Find solutions by species, Find a licensed wildlife control professional, How to live trap and remove a problem porcupine, How to keep porcupines from damaging my vehicles, How to get porcupines out from under my shed or deck, What to do with an animal that is behaving strangely or aggressively, Northeast Wildlife Damage Management Cooperative, Northeast Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies, signing up for notification when your state is added. Please consult a pest control professional before applying any tactics from pestpointers.com. This website primarily references personal learning experiences. If you have used a lethal trap, porcupine quills are still a threat to you. per 40 sq. That being said, just be aware that if you dont currently have a porcupine problem, placing a salt block out willdefinitelyattract them! This prevents vital nutrients from reaching the other parts of the trees. They enjoy leaves, twigs, berries, nuts, seeds, flowers, fruit, inner tree bark, and evergreen needles. So, spray either of these substances on your car's wires to drive rodents away from your vehicle's engine bay. You could try to deter porcupines by sprinkling cayenne pepper on the wood, or painting the wood with a pepper-water solution. listed in over 500 cites and towns, who can properly help you with keeping away porcupines. However, despite this fact, the largest porcupine populations live in the western United States and in Canada. Previous How can we keep Canada geese away from our pond? Porcupines are the third-largest member of the rodent family. They also look at wood as the answer to the nutrition and diet they need. You will know as soon as the trigger arm gets hooked to the door. Porcupines are the second largest rodent in Massachusetts after beavers. Properly dispose of and store your garbage. Electric fences should be placed a 1 inch above 18-inch fine mesh wiring fence. Chances are that these pests may knock over the trap to reach the food inside. Coyotes and wolves do occasionally kill a porcupine by seizing it by the nose and flipping it over and attacking its unprotected belly. Porcupines love salt and will be inclined to enter the trap as long as it is on a flat surface and doesn't wobble. Notify me via e-mail if anyone answers my comment. Bend the top few inches outward at a 65-degree angle and run a smooth electrified wire 1 inches above the poultry wire. This liquid repellent has very little odor to people but to animals, its repulsive. Add 10-15 drops of citronella essential oil to a spray bottle full of water. Be careful when mixing up a spray like this and when you are applying it. Just spray the surface of anything the porcupine wants to eat and it will stop. Youd need to reapply this every time it rained, though. Start by building a fence around trees, gardens, and where damage has been most prevalent. Each 1.25 lbs will protect approximately 50 sq. How to Deter Porcupines From the Area. They will keep coming back for a food source. Here are some alternate ways to keep ticks away from your property: Keep your grass short Clean up lawn clippings Create a barrier of mulch around your yard Weed and trim any tall weeds or plants Use professional outdoor pest control services, like Mosquito Joe, to protect your yard How to Avoid Tick Bites Otherwise, hanging them around the garden or yard is a great way to keep porcupines out before they cause Damage. What animal would strip the bark off a tree? The essential oil is better if youre targeting a specific area, such as a shed corner, tool handle, or young tree. As an Amazon Associate, we earn from qualifying purchases. Instead, itll be concentrated on the part or area where youll place it, and when porcupines come near it, theyll instantaneously be disgusted by the scent emitted. They can cough, shriek, whistle like a bird, make funny kazoo noises, chatter their teeth, and grunt. How To Put Up Led Lights Without Ruining The Paint? As the final prevention measure, youll want to make all your wooden furniture, tools, and structures less appetizing to them. Wood preservatives may repel porcupines. Once inside the house, they often are not able to find their way back out and end up hunkered down in the corner of a dark room. Trees that have been girdled by chewing will die, often ruining thousands of dollars worth of landscaping. Use a Smell or Taste Deterrent. One of the easiest ways to deter porcupines is by using scent deterrents. According to theNational Pesticide Information Center, citronella contains three main repellent ingredients: These three babies combine to make both an insect and animal repellent. Electric fencing can also be put at the top. High poultry wire that is at least 60 cm high is used to enclose the area. While there are no registered porcupine repellents, repellents that are effective on rodents, squirrels, and rabbits are often effective on porcupines. 4. Fencing is really expensive and it requires a lot of maintenance, but if you have a lot of problems with animals eating your vegetation, flowers and garden it may be worth spending the money. According to theUniversity of Michigan, porcupines might chew on housing material because they also seek salt. If you want to try to solve the problem yourself, you can look up a . Porcupines are not overtly aggressive, but they still have teeth if their quills dont get your first. 