor to crack. We hired professional trappers (they caught them ... but not ALL of them, just the juveniles), put out fox urine (from Agway) -- that was a lot of fun :( -- filled in their den entrys when we knew they were out and about because we'd seen them. All to no avail, they just dug them out again. For what it's worth, we were told that in our county, it was actually illegal to "relocate" them ourselves, even if we'd been succesful with our Havahart trap. They did wreak havoc in the vegetable garden, even stripping every leaf AND pepper from the jalapeno plants, of which there were about six. (We had visions of a bunch of woodchucks under the garage, chips and salsa and some nice cold margaritas in their paws... :)

I call Critter Control and wave goodbye as the truck pulls out of the driveway with the critter in the back (on it's way to goundhog heaven!)

I used to live out in the country with my terrier. He would happily go to any effort to destroy a critter. Terriers are bred to follow a critter into its den and kill it. No woodchuck, possum, raccoon or squirrel crossed the yard without looking both ways.
That same property is now overrun with woodchucks, rabbits, you name it. They cannot garden there anymore, and they do not want a dog.
My standard poodle has also killed a woodchuck and a raccoon where I live now. Even with the fancy haircut, a poodle is a very avid hunter. Mine even chased a moose, though we all agreed that was not a good idea.
A terrier for the big rodents, a cat for the small ones: these animals earn their keep for the gardener, and give you lots of love too.
I'm emphasizing terriers, but a mixed breed from the pound, about the size of a cocker spaniel, should do well for you.

I have not tried intense chemical warfare. In our years of woodchuck company, all that worked was a heavy duty chicken wire fence, dug in two feet below ground level, with the the wire folded so the woodchuck could not burrow under close to the fence.The fence must be tight, and the wire gate kept closed at all times. They'll find a week point and storm the barricade.

That's no help with a pretty garden full of ornamentals.

Seeing that mother and her babies, walk away from my garden having taken the top 8 inches off the peas was the only time I really really wanted a gun to blow a creature to smithereens.

With great sympathy for your plight
Idabean

There is nothing nice to say about a woodchuck, groundhog, or whatever they are called and they aren't even cute either. At least a rabbit, squirrel and chipmunk or cute to look at. But a groundhog? Nothing nice to look at.

So what is it with these commercials on TV using groundhogs in them, talking ones no less.

After coming inside from working in the garden late this afternoon, I turned on the TV to catch some news. What did I find looking back at me from the TV screen but a talking groundhog sitting next to a fake Abe Lincoln, and some weird thing in a spacesuit walking around a room. Abe calls the groundhog "fur ball", (believe me, I can come up with a better name than that), and a guy is sitting at a desk being told to swallow some pill to sleep, and spacesuit man hands the guy the phone to call his doc for some sleeping pill.

Just what I needed to see as I fight the groundhog war. So far, so good, the windchimes have worked. No damage inside the fenced in yard. Outside now is a different story. Waiting to see what is left in the morning after planting this afternoon.

Seems like everyone in the neighborhood has their own groundhog in it. We had thought it was traveling between yards, but not so. We all have groundhog holes, and 5 of us had adult ones in the yard at the same time.

There is one less though. Hubby borrowed a slingshot from a guy at work and my hubby got himself a dead groundhog. First shot, right in the head. He was so proud of himself, till he had to go dig a hole and bury the thing.

By the way, did you know that a sling shot is illegal to have. It's classified as a dangerous weapon now and is in the same category as a switchblade and the like. It's also illegal to transport a groundhog to a new location from your yard, as long as it's alive that is.

Idabean, I'm with you. Never thought of killing a wild animal before, don't even believe in owning guns, but these groundhogs are really pushing me to the limit. I'd love to just blow him/her and all the offspring into little pieces.

What a sight of joy that would be, totally exploded family of groundhogs.

Anyone know if they serve some kind of purpose in this world? All my 24 year old daughter can come up with is "just something else to make a mother's life difficult."
Now, how kind is that?

Seems like there are plenty of folks here who would enjoy Caddyshack. One of Bill Murray's finer moments....!

Oh my nemesis the woodchuck!

My experience in a nutshell
-large holes and totally destroyed plants (just like in the original post)

-researched and found that in MA it's illegal to trap, relocate or kill the little........"rodents" (trying to use ladylike language here!)

-went woodchuck hole hunting nearly every day for a few weeks. Loaded up each hole and surrounding area with a concoction of cayene pepper, tabasco, garlic oil - anything strongly pungent that I could find

-shoved every rock imaginable down the hole

-spray my plants with a deer/rabbit repellent (safe for edible crops) that stinks to high heaven

-no woodchucks!
-rabbits eat the clover from the grass and not my plants

Granted - I've no doubt the woodchucks are watching me from their dens (relocated to a neighboring yard) and waiting for the day I forget to spray.

