I can quarantee this method to rid yourself of pesky squirrels. We have been squirrel free for six weeks now. We have two trees which the squirrels entered the yard with. I took vaseline and made a ring around each tree as high up as i could reach. Then with gloves on i smeared in cayenne pepper from the grocery store making a vaseline pepper combination ring. Additionally to ensure the squirrels didnt follow up by using the fence rows from the neighbors tress, in strategic places i smeared the mixture on certain places along the fences surrounding my yard. The only other thing i did was took moth balls and put them in some legs of panty hose and hung them in the corners of the fence rows. I used neutral colors so they did not stick out like a sore thumb. No one even notices them there. I am not sure if the moth balls or the vaseline but either way we have been squirrel free and for the first time in five years we have gotten ripe tomatoes, radishes, peppers and onions out of our flower bed gardens with no animal bites taken out of them. I have read several articles about killing the tree rats but i caution this method as others will just continue to move in, it will never stop. good luck

First, hostas, bird feeders and squirrels do not mix well. No animal should be digging in hostas for seeds. I would remove the bird feeder or any hosta around the birdfeeder in a 6 ft diameter circle. We have our bird feeder in the middle of the lawn, but some part of the lawn underneath needs to be reseeded because birds, squirrels and chipmunks constantly scratch there for fallen seeds. Fallen bird seeds also feed mice which then harm hostas too. I noticed that to get to the bird feeder squirrels travel in the tree canopy, climbing down to the ground at one tree, with the hostas at that tree getting damaged. Good luck! Bernd

If you have predators to balance the groundhogs (e.g. wolves), don't worry. But if you don't have wolves, or a real lot of hungry coyotes, whatever a 4-10 is, you will probably need it. The local outdoorsmen (hunters, etc.) will know the story. In areas where hedgehog population goes unchecked, they multiply quickly. We used to have several dozen in our yard, and they were roadkill all over the area. Then one day I saw a wolf 1 mile away. All the hedgehogs disappeared that season.

It's funny how squirrels can be such a hot subject. Where I work in the countryside they get shot on sight because they are bad-but then some who live on the estate are into shooting so it sometimes seems like anything for the kill. Living in a city squirrels at times are the only live wild mammals you may see. We have them in our garden and they never get out of control as cars seem to control them when they cross the street so numbers never explode. We feed them and they cause little harm other than sometimes burying things alittle to often. I have to laugh at their antics and love it when they dive for the wood pidgeons to scare them away. Now alittle story. My neighbour reaches through and places food for the squirrels on our bird table. One squirrel became so tame it finally started taking food from her hand. Then (and this is where it gets weepy) as she reached her hand out one morning it touched her hand with it's little paw as it took the nut. By T time it was dead having been hit by a car. My neighbour was devastated and actually stated she cried that night-she loves her pets etc.