A Guide to Keeping Squirrels Out of the Garden

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You have so many options to you when you have a problem with squirrels in the garden, although not all of these approaches are considered equal. The BEST way to keep squirrels out of your garden is to make sure you have nothing there that attracts them, and this will usually be things such as food, shelter, water, or other squirrels.



A wild animal will always come onto your property for a reason — for something. They will be looking for one of the things that we mentioned above, and your home usually provides the perfect setting, unless you have modified things slightly beforehand to make the land less attractive. These modifications are quite simple too, such as adding a baffler to bird feeders or removing the feeders from tree branches. This will prevent the squirrel from being able to access the source of food, and, after a while, the animal will give up and move along, especially if its efforts constantly prove to be fruitless.

Removing all sources of food is the first thing that you should do to keep squirrels an other wild animals out of your garden. It is food that often draws them closer in the first place, so by taking that out of the equation, you are removing part of the problem. All the while you do still have food in your back garden, wild animals will be able to take advantage.

Of course, it won't be as easy to take all food sources inside, especially if you are growing fruits and vegetables or similar. You can protect these food sources also, using wooden frameworks and hardware cloth or mesh wiring, but you must remember that squirrels can dig, jump, climb, and run very fast … You will need to make sure that whatever framework or support you use, it will be enough to keep back and withstands squirrel attacks. If they want in, they will fight hard to get in.

Even food that might not seem like food to you, can be food for a squirrel. We often associate garbage rummaging with raccoons or foxes, but squirrels can be just as bad. People assume that they just eat seeds, nuts, and berries, but they can be easily convinced to eat meat products that have been left in the garbage bag. If they’re hungry, any food is fair game. They need to do whatever they need to do in order to stay alive.

Of course, instead of making life difficult for the squirrels to get to the food sources in your yard, you could always look at making life difficult for the squirrels trying to get into your yard. This is tough, because (as previously stated), squirrels can climb and jump remarkably well, meaning that very few places are out of reach. A fencing system can help, but you should add an additional part that fits underground (such as bent into shape hardware cloth) to prevent attacks from burrowing and digging pest animals. In reality, it is quite tough to keep ALL wild animals out of your garden, especially when they can move around with much more freedom and ease than we ever could.

The best thing to do when you want to keep squirrels out, is to not give them a reason to come in. Wide and open spaces will scare squirrels — they have nowhere to run into and hide. They will be vulnerable from passing predators, such as foxes, coyotes, owls, and eagles. A clean and open garden is less likely to have animals in it than a tidy one.

There are plenty of small changes you could make to your garden to prevent squirrels getting in, but you won't ever find a way to 100% keep them out. The only thing that you can do is stop anything squirrel-attractive from being easy to get to, as well as making sure that your home is sealed, top to bottom, so that they can't physically get in.

As much as you might not want a squirrel in your back yard, you're going to have squirrels in your attic even more!

Go back to the Squirrel Removal page, or learn tips to do it yourself with my How to Get Rid of Squirrels guide.

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