It's a war out there!

honestly the best thing you can do is get a dog. Up until this past year we had 2 dogs. One died and we gave the other one to family. We NEVER EVER had any critters of any kind above a snake or toad. Now my yard is chock full of everything on the planet. I've got deer, woodchucks, rabbits, chipmunks, I think a fox and I know fisher cats and coyotes are in the area too.
I used to think people must've been crazy or just too persnickety to live when they complained about some animal or other. NOW I get it.
That said, my kids really love watching them from the windows and when they are ouside making all kinds of noise and wreaking havoc, the critters get out of dodge very quickly.
I don't know if this is avail for you, I did set aside the part of my yard that is furthest back to be "wild". There's tons of places for animals to forage and live. I'm lucky enough to live in a semi rural area and try to remember that they were here first. Ok well I do spray the bejeezus out of anything I want to keep with a hot pepper concoction too.
Best of luck to you.

I absolutely agree with the dog thing! We had a couple of them and they made life for the marauder so miserable he "cashed in his chips".

A few years later I pulled into the driveway and saw a young one scurry for the ditch. I gunned the car, blew the horn at him, jumped out and pummelled him with rocks, screaming like a banshee. I ralleyed the elderly dog (who rose to the occasion with great bravado) and never saw him again.

YEAH, call your gun-toting neighbors! You bet!! Woodchucks suck, the faster you get 'em outta your area, the better. They will destroy your plantings and once they get a toehold you'll have a tougher time eradicating them. Babies aren't "cute". Get rid of them, too! and fast. The best thing about the babies are that they're DUMB and slow. ;)

My neighborhood is full of dogs in almost every home but mine. I'm very allergic to them. Alas, even with the dogs outside a goodly portion of the day, these groundhogs around here are just as happy as 2 peas in a pod. Doesn't bother them in the least. Dog turns it's back and out comes the damn thing for a quick bite. See's the dog and presto back in the hole.

May have some luck though. There is now a family of fox roaming the neighborhood. Could we all be lucky enough that the fox are hungry and will get at least a few of the groundhogs?

One can hope

Fran

A cat can clean up most woodchuck problems, but it will take a couple of years. They can't quite do in the adults, but mine thinks the babies taste good.
The bombs work a lot quicker, if you can find them. It's been a few years since I needed them. (knocking on wood as I write)

Thanks for all your advice. I'm trying the epsom salts and I bought another bigger havahart trap.I also plan to make a hot pepper spray from a recipe I got on line.Nothing in the trap yet but no damage so far to the plants I sprayed.
Annie

Chucky's my nemesis, too. And like you Annie, this year they have a den right next to my foundation, I'm reluctant to try bombs again where it may permeate my basement. Those never worked very well, anyway, as one has to find all the outlets to the den.

Best I've found in the past is a dog, followed by fence. I travel too much for a full-time dog, but take every opportunity to 'rent' one, in the sense of pet-sitting. Also, groom her, save the hair, and sprinkle it around. Idea? Ask for the sweepings at the local Poodle-Cut.

Others have mentioned laws about re-locating them. I did some research a few years back, not an issue in my NH town, but shooting without a permit is unless they're interfering with your income. Which didn't prevent me from borrowing a .22, though I could never bring myself to do more than scare them.

Fran's wind chimes sounds like a charming idea, and since the hole by my foundation happens to be right under where I took in the bird feeder, I'm going to add that to my arsenal.

Good luck! Ana

Watch out for those bombs. We used them successfully a couple of times til we read that the gas is quite deadly for cats, dogs and even humans with enough exposure.

And my friend who has a large garden in my town--two acres of ornamentals--set her yard on fire with the bombs. The tunnels were full of dry leaves and other nesting materials and there was smoke pouring from the ground everywhere. The fire dept had to come and put it out.

A tip about the Have-a-heart traps: close them at night so you won't catch the other critters. We caught coons, skunks and possums (eww are they ugly and smelly) till we learned this. To get a skunk out of the trap, approach it with a tarp in front of you. They really aren't afraid of much, but don't typically smell bad till they spray. Some chucks will growl and charge you, so be aware of that.

We put apples and Woodchuck Weed, which I think might be Celandine, a yellow flowered lobe-leafed spring plant, in the trap to tempt them in.

Then you have to transport them, which I think is illegal but necessary, or the filled trap will go into the bay - we have no pity on GD woodchucks. I don't think any other critter will eat a delphinium - hello, Chucky, it's poison.

We tried a slingshot with bb's but it only made them hop.

Filling the holes with rocks helped.

Still, probably best bet is a dog or a rifle.

I think I reported on another thread, that I had a woodchuck this year. We were having damage in the yard and it wasn't until last weekend that we saw the woodchuck wandering all over the yard, feasting on the clover that is in our lawn. We chased him and boy are they quick. He was out the fence by the time we were going down the back steps.

I was suspecting a woodchuck because last year I met him walking in my gate, as I was sitting in the yard. What was odd though, was that he hardly touched anything last year. This year, I started noticing leaves all chewed up, a few weeks ago then we decided to try blocking the gate with a small picket fence with rocks. That worked fine, until he chewed through the bottom of the pickets along another fence line. We blocked that one up and he just dug under the fence further along. So we stopped trying to keep him out before he wrecked our fence.

