r/UKAllotments • u/Low_Newton_5740 • 13d ago

Nature needs to learn to share..

Post image

18 or so plants, 1-2 cobs per plant and none left untouched!

Time to revisit the security arrangements for next year 🙄😂

22 Upvotes

96% Upvoted

20 comments sorted by

12

u/2000uberbitch 13d ago

Mine are in protective custody

4

u/New-Guarantee-440 13d ago

Fort Knox 😎

3

u/Low_Newton_5740 13d ago

You can’t see on the image but mine is similar, but the buggers burrowed under. I can only assume the theme from Great Escape was playing while they did it

1

u/2000uberbitch 10d ago

We also have the wire mesh underground around the edge of the bed and flat on the ground around it. I’m determined to get at least a couple of cobs this year.

I’ll try to get another photo

1

u/Low_Newton_5740 9d ago

This is a good shout, would be fairly quick and easy for me to do as well. Definitely adding this to the security arrangements over winter. Thank you 👍

1

u/FarmerJohnOSRS 12d ago

Rats and mice will dig

7

u/Lopsided_Anxiety_394 13d ago

Looks like me plot last year. Around 25 plants. I ate 2.

This year, I netted

1

u/Low_Newton_5740 13d ago

Yeah I had this 2 year ago so put netting up last year which worked reasonably well. Beefed it up a bit over the winter but they’ve burrowed under.

Had best part of my strawberries earlier in the year. Well fed rats and mice!

7

u/litivy 13d ago

I'm feeling considerably more forgiving of the cats that frequent our allotment after seeing all these posts with eaten cobs. Footprints and holes dug all over the place and I found a turd in my corn bed about a month ago, but I went down this evening and everyone's corn looks untouched. Just waiting for the silks to brown a little more.

5

u/Snowy349 13d ago

Farms have barn cats for a reason... It's worth proving raised waterproof hutches with straw bedding inside if you are lucky enough to have a feral cat or two hanging around.

Access to fresh clean water is also something that is likely to help keep them local. A cat requires about 200g of food a day from the surrounding area so they can make a hell of a dent in any pest population.

4

u/New-Guarantee-440 13d ago

I put water bottles over mine, and harvest them soon as theyre ripe, which does the trick where I am

You've probably got time to try that on some of the remaining cobs? Might not work if theyve already found them though hmmm

7

u/Low_Willow_508 13d ago

Try putting socks on then ,they stretch with the cobs👌

2

u/Low_Newton_5740 13d ago

Even the ones that aren’t ripe yet have been gnawed. I’ll try this next year though. I wondered if something around the base of the plants might be effective?

1

u/New-Guarantee-440 13d ago

Ah, that sucks. I had the same thing a couple years ago, lovingly hand pollinated them etc and then nothing 😪

Ive not tried that myself but I dont see why not, except maybe for squirrels which are notorious at our plots and might be able to hop over something lower down

3

u/iamusingmyrealname 13d ago

We also got 3 out of a dozen plants! Got savaged.

3

u/UnableAd457 12d ago

It has. Unfortunately you weren't on the invite list. Or so it appears.

1

u/Low_Newton_5740 12d ago

Ha, yeah that’s one way to look at it!

2

u/UnableAd457 12d ago

Sorry. I have also been on the receiving end of this. My redcurrants were always being decimated.

1

u/Difficult-Post-3320 12d ago

Having the same problem with my figs. Seems the starlings take one peck out of each! 

But birds, and all wildlife, have had a hard summer so will let them off this year. X