We have two kittehs who are regular visitors, and I don’t know, but they’re suspect right along with the raccoons. You can’t blame them. There’s no way for them to tell they’re not ‘free food.’ But we have to do something.
So…bird netting over our eagle-discouraging fishing line. I’ve tried it before, but anchoring it taut has been a pita, in our very irregular, rockbordered pond. I found some excellent stainless tent stakes at Walmart, just a spike with a bent hook at the top. Bury those, and they’re good for this purpose, hook net webbing in, stamp into the ground, and you’re good. So…
We’d rather not have the netting, but we view it as a way to let our fish get big enough to discourage predators. Notably, the eagle made a try at Ari, who’s large, and couldn’t lift off with her, but 99% of our losses have been 4-6″ fish. So we’re just going to bring up everybody beyond that size before we think of changing that netting back to just lines.
At least we can now relax.
Somebody just told me a neat thing: that vinegar will kill weeds, if used in a sprayer. I’m trying this out in the front walk. We hate using chemicals and poisons near the fish—or our water table, for that matter; and if I could sub vinegar, I’d do it in a New York minute.
Sorry about your fish. A kettle of boiling water on weeds coming up between the cracks of paving stones is effective.
I’ve had good experience with this myself. Most plants, even weeds, don’t survive getting scalded. A great environmentally friendly way to get rid of weeds from a spot that you don’t have other plants you care about.
My only caveat is not to try this with poison ivy, oak, or sumac. The boiling water can vaporize the urushiol off of the leaves of the plant, and the vapor has the same itch-inducing properties as touching the leaves.
Thanks!
Most animals seem to despise the odor of cumin. I have known it to keep racoons out of trash. Ammonia can also be useful for weeds and unwelcome critters. Salt will kill plant life for a while, but it comes back more lushly than before.
I wonder if the boiling water would work on plants that have a large taproot, like dandelions? If it’s sufficiently established, you might kill off the current growth of leaves, but not do in the root, and I know a lot of weeds can sprout from root fragments (which makes them terribly pernicious).
The Kitteh Posse has evolved into the Breakfast Club: Smartypants, Froofy, Little Brother and Spot all are sitting just outside the sliding door as soon as the kitchen lights go on. Zorro gets fed first, then the outdoors cats. It’s all fairly orderly, although I’m pretty sure Smartypants thinks the younglings have a horrible lack of gravitas, what with the purring, headbutting, and adorable rolling about.
It can be. Worked for me once when I had too much water in the kettle, and a dandelion.
It should do if they’re this year’s seedlings. Dandelions are a devil to pull out of cracks because the leaves just break off. Doubt it would work on a 9″ root though!
Sympathies to you both and to the late, lamented fishie.
Unfortunately, wildlife sees your back yard as a whole big pond full of targets of opportunity. Where’s a force field when you need one?
One good thing about the dandelions which the pilgrims brought to the new land is that you can eat all of it. I have heard that even the roots are rich in vitamins A and C. We had sleet this morning, I still have not seen the first dandy of spring.
Vinegar will kill any foliage that it touches, but it doesn’t kill the roots so it becomes an endurance contest. Can you keep spraying that @%$#$# weed every time it comes back for a couple months? If yes, then it will at last die, if no then the weed wins. And like any other sprayed on herbicide, it’s best to spray early in the morning when the leaves stomata (pores) are all wide open before full sun shuts a lot of them to conserve water.
As a last ditch effort, my friend would dig around the worst perps and shove an empty can over it. Most of the time the plant spent its energy trying to circumvent the inside of the can rather than send up shoots beyond the can. Worked very well for young trees with looooong tap roots.
I’ve got about a gazillion *(&^%$#!@#$ “Tree of Heaven” [sic] seedlings in my lawn. That’s a lotta cans….
Brilliant! note to self: must try this.
So sorry about the fish. I have a raised small pond, only about 5 feet wide, that my daughters’ BIG dogs LOVE to jump in! At least they are not after the fish!
As for the vinegar as treatment for weeds, you are actually supposed to use horticultural vinegar, which is a much more concentrated version of vinegar. Vinegar is an acid and the horticultural vinegar will burn your skin so wear protective gloves. It has to be applied more often than commercial weed killers, which I refuse to buy. There is a particular company whose products I refuse to buy (starts with M) because they seem to be determined to drive organic farmers out of business.
[THIS is where my comment belongs, NOT on the spammers issue – sorry!)
Do koi need to come to the surface? I’ve seen them at the surface apparently gulping air, but do they need to do that? I was thinking perhaps stretching “bird netting”, the thin black plastic netting with about a 1-1.5″ mesh, right at the surface might provide unobtrusive protection.
They could get snagged in it. They eat their kibble at the surface. I’ve got the bird netting about 6 in above.
We used to spray bleach on sidewalk weeds. Killed ’em dead and kept ’em that way. I wouldn’t try it on lawn weeds, though.
If you’re in a water-catchment area, that generates the drinking water for the city, there may be rules about what chemicals you are and are not allowed to use outdoors on any surface where it can leach into the groundwater.
I don’t know how these things are done in the USA, but here in such areas the use of pesticides allowed is quite limited, oil changes on your car at home are not allowed (garages have fluid-tight floors and oil traps), sometimes using detergents for washing the car at home isn’t allowed, etc., because of contaminating the groundwater necessary for tapwater. You can get a fine that costs more than an oil-change or a car-wash, so it doesn’t stop everyone from being irresponsible and self-centered but it does significantly diminish the contamination.
Before using bleach or acid strong enough to burn skin it might be a good idea to check up on this.