"NO HOPE" oganic grower needs advice.

[moondawg]

Im an outdoor guerilla grower at 38north thats grown for years using chemicals but ive settled on a strain thats known to be tasty so for the past several years, ive been trying to grow some plants organically but without success.

Animals in the enviroment are attracted to the food parts such as alphalpha or whey and animal waste products,(bone meal, blood, chicken manure,etc.) that most organics seem to be made of and they continually dig up the soil to eat the minerals they seek. Ive tried placing nutrients in the whole the previous fall and allow them to overwinter before planting but it doesnt matter, the plants get dug up repeatedly and the plants are eventually killed without exception.

We have wild boars so fences are not only ineffective but dangerous as he might be tangled in it when you return. Ive tried putting wire mesh over the planting hole which stops them from digging it up, but they destroy the plant in the process of trying.

Skunks, oppossoms, ground hogs and minks seem to be the worst and will return to the hole repeatedly and dig up the soil.

Are there any organic ingredients/ materials or soil that dont inclued animal byproducts, waste or food additives?

 

[Scrappy4]

Are there any organic ingredients/ materials or soil that dont inclued animal byproducts, waste or food additives?

Sure there are lots of them, but animals like them too. My dogs love rolling in fermented plant extracts that smell worse than ass.

I guess you need to play a game of keep away to outsmart the animals. Could you make an improvised corral? Plant something they like better close by. Or maybe grow in buckets hanging from trees, like those upside down tomatoes you see. Or just bite the bullet and grow indoors.....scrappy

 

[RanchoDeluxe]

It sounds like you would need to incorporate multiple techniques to rid yourself of these varmints. If you are in an area where wild boars are likely to be encountered I'm assuming you are armed. If a gunshot every now and then isn't going to attract attention....I'd start killing. A .17hmr makes very little noise and would kill everything you mentioned with a well placed shot.

Trap them.
Spread predator urine in the area. Cougar piss works well here.
Human hair spread out through the area...don't use your own.
Dog shit.
There are some organic sprays out there meant for deer and the tree industry. Test first before using on all your plants. Pepper and rancid eggs are the ingredients for most of them.
We used to hang bars of soap from trees in the area...this was for deer...can't hurt to try.

If none of this works or appeals to you. Bring some 50-100gal smart pots out there. Place them ontop of a couple layers of chicken wire. Then wrap the smart pot with 6' tall 4" square fencing. This will make a tube around the entire pot...make sure to attach the tube to the chicken wire underneath. You could even make a lid if need be. Stake the tube to the ground.
Send me some herb...for product testing. hehehe.

Peace
Rancho

 

[hope2toke]

I would imagine they are not attracted to things like forest litter compost, rock dusts, lime, pumice and wood chips. You can get good results with these materials I'm fairly sure...

 

[Dkgrower]

That sucks moondawg, so they dont go after the chem ferted plants, thats unfair...

A proper fence made by logs is the only thing that come to mind.

 

[great brozini]

My experience, going guerrilla and organic is more trouble than it's worth... Animals just like it too much. And once you get to putting up fences to keep hogs out, you're starting to loose your stealth factor. I also try to minimize my impacts on the environment.

Osmocote (4 month slow release) put out in late spring is plenty to keep a bunch of plants happy, and is pretty much depleted by the end of the season... Amend native soil with the osmocote, water crystals, a bit of lime if needed, and coco until you reach a happy mix density. You're set of the season if you get sporadic rains

I'm sure many out there pull successful organic guerrilla crops, but it definitely takes a bit more work, dedication, and cooperation from the critters...

 

[FunTimesIndeed]

Use only plant and rock based ingredients, amend the soil a season in advance, and cap off the hole with some of the un-amended fill dirt. Avoid anything fermented to (I test my bokashi bran for doneness by feeding it to my dog LOL). Something like Down-to-Earth's vegan mix would be an easy solution.

If it still gets dug up, I would try weaponry or a kill-bot. It may result in some delicious boar meat.

 

[Talonted]

you can walk into any sporting store and buy wolf or panther urine and i hear it works great for guerrilla growers. splash some here and there but say 15 ft from plantation

 

[Coba]

..." alphalpha or whey and animal waste products,(bone meal, blood, chicken manure,etc.)"...

if your animal waste products are being applied raw... that may be the issue.

I have a couple of suggestions... This won't be instant gratification but, if you're familiar with vermicomposting, you could feed the worms this material first, then feed the worm's poo to the Guerrilla garden in the woods.

thermal compost also will work well... with both vermi and thermal compost the "food" will/should be like dirt. no mammals eat dirt.. well, primarily anyways.

Or, a tea comes to mind... Blood meal tea will likely burn and, bone meal is not water soluble but, alfalfa is and so is kelp ( i noticed you didn't list kelp... I would get some though).

Lastly, may I suggest getting out there now, in autumn, and working the soil where you want your plants. cultivate, amend, fertilize. then let it set over winter... come spring, you should be GTG.

stay positive!

 

[SeaMaiden]

I never expected wild/feral animals to be attracted to something like chicken shit, certainly not boars, but my own experience is with domestic pigs only. The animal byproducts will ALWAYS attract varmints, I made that mistake once with a powdered hydrolized fish that to me smells like an old aquarium, but to raccoons must smell like something else. Ruined a whole corn planting making that mistake.