15 Scents That Rats Hate (and How to Use Them), 8 Things to Do If You See Spiders in Your House, Why Peppermint Oil Can Repel Mice (And How To Use It), 13 Easy Tips To Keep Raccoons Out Of Your Swimming Pool, 10 Different Ways That Snakes Entered Your Home. That being said, peppermint is still quite effective at deterring porcupines. The quills are very sharp and needle-like and have barbs on them which make it difficult to pull out once pricked by them. But in eastern North America, by far one of the porcupines most formidable predators is the fisher, a larger cousin of the American marten. Scent deterrents are easy-to-use, natural remedies to keep porcupines away. The rumor that porcupines can shoot or throw their quills at aggressors is only a legend, but theres no need to test that out for yourself. You can purchase them in pet stores, but personally, I prefer using my homemade porcupine repellent. I can't shoot him because he's only there at night. - Find Out The Best Way, Should I Cover My Patio Furniture In Summer? This is . Visit our Terms and Conditions for more information. A proper face mask, eye protection, gloves, etc. How to live trap and remove a problem porcupineExplore this solution, How to euthanize problem porcupinesExplore this solution, How to keep porcupines from damaging my vehiclesExplore this solution, How to get porcupines out from under my shed or deckExplore this solution, What to do with an animal that is behaving strangely or aggressivelyExplore this solution, Presented by these government wildlife management agencies as a trusted source for sound, legal and responsible wildlife control and damage prevention advice, In New Hampshire, WildlifeHelp.org is supported by the Wildlife Management Institute, the New Hampshire Fish and Game, the Northeast Wildlife Damage Management Cooperative, and the Northeast Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies. Captured porcupines are easily relocated into state forest. You cant place candles all over the yard, so what can be done? Create a cayenne pepper spray. You can also use an ultrasonic emitter to keep them away, but again this is not 100% certain to work. How do I stop my toilet flapper from closing too fast? Porcupines are primarily nocturnal animals who rest during the day in hollow trees and logs, underground burrows or in crevices found in rocky areas. This site is intended to provide education and information about how to keep porcupines away from your house, yard, garbage cans, shed, so that you can make an informed decision Its not rocket science you can do it using a couple of household tools, kitchen staples, and home equipment! Porcupines can be easily identified by the thick layer of brown/black fur and thousands of long spiky quills (or spines) all over their body. Your email address will not be published. If they happen to catch their reflection in a jar of water, it may be enough to scare them off because they will think another porcupine is around. Their winter food supply is of little nutritional value, however, and while they might eat a pound of food every day all winter, porcupines lose almost a third of their weight by spring. Copyright 2020 by Wildlife Animal Control. Its unreasonable to cut down all your trees, remove gardens, and put a fence around your entire house just for the sake of these trundling rodents. How To Clean Mohawk Laminate Flooring? Fisher cats, however, excel at preying upon porcupines and may even suppress porcupine populations in some places. Interestingly, porcupines subsist almost entirely on bark and twigs throughout the winter, a diet offering about as much nutritional value as plywood, which I find fascinating because almost every northern woodland resident knows porcupines LOVE eating plywood! Call us today! Heres How To Fix, wood as the answer to the nutrition and diet, How To Identify Vintage Wicker Furniture? Mountain lions and fishers have different stratgies for attacking porcupines. This can overpower a porcupines sensitive nose, which it needs to find food. Trapping a porcupine can be done by a homeowner, but some safety precautions should be remembered. Make sure you wash the trap with soap before you set it and wear latex gloves so you dont leave your scent on it. Any gardens or vegetation are at risk of being destroyed as well. Their calls even occasionally befuddle experienced ornithologists who can be forgiven for thinking they are about to discover some sort of rare European bird lost in the forests of New England, only to discover the source of call is a basketball-sized pincushion halfway up a tree. Youd need to reapply this every time it rained, though. Step 2 Encourage trees to grow leafy closed canopies by cutting back on tree trimming and by watering and fertilizing the trees in your yard. To use peppermint to repel porcupines, you can use the essential oil combined with water to create a spray. Porcupines love to chew wood! Theyve become household items for their many different uses and scents. Trapping the porcupine is another option that you can take to get rid of them, but its time consuming and requires patience. Identifying and Preventing Porcupine Damage to Trees. Porcupines are no different and need to chew to keep their teeth from growing too large. Porcupines crave salt due to how their bodies process sodium from tree bark and other plant materials. Their favorite food item is corn on the cob. Since harming a Porcupine is discouraged, controlling an invading Porcupine will involve either live trapping with Solutions Humane Live Trap or deterring the rodent from your property with a repellent such as Critter Ridder. Log in, BAIT, GRANULE AND LIQUID STATIONS (EMPTY STATIONS), INSECTICIDES:BACTERIA BASED (BACILLUS THURINGIENSIS), INSECTICIDES:SCALP (FOR USE ON PEOPLE), POLES, SNAKE TONGS, GRABBERS AND OTHER MISC, SOLAR POWERED GROUND STAKE REPELLER REBOOT, TREE BORERS HOW TO IDENTIFY THEIR DAMAGE. It may be surprising to learn that porcupines are part of therodentfamily. Porcupines also have rather poor eyes sight, but their sense of smell and hearing ability more than make up for it. Both spearmint and peppermint are part of the mint family. Email us at info@wildlifeanimalcontrol.com - Animal Education - Wildlife Control in Over 600 Locations, Dead Animal Control Education and Services, Click here