Protecting potatoes from mice and voles

Despite several years of success with our Ruth Stout style potato beds (growing potatoes directly under hay mulch), during the past two years, we've been invaded by hungry voles. So this year, we decided to try a simple method of deterring them them, with companion planting.

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[giancolabird]

Word to the wise: always request hay/straw that has no pesticides and herbacides. No grazon or roundup. My entire garden died because I 'assumed' it was free of chemicals. Wahhh

[mariecooney]

I had a vole and mouse problem, but now that I have 2 cats, I have no problem …coincidence ?🤔, I think not 😉😂

[chadtitan]

I live in a place where mice 🐭 are a plague. I never thought of this till now but I planted garlic 🧄 around my deep leaf mulch potato garden. I was surprised that I had a huge harvest with no mice problems. You might be on to something here.

[Warrior-In-the-Garden]

I love your respect for scientific principles when sharing your results...an honorable and rare quality these days.

[tessen]

The pocket gophers in my garden love garlic. They'll eat it all if they can. They don't eat the onions though. I have Quack grass, voles, pocket gophers, mice, ground squirrels, squirrels, chipmunks, and now.... Giant Marmots. Lots of giant Marmots who can dig down a foot and climb more that 5 feet. I'm not giving up but it is sure a battle!! Yes, the first couple of years nothing ate the potatoes. Then they found them and also established their tunnels and probably made lots of baby rodents after eating all my good nutritious food. I enjoy your videos and I hope you keep them coming!

[gac]

Back when I kept my gardens, I was plagued with another rodent specie, (rabbits.) I got a tip from an experienced gardener that told me to plant Marigolds around the entire perimeter of the garden. I never again had any problems, plus the garden was always ringed in rather attractive flowers of various colors. (just don't get you nose too close to smell the flowers, they stink to high heaven, which was the deterrent to the pests. . . .!!!!)

[lorangerie]

Great video as always. I come originally from Canada, now live in Germany. I tried this methods (planting onions or garlic to protect other crops) in the last few years. Maybe the voles here are different, but here is what I experienced: the first year on a patch there is almost no vole damage. Then the voles come in and eat almost 100% of the potatoes. With onions? They do not stop eating the potatoes (or carrots, or whatever) and will even eat some of the onions!! With garlic? They will not eat garlic, but they will tunnel directly beside it to reach what's on the other side.

This is still anecdotal of course. Still experimenting, trying to improve the mushroom community in my beds, since voles will prefer to eat fresh mycellium to plants if they can. Will see next year!

[StrangeLittleGarden]

I have two small potato beds. About the size of a queen size bed each. And a few times during the summer and when I plant them I will sprinkle the hay and the ground with a mix of cinnamon and ginger powder. So far it's worked good to keep rodents at Bay. I tried to sprinkle them usually directly before a rain so it'll wash the cinnamon down into the hay deep

[PoisonBreaker]

i am really enjoying walking onions for the purpose of pest reduction, very potent and easy to manage.

[Trupen]

I'm not planning to plan potatoes, but I still love your videos
they are so relaxing :D

[bobg]

Great information as always. Thank you. I let those potato fruits dry and save the potato seeds inside. I figure God forbid some blight or calamity happens that wipes out my entire potato crop and/or seed potatoes are unavailable, I might at least have something to fall back on. The resulting tubers may not be true to type, but any taters is better than no taters.

[livingintoday]

So my family went out yesterday to harvest some of our potatoes and discovered that about a quarter of them had been chewed on in 25 ft of a 50 ft bed. This 25 ft had red potatoes growing in it with no onions or garlic. The other 25 ft of the 50 ft bed has white onions and garlic. We harvested 3 plants from the white potatoes and none of them were chewed on.
We have another 50 ft bed of white potatoes and onions growing about 3 ft away from the row that had rodent damage. We harvested 6 plants from this row and there is no rodent damage at all. I couldn't figure it out at first so I went to YouTube to find an answer. Now I know❣️ Thank you sir😊
Peace and Love Neighbors ❤️

[paige]

I typically grow in containers. Easier to weed but more watering needed. I hope to use the Ruth Stout method next spring on a hill I don't use for much and hope for a huge harvest. Thanks for the onions tip.

[kevin]

That meadow pathway is the thing of dreams! I LOVE it!

[littlehomesteadbythebeach]

I'm looking foward for the next years! Even if we do not grow potatoes. haha!

[simplegardeningjourney]

Interesting! Our local voles ate all most our onion sets this year...

[wvhaugen]

I started reading Ruth Stout's books in 1971. I tried her methods twenty years ago in NW Washington state when I started as a market gardener. Massive slug damage. Went back to the traditional method of planting in soil, hilling with dirt and then using as much mulch as I could get. I have been in France for the last six years and the slugs are not as bad in my half acre home garden. The birds and lizards keep them manageable. This year I have a lot of straw I purchased last season (Side note: I spent more on straw last season - 400 euros - than I did on fertilizer - 300 euros.) I have two experiments in play. One experiment is throwing the long-stoloned, poorly stored potatoes on the ground and covering them with straw. Some are coming up, but we had a severe cold spell mid-April. The other experiment is planting in soil and hilling up right away (which I have used for years) and then covering everything with the straw. Slow sprouting so far, but it is still only May 9th and we are at 500 meters in the Pyrenees.

Keep up the good work.

[gayle]

I'm totally going to try this! I followed your Ruth Stout method for two growing seasons and the potatoes took a beating from what I had assumed were mice. Voles! Little buggers! I went back to the old method of burying the potatoes under soil, but I'll try the onion fence this year in an extra bed and see what happens. Thanks for the update and all your videos. I really enjoy them and appreciate you keeping it real.

[giancolabird]

Exvellent content. Thank you. I use the Ruth Stout method and would like to avoid voles.

[opcn]

I let weeds go crazy in my garden this year and the voles and pack rats that overwintered on my sunchokes (I didn't get to eat a single one) have absolutely devastated all my cabbage and beets. Probably facing a 95% loss. They just eat the crowns off the beets too so the root dies with nowhere to send out new leaves.