Keep Rats Out of Your Garden

[@kecaleb]

Good job man! Thank you so much for sharing your experience in dealing with rats. I'm going to copy+paste this into my back yard. My crops have been devastated by the rats from under a neighbors a shed. Since there's nothing I can do about their yard, this is a great proactive prevention method!

[@tv510]

It really works. I've used this method now for 3 plus years, very little maintenance and ZERO loss of vegetables and fruit. Good luck!

[@trinettehardie4182]

This is a great video for keeping rats and mice out of our yards! I love the extra sound effects! Thanks for making this and sharing your knowledge!

[@tv510]

It really works well. I am waiting for mine to start turning red. (about a week or two yet) but I have my system turned on and ready to repel the ones in my neighborhood.

[@ferretswish6575]

Thanks for the video and links to materials; I've been searching for something like this! The rats totally destroyed my garden last year because it took awhile to figure out what the problem was, and even then I underestimated the extent of the issue. We had to engage an exterminator in the fall because the rat population had exploded. (Neighbors began raising chickens in their back yards and it's changing the entire eco system,) Now there's a barn owl in the trees outside our house hunting for rodentia and evidently staying well fed. Bottom line: cannot use poison or snap traps. It's starting again this year with all my starts chewed off. But now there's hope! I'm ordering from Amazon today. Will keep you posted.

[@tv510]

Thanks for watching and good luck. I'm sure you will have some great results as I have.

[@journeytoraceday]

Did you end up installing the fence? How did it work out for you?

[@sujji59]

Thank you! I installed this fence and it has been very effective so far. Now I have to figure out how to improve the yield. Your tomatoes look great! What’s your secret?

[@tv510]

Thanks for watching and thanks for asking. I believe that what really helps my garden is the raised beds that are converted horse troughs. The galvanized metal heats up during the day and retains the heat during cold snaps. I live in the San Francisco Bay area and in the summer we have warm days but cool nights. This has made an outstanding difference. Good luck!

[@sujji59]

@@tv510 I live in San Jose. Unfortunately, I have the typical wooden veggie bed. Mine is quite tall, about 3’ or so. Figured it would be helpful as I get older but kinda regretting it now. Do you supplement or change the soil every year? Any specific fertilizer?

[@tv510]

@@sujji59 I add new soil every year and sometimes add fish oil fertilizer. I use miracle grow, but best is my own compost. Hope this helps.

[@sujji59]

@@tv510 Thanks

[@Mamakate2382]

Very informative and timely. Thanks!

[@tv510]

I hope it worked for you! thanks for watching.

[@sandrinakeffufal6008]

Great video! Well presented and very informative. I encourage you to make more clips - also love your youtube channel name lol!

[@tv510]

Thanks Sandrina, I appreciate the views. I'm sure I'll come up with more.

[@knnthl5326]

I have enjoyed this nice presentation very much. Do you think I have to run a separate grounding wires to my insulating plastic planters from Home Depot? Do you think I can use my 12 V DC landscaping power line to charge the lines? I do not want to test the intensity of the 4:02 shock with my own hands.

[@tv510]

I recommend using the solar generators that are made for this kind of thing. They also sell testers that aren't very expensive to test the hot wire. As far as ground wire, I think you might have to, in order to create the ground circuit. I doubt plastic will do the trick.

[@KathleenMcLynn-e7e]

Thank you for posting this! Now I just need to rig up an electric fence to keep rats out of our chicken’s coop!

[@tv510]

Funny you should say that. I was just up at a friend's place and he had problems with ground squirrels getting into his chicken coop. I never knew that was a thing. Good luck.

[@annieyahu676]

Thanks for Sharing ❤️ May have to do this where I'm living now.

[@BlancheBlachman]

I was wondering what you used for a grounding rod, galvanized, copper, stainless steel? Also, how long was the rod you used? I know the charger has to attach to the rod so I wondered if a 3' rod would work, or do I have to pound it into the ground a certain length? I noticed you had wire running on both sides of your stakes at slightly different heights. How many inches apart are they on each stake? And finally, I love your bridging idea but I wondered if there was a way for me to put it in some PVC pipe or insulating tube of some kind so it can run the connecting wire on the ground from box to box. I have a dog that I want to protect from being shocked-I just want to keep the rats squirrels from eating my tomatoes! Thank you for your great video! I'm going to give it a try.

[@tv510]

I just used steel, it was about 3 feet. It was pounding into the ground about a foot. As far as the grounding wire, the way this works is the rat needs to be grounded to get a shock. I use the galvanized containers as grounds but other places, like the fence, I needed to add a ground. Simple wire attached and brought back to that main grounding stick. I don't see why running inside a tube would be problematic, so go for it. However, my dog got zapped by it one time, barked like crazy at it and has never been shocked again. When we have other dogs over to play, I simply turn it off and then turn it back on in the evening. Good luck.

