Keeping bugs and critters out of the vegatable garden?

What do you use... I need help the leaves are already being eaten.

Re: Keeping bugs and critters out of the vegatable garden?

I am doing a combo:

1.Home Depot Insect & Disease Spray called Eco-something. It's canola oil & some other organic things that you spray on the leaves. (I read you can make your own with vegetable oil & dish soap)

2 . Spearment & Peppermint Plants around garden (animals don;t like the smell)

3. Cheyenne Pepper & Crushed Red Pepper Flakes on Leaves and around the border (hate the smell and once it gets on their paws, they don't come back. I think this is good for insects too) - I read to mix pepper with tasasco sauce and elmers glue and then spray on leaves. Not too much to kill the plant, but enough for it to stick.

4. Marigolds around the perimeter (cats and other critters hate marigolds)


HTH

ETA: I read wrapping tinfoil around small stakes and putting them in the garden helps keep critters away. The glare from the foil scares them ---- the same can be done with mirrors

Message edited 5/24/2009 10:52:41 AM.

Re: Keeping bugs and critters out of the vegatable garden?

The pepper flakes or blood meal generally keeps the critters at bay. I learned after the squirrels ate my DS's entire tomato crop last year.