Try these unconventional ways to keep predators away from your homestead

Homestead
BDN’s Homestead section is a celebration of rural life. Our writers cover small farms, animals, DIY solutions and fascinating Maine people who find unique ways to live simply. Read more Homestead stories here. 

Some basic principles keep your animals and produce safer, such as installing hardware cloth around the chicken coop, keeping food containers closed tightly and fencing in garden beds.

But for extra security, there are a wide range of unconventional ideas for keeping your animals and plants safer, from the used-car-lot approach to the fake corpse decoy.

Car lot inflatables

Those dancing, inflatable tubes with smiling faces and waving arms that you probably associate with car lots can also frighten hawks off from your chicken run. They aren’t cheap, and you will have an addition to your electric bill, but Maine homesteaders have had success with them. If you try it, move it around every few days so the hawks don’t get too used to them. This is good practice for anything you’re trying to do to scare off birds.

Dead crow effigies

The sight of a dead bird tied to a post can deter fellow birds from bothering your fruit trees and bird coops, but it doesn’t have to be a real body. Realistic Halloween decoration crows should work just as well.

Noisy poultry

Guard dogs are one option for poultry protection, but if the training or expense is too much, you can add a layer of security by getting some noisy birds. Geese are protective birds, and if you raise them among chickens they should see them as part of the flock. Guinea hens are another vigilant, talkative option if you don’t have neighbors nearby.

Frightening fish nets

Creating crisscrossing layers of fishing line over the top of the chicken run works to deter hawks.

Double deer fences

Deer can jump more than eight feet high if they’re after something in your garden. Building a very high fence or a netting “roof” over your garden might not be realistic, but deer don’t have great depth perception, so having two fences around each other can confuse them.