26
After a predator took my hives: what actually keeps them out, in order of what works
Lost hives to a large animal. Rebuilding taught me that the defences people recommend are not equally effective and the cheap half-measures are worse than nothing.
Works
- Electric fencing, done properly. The only thing that reliably stops a determined large animal. Properly means: multiple strands with the lowest close to the ground, a strong energiser rather than a small one, vegetation kept off the wires, and a tested voltage rather than an assumed one. A fence that is not stinging is a fence that teaches the animal it is safe.
- Baiting the fence. Something smelly on the wire so the first contact is with a nose. One lesson learned properly is worth more than the fence being there.
- Ratchet straps and ground anchors for smaller raiders and for wind. Cheap and stops a lot of opportunistic damage.
- Not siting hives against a wood edge, which is a corridor.
Does not work
- A single strand of wire. It steps over.
- A weak energiser. It gets through and learns the fence is a nuisance rather than a threat.
- Noise, lights and smells alone. Effective for about a week.
Once they have found you, they come back. That is the part I underestimated. The fence has to go up before the next visit, not after, and an animal that has been rewarded once is far harder to deter than one that has never tasted it.
Check what is permitted where you are before installing anything.
@smaller_pests · 3w ago
Worth adding the ones that do more cumulative damage than any single dramatic loss: mice in winter, wasps at the entrance in late summer, and ants.
Mouse guards on in autumn before the nights turn, entrance reduced when the flow stops, and hives up off the ground on a stand. None of it is exciting and over five years it has cost me more colonies than anything large ever did.
Reply
Report