If you wonder about How to Keep Cats out of the Garden? We have some brilliant not-harmful hacks to protect your garden from them!
Although cats are cute and adorable, these furballs aren’t your plant’s friend! So, if you are worried about How to Keep Cats out of the garden, we have the best remedies to help you out! And the best part is all of these are safe and non-toxic to cats.
Disclaimer: We don’t suggest the use of cat traps, poisons, toxic cat repellents, or any other such thing that may harm the stray cats.
Learn how to keep cats away from houseplants here
How to Keep Cats Out of the Garden?
1. Make the Bed Uneven and Pricky
Plunge pricky objects such as twigs, chopsticks, or chicken wire into the garden bed. You can also mulch the ground around the tender plants with eggshells, plastic pieces, or shredded wood. Cats find it uncomfortable to walk on the sharp edges, hence stay away.
Ensure to wear shoes and use gloves while working in the area to prevent hurting yourself.
2. Build a Fence
Fence your garden beds with chicken wire or create a mesh of PVC pipes, or wooden skates so that cats avoid frolicking in your raised beds. Make sure to build a barrier of at least 2-3 feet high so that the cats won’t jump over easily.
3. Citrus Peels
Cats are scientifically known to be sensitive to the citrusy smell and stay away from spots that emit a strong lemony fragrance. Sprinkle shredded citrus peels in and around your garden so that the felines stay away.
4. Brewed Coffee Grounds
Similar to the citrus, cats are not very fond of the strongly concentrated caffeine smell. As forwarded by the American College of Veterinary Pharmacists coffee is toxic to cats, so you can drop brewed coffee grounds around the garden.
Although, make sure to not use this remedy around non-acid-loving plants.
5. Human Hair & Urine
Clean off your hairbrush in the garden, or fill a bag with human hair and leave it at the place where cats frequent. As cats dislike the smell of human hair, they will stay away from your yard. You can also get them from hairdressers.
It may sound absurd but just like human hair, human male urine diluted in water is a powerful repellant for cats, foxes, and deer. You can try that too, learn more about it here!
6. Hang Wind Chimes
Cats are sensitive to high-frequency sounds such as a wind chime or stringing bells. They produce an ultrasonic vibration that is unbearable to cats and hence deter them away.
7. Grow Cat Deterring Plants
Grow cat-deterring plants such as lavender, lemon thyme, pennyroyal, and rue around your garden so that the other plants can thrive well without the fear of the pouncing kitties around.
Also, do make sure to avoid growing plants that cats love–like catnip.
8. Essential Oils
Add 5-6 drops of eucalyptus, lemongrass, lavender, or peppermint essential oil to a liter of water, shake well, and spray around your yard and the areas you want to keep cat-free. Cats cannot stand such a scent and stay away for a while.
9. Keep the Place Clean
Keep your garden clean and litter-free. Ensure that no food bits or pet toys are lying around; if there are any compost bins around your garden, cover them up to prevent the unwanted ransack of rats and rodents.
Also, conceal any openings or holes that could be a hiding place for the cats or their prey.
10. Treat them with Sudden Splash of Water
As surprising as it may sound, cats fear water splashes. Keep an eye on your cat, and welcome them with a sudden water hose. This will keep the pet from visiting your yard for a few days to come.
You may also use a motion-activated water sprinkler that would sense their arrival and give them an unpleasant water bath.
11. Commercial Cat-Repellents
Commercial cat repellents come in powdered or granular forms that smell of cat predators such as foxes, coyotes, or bobcats. You may sprinkle the granules around your garden to fear the cats away.
The best part is that they are non-toxic and will neither harm your plants nor the unwanted felines.
12. Get a Dog
Train your dog to be a good garden keeper and bark away the cats as they spot any around the garden. Their blaring bark will scare the felines and the word of mouth will spread around cat families 😆 and they will start ignoring your yard.
13. Dedicate a Place Outside Your Garden
Designate a cat-friendly spot away from your garden. To keep them occupied, you may grow feline-friendly plants there such as catnip, rosemary, and zinnias. Also, make a sand bed to free the rest of your yard from their feces.
None of those ideas work our family has done just about everything to keep cats out of our yard. Nothing has work yet we have tons of cats constantly coming in our yard.
For those particular difficult jobs I would just do what my grandma did and took her old thick plastic office mat, flipped that dreadful thing upside down & stick it just underneath the top soil so when they did decide to use ur bed asa bathroom, they’d find it isn’t as pleasant as they thot kept her trouble felines at bay but after doing this she didn’t have any in her entire yard they learn & communicate rather quickly with each other which was a win win for grandma. :)
Use a pellet gun, works well for me
Question on the citrus situation does it have to be lemon or can oranges or tangerines be used as well? Says citrus but does indicate lemon specifically as scientifically being the one so I wasn’t sure. I’ve got oranges coming out my eyeballs & not so much with lemons is why I ask. Ty btw for the very helpful natural repellent type tips. I’m a HUGE bunny fan but also a bunny mom so I can’t in good faith use anything that would harm those wild variety that we have. Hoping none mentioned do.. another possible solution is to use the food grade silica but be sure to heed all safety & use instructions if u do. Vinegar mixes have always been my best method. But it helps deter ‘skeeters n a laundry list of other things ya don’t want around.