[@HendrikEnsingMindLenses]

I tried this after trying many things. Rats were getting onto our roof and then under the corrugated iron, making noise at night. I filled all possible holes under the house and on all outside walls with cement-based tile grout. I constructed a one wire electric fence on my roof, around the perimeter (outside edge). Once I had hooked it up to the energizer, it took 2 nights for all rats to learn not to try to cross the hot-wire. Insulators are screwed to the metal guttering. In the wet weather, the rats made a good earth contact and received a shock. I turned it off for 1 night and the rats returned. Perhaps they test the wire with their whiskers, and only get a slight tingle, just as you can test the electric fence with a reed of grass. However, it seems the rats return as soon as the fence is not on. A good permanent fix as I do not know how they are climbing up. That they can even get onto the roof seems impossible. They must be rat ninjas. A single hot-wire powered from an electric fence energiser was the cheapest option. I have the smallest mains-powered Gallagher electric fence energiser, not a solar powered one. So just a small pulse shock is enough. Only 1 wire was needed. No more rats in our ceiling. Great relief! This needs a video searchable by keywords 'Rats' and 'Roof'. Thanks for this video.

[@tv510]

Fantastic! Glad it works for you.

[@tv510]

@@shockadellick it has worked for me, good luck.

[@alyssaje4754]

The rats your dealing with are known as roof rats 🐀 and they are supremely excellent climbers and like to nest high off the ground. I’d bet they definitely were nesting in your ‘ceiling’ or attic space!

[@ginoparisi967]

Hi @tv510, thanks for this great idea. I’m considering doing this in an urban garden in NYC. Tons of rats, as well as birds. This won’t harm or kill the birds will it? Thanks

[@tv510]

No issue with harming these animals, the only thing is that bird aren't likely to walk into your garden so I'm not sure how you are going to set up the wire for them to get shocked. And, the animal needs to grounded. So a bird can perch on one of the wires, and unless they keep one foot on the ground, they will feel nothing. It does work well for rats though.

[@Babe3Ruth3]

I have 18 separate metal cages spread over a 20 x 20 plot. How would I wire all of them? Because the cages are metal would the entire cage become electrified? Thanks.

[@tv510]

Think of the cages as the ground. You need a power wire and a ground, when a rat touches both at the same time, its get a shock. So you still have to run the wire to get coverage.

[@ghour5s819]

Would water impact the wire? I have irrigation system and sprinkler in the garden area. Thanks for the video.

[@tv510]

No, I have the same thing going on here. No issues with water. Occasionally I have a leaf land on the wire and you can hear a ticking sound, just clear it away and I'm back to normal.

[@nagenderbandi]

Fantastic video. I was thinking of doing just this with a lead-acid battery. We stopped growing vegetables because of rats. Problem is so bad that they are eating weeds and even Camelia flowers now. I am glad I found ur video. Appreciate it. I am in norther California as well (Foster City). Where are you located?

[@tv510]

I'm over in the east bay - I haven't had any more loss since I put this system in. Good luck!

[@nagenderbandi]

@@tv510 Thanks Terry! I hope to replicate ur success

[@nagenderbandi]

Also curious how this impacts birds. Has there been any bird deaths?

[@tv510]

@@nagenderbandi I haven't seen any deaths related to the electric fence, other than ants. For some reason the ants are attracted to it, they stack up and then get electrocuted in clusters. Kind of grim.

[@plantbasedprepper]

Will this cause a problem with any the plants that touch it? Will it affect there health and growth? What about the automatic watering system or rain?

[@tv510]

Nope, none of the above. If plant leaves come in contact with a wire, you might get an annoying electric “tick” sound. Just keep them trimmed or pushed out of the way. But not harm to the plants. One weird thing, if you have ants, they can sometimes create a bridge to one of the wires killing the ants that are connected. More ants will come to the rescue and can get shocked as well. Resulting in a small stack of dead ants. This can be remedied by not placing the wire too close to the ground. Good luck!

[@donaldfox7187]

Does it work on squirrels, too? How do you know which it is?

[@tv510]

Yes it works just the same with squirrels.

[@civitaron]

why did you choose the s12 over the s6

[@tv510]

When searching for a solar electric fence, I wanted something that would shock a small rodent and this is what I landed on.

[@plantbasedprepper]

I just bought the s6. I think the only difference is how far the range is and I only need it for a small garden. I'm trying to keep rats out so I hope this works!

[@vinceguaglianone5576]

Great video. Nothing makes me happier than the thought of rats being shocked. Dirty little varments.

[@ferretswish6575]

I could not agree more!! I hope the barn owl in my yard eats the ones trying to recover from being shocked.

[