Soooo....I have read all the posts here and found some of the ideas suggested interesting. I really wanted to deal with the woodchuck right away and not have to worry about him or wonder if what I was using for deterrents was going to work or not. So, I called Critter control that whitegarden mentioned.

This is what I was told by Critter Control. They charge quite a bit..which I won't post here...but a significant expense. They have one fee for coming and finding out where he is getting in the yard and they set up multiple traps. Then they charge you another fee for each woodchuck they capture. Then I asked well..if you remove all you can find and we leave the tunnel system, what's to stop another woodchuck from moving in? He said true, so they charge another fee for each hole that they take care of. They fill it with small rocks. So I asked what they do with them and he said they euthanize them. I thought you couldn't trap them or kill them in Massachusetts? He said no, you can't 'kill trap' them. Which I guess he meant a trap that kills them. They 'require' you to euthanize them and not relocate them. I would assume that he must know the law if he is in the business.

After hearing all of this, we decided to try something less drastic before considering this as an option. Today we bought some 'coyote urine' at Russell's. We just came in the yard from distributing it. So now we watch and wait. I am keeping my fingers crossed that this will do the trick. It stinks to high heaven if you are right next to it, but supposedly it will fade in a short time then only the animals can smell it.

You get little bottles that hang with cotton batten in them and you squirt it into the bottle and get the cotton batten moist, then you hang them every 12 feet around the place you are trying to keep them out of. It is supposed to last a month, but that seems a stretch to me. It cost $10. for the bottle that came with 3 dispenser bottles. You can buy extra bottles but they charge you $1.59 for a little 3" high plastic bottle. Which can add up if you have a large property you are trying to keep them out of. We used 9 bottles in our small yard and it only took care of about 1/4 of the yard where they are doing the most damage. I would think you could come up with your own bottles if you wanted to.

I will come back and report how this option is working. I took photos of my poor coneflowers and asters and I was going to post them, but I think you are already plenty familiar with what that looks like. [g]

Okay...I am back so soon..lol. The coyote urine we put around the yard has done no good at all. I saw a squirrel in the area that we had just finished applying it to and I thought..hmmm...doesn't seem to bother him. Well, it didn't bother the groundhog at all either. I found more plants eaten this morning. He has started eating the leaves on the tomato plants and the one he was eating was 3 feet away from one of the coyote urine bottles.

Very discouraging. I just did a search on GW for posts on the subject and there are a lot. So far I am hearing a lot of people complain about woodchucks and people posting that they are going to try one type of deterrent or another but no one actually coming back to the posts and reporting on whether what they were trying was successful or not.

About the only people reporting success are those who live in a rural area and can shoot them. So...if there is anyone out there who has a sure fire method of keeping them out of their yard other than shooting them or digging a trench 2 feet deep and installing chickenwire below ground all around the perimeter of the yard, I would love to hear it.

Thanks :-)

You can trap them yourself with a Havaheart. I know a number of people who have done that without too much trouble. Then you have to kill them to get rid of them. You cannot legally remove animals from your property in MA but you can kill them. You cannot use leg-hold traps in MA--illegal. How you kill them once in the Havaheart is up to you. As mercifully as possible.

I too have been in and out of woodchuck hell over the last few years-in fact I have stopped planting a vegetable garden all together. But since getting my 2 Newfs-my flower gardens have shown no damage-and last year I actually planted some herbs. This year I have 2 tomato plants-so I am slowly returning to vegetable gardening. By the way-if anyone needs/wants dog hair-I have a lifetime supply available FOC.

I bought a huge bottle of black pepper at the local warehouse store (BJ's, Costco). I'm out in the garden anyway, so I just take it with me and shake as I go. Seems to be working....

I came out one morning last week to find a huge pile of dirt next to a hole under my compost pile (which the coyotes visit regularly, so I guess this was one dumb or gutsy woodchuck!) Every broccoli plant in the garden (and they are scattered around so he had to go hunting) was eaten down to 4 or 6 inches. They were just beginning to head up, too! Since he'd not had the time to dig a back door, bombing him wasn't difficult, and now my broccoli are just beginning to develop small florets from the side buds.

I've had a groundhog problem for years. They come in from a nearby wooded area and take up residence under my neighbors shed, not far from my garden. I've tried garlic, and every kind of smell imaginable with not much luck. If you can find the hole, dump a bunch of sticky stuff around the top. They hate sticky but there's usually a front door and a back door. Filling the hole with loose pea gravel helps. They try and dig it out and it falls back in and feel like they are downing. Dog pee down the hole or even dog poop. ... A wire fence that goes up 4 feet and loose on top to if they or raccoons try to climb they will fall back down, with a foot underground, bent out like an L for at least a foot or two. So if they try to dig under they hit the wire.

J Orange, I haven't seen a ground hog yet this season, but we've had them before. You are diabolical with the ideas you have to make them move on.....lol!