Chipmunks or groundhogs/woodchucks will eat anything. They are both members of the squirrel family, but burrow as well making them very difficult to keep out of a garden. I have no great suggestions as I've been battling both for years and the only thing that has helped at all is a motion-activated sprinkler that sprays when motion is detected. Or get a dog.

I will look into the sprinkler. I have two dogs and they are useless.

Could you post a photo of the damage? IME woodchucks eat and damage large quantities of material, not just edges, pulling down vines, eating entire broccoli plants, etc. Sounds like something relatively small.

Hi Babs. I agree it is probably small otherwise it would have eaten the whole thing. The lettuce should have been about twice this size. Here is a photo.

Is that what all your plants that were eaten look like? That's what my plants look like when eaten by a woodchuck. To me, that is nearly the whole plant.

I guess I should get my woodchuck Havart trap out again!

Suzabanana, your woodchucks are way more polite than mine which leave piles of shredded foliage from things like peas, and less than an inch of stem from things like broccoli, Kale or lettuce. :>(

I haven't seen damage like Vladimir's - not neat enough for what deer very occasionally do in my garden, but neater than my woodchucks.

I know that woodchucks can climb well, so it definitely could be woodchucks in your garden.

It is an adolescent wood chuck! I suspected as much and so set a Han-a -hart trap for him but the only animal that took the bait (lettuce) was one of my dogs. He must be able to climb over a f foot high rabbit fence to get into the garden. The two kinds of repellent I have used are useless.

1. Is there a better bait I can use?
2. Is there a better way to keep him out of my garden? (Build a 6 ft fence (and have him or Mexico pay for it?)

Claire, thanks for the tip and the link!

Woodchucks are ground squirrels - they can climb trees. So, there is not really any height that they can't climb. They also burrow underground.

Again, I recommend the sprinkler.

A low electric fence is a good repellent, but you would need to keep the grass trimmed in the vicinity. Also, if the top 1' or so of a wire fence is floppy, it makes it difficult to climb over.