to hire us in your town and check prices. These materials attract rodents like rats, skunks, and even squirrels. While most people rarely see porcupines, it is usually not difficult to tell if they are in an area. Once you have confirmed Porcupine activity, this is where you will apply treatment. Transfer it into a spray bottle and spray it on your wooden furniture and structures at least once per day. If the threat continues, the porcupine will turn its back, raise its quills and lash with its tail. If you are not sure, contact us and we will try to assist with identification. It is my goal to educate the public about porcupines and other wildlife, and If you use fencing to protect a tree, make sure to leave enough room for the tree to grow, especially if it is young. Once the Porcupine threat has been neutralized, you will want to make sure an invasion doesn't happen again. Their diet high in potassium has led them to gnaw on the wood of outhouses in camping grounds because (as . You can try predator scent like coyote or fox but you constantly have to reapply it to keep it fresh and the porcupine will probably figure it out that its not real. 2. I mean, what is there to love about wood? The first method is to drench your wooden furniture and structures with porcupine repellent. As an Amazon Associate, we earn from qualifying purchases. if you need to deal with a porcupine problem. Car tires and hoses may also be chewed on for their mineral content or road salt coating. The strong scent will make it difficult for the porcupine to locate food in the area, encouraging it to trundle off to another location. If you are from another state, please indicate your interest by signing up for notification when your state is added. todd heyn. You can get traps at most hardware or garden stores and some animal control officers will either let you rent one or will come out and set the traps themselves. Rabbits, rodents, and other animals can cause a lot of damage to your vehicle's wiring if left unchecked, especially in a vehicle in storage. Since homes are made of wood, these can also be susceptible to wood damage. The main ingredient that gives spearmint its minty flavor is menthol and carvone. Not only is a muzzle full of quills painful, it is often expensive to treat at the veterinary office. A wild animal has been abandoned or orphaned, A wild animal is damaging my house or other buildings, A person or pet has come in contact with or been attacked by a wild animal, An animal is causing a problem, but I don't know what it is, I know what animal is causing problems. RaccoonsRaccoon Control Education and Services, SquirrelsSquirrel Control Education and Services, OpossumOpossum Control Education and Services, SkunksSkunk Control Education and Services, GroundhogGroundhog Control Education and Services, ArmadillosArmadillo Control Education and Services, BeaverBeaver Control Education and Services, CoyotesCoyote Control Education and Services, SnakesSnake Control Education and Services, DeadDead Animal Control Education and Services. Porcupines are notorious garden pests that damage fruits, small grains, and ground vegetation leading to sizable losses. Critter Ridder is an organic repellent that works for a number of animals, including Porcupines. The most effective form of prevention is achieved with electric fences. Right: The upper and lower jaws of a porcupine. The peppery, soapy taste will deter some rose-eating animals, including deer. Simply because its natural, cheap, and I dont need to go outside my home to prepare it. Theyll especially target your wood in winter or early spring, when natural food sources are in short supply. Consultyourlocal and state guidelines to see if Porcupines are a protected species in your location before applying controland proceed with caution when applying control as Porcupines can be dangerous. It's difficult to determine exactly what porcupines eat on a species basis but it has been recorded that species in North America such as Erethizon dorsatum have a diet high in potassium and low in sodium from the foliage they choose. Bio Explorer explores the insight into the different porcupine species' diets, how porcupines hunt if they do, when they eat, how often they eat, what they eat porcupines and their role in the . This means looking for twigs that have been eaten, their tracks (especially during the winter when they are active), and barkless trees that have been stripped by their gnawing. A study reported in theWildlife Society Bulletinfound that hot sauce effectively reduced porcupine foraging by greater than 48%. Luckily, there are plenty of ways to deter them! These will attract porcupines. We are compensated for referring traffic and business to Amazon and other companies linked to on this site. Combine the ingredients in a spray bottle and give your rose bushes a good soaking. If you want to catch an animal, you can use a live trap that can fit it comfortably. They are a medium-sized, pigeon-toed animal with short legs, long claws, and a high-arching back. This site is owned and operated by Pest Pointers LLC | pestpointers.com is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.com. I grew up in an area of Upstate, NY where dealing with wildlife pests is a common occurrence. Call us today! This type of repellent is similar to lavender and spearmint, making it difficult for porcupines to locate food in the presence of these scents. Proceedings of the Eighteenth Vertebrate Pest Conference (1998),23. where regulations may be more restrictive, especially as it applies to discharge of firearms, transport of animals or use of trapping equipment. Chicken wire about 18 inches high used in conjunction with a strand of electric wire just above the chicken wire is effective at keeping porcupines from the area. 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