I'm thinking, but don't have experience with bio-char and using that to sequester nutrients and, more importantly, make a home, a condominium complex that's like Squaw Valley, complete with plenty of parking, restaurants, clothing shops, places for all kinds of outdoor gear, gathering spots, coffee shops--you name it. That will make for happy, prolific microbes, and they're really what you're after, not those amendments per se.

Combination of bio-char made from something easy and lightweight like rice hulls (which I'm going to be doing as soon as I can get the trailer emptied of compost, then we do a dump run, and *then* I can go down to the feed store and get a few bales), inoculated heavily with microbial teas and plant extracts. Nothing more than plant material and rock dusts for soil amending along with that and maybe it'll work.

I grow behind an expensive fence, so... there ya go. The deer are fucking hell on four legs, they bash through everything and they're after what's growing, not what I'm using to grow. Last week they came up ON MY DECK and ate the comfrey. WTF?

 

[all natural]

I did a successful organic guerrilla grow years ago in NJ just using bobcat piss. The only animal I ever saw out there was a giant turkey.

 

[FunTimesIndeed]

My only guerrilla harvest was my first organic run--used nothing but local dirt and aged horse manure. It was enough to make me forsake chemicals forever.

 

[jerry111165]

Moondawg, use all the items needed. You just need to let everything break down longer and it will no longer draw in the animals.

Use the alfalfa, use the manure - etc. Make it ( your soil) well in advance - and I mean months, and all the animals should lose interest.

J

 

[Granger2]

These predator urine products are handy crystals. The animals aren't repulsed by the smell, they are afraid of the "predators" that pee'd there. They start avoiding the area. I don't know if it will work with hogs, but it'll work like a charm on the rest.

If you're hogs are adults, I would be very leery of shooting them with a 17 cal. unless I were up a tree. I'd rather be using a 12 ga. with hollow point slugs. Good luck. -granger

 

[RanchoDeluxe]

^^^^^^^
My shoulder hurts just thinking about pulling the trigger on 12 guage with slugs. Goddamn Granger, you're alot tougher than I am. Double ought buck shot doesn't hurt so much....I use it for protection against grizzlies. I just love my little .17hmr...IME once you put a bullet in an animal they run the other way. I'm guessing ole Moondawg would be up in a tree stand. ...Good Luck man.

 

[Granger2]

Rancho,
lol. Probably no tougher. I'm just saying that the 12 ga. slug kick would hurt me less than the hog would. The .17hmr is a fine gun from what I hear, but it's not the right tool for an adult hog. Maybe a brain shot? How well does it penetrate? I've shot thousands of .22 rounds, but never a .17. Good luck. -granger

 

[moondawg]

I appreciate all the responses guys. This is an active forum.

some of the suggestions are unique and im goona try them out but i tell you, ive tried every predator shit and piss and other stuff with no results.

Im going to inocorportate some of thes ideas into this years holes. I dont p lant in them anymore. I just dig the hole and prepare it and then wait. They dig it up whether theres a plant in it or not. So... its easy to tell if they dont go after it.

Im hopeful. I have a pinapply girl that taste like pinapple syryp when i grow her indoors but outside, more lik burning oak leaves.

 

[floral]

My dogs love rolling in fermented plant extracts that smell worse than ass.

Mileage may vary but in my experience nocturnal creatures may be curious about FPEs and other foul-smelling plant-based organic concoctions, and dogs may want to wear it as perfume, but they don't dig them up the way they do the slaughterhouse ingredients. The only area skunks dig up in our garden is the one where some fish meal and guano was once sprinkled, not the cold compost pile with FPEs and alfalfa and inoculated biochar and misc. plant-based goodies in it.

As was mentioned above, they *do* love bokashi so that gets buried deep in the ground.

 

[RanchoDeluxe]

I was doing a little brainstorming for ya...not sure if it would work in your situation.

Use 55gal drums as your containers. Bury them but allow for a few inches to stick out of the ground. Drill some holes and attach fencing to this making a tube. Paint the fencing black or brown or both so it less conspicuous. Double it up if you feel it's not strong enough.

Lay fencing down all around/ in between your plants (I would use 4" sq stuff) stake it to the ground and place rocks/logs on top of it. Once again double this layer up if ya need to. Cover with leaves/natural veg.

 

[InTheGarden]

Hey moondawg,
Have you considered starting a large worm bin and basically running all your amendments through the worm bin first? Or you could get a 50gal smart pot or two and mix all your amendments, along with some compost/vermicompost and maybe a little peat, and let it compost for 6+ months (at home) before you ever put it out in your spot. I don't know how "guerilla" your spot it, it may be that you just can't haul 50 gallons of composted soil and amendments out there. I do think that if everything is well broken down before it ever goes into the ground, the chances of animals being interested in it are greatly lessened.

Or consider using only plant and rock based amendments (as suggested by others), but avoid plants commonly used for feed (like alfalfa meal, soybean meal, etc.). Work a bunch of comfrey, stinging nettles, etc. deep into the ground in the fall. I imagine the animals will be less interested in the actual decaying plant matter than they would an FPE.

What about a cover crop of clover, oilseed radish, or the like? You could seed it in the fall, then turn it under in the spring. Add some compost and rock dust and you're pretty much good to go. They couldn't eat all your cover crop at least.

You could also dig the hole, then line it with chicken wire on the inside, and put another piece of chicken wire over the top, covered with several inches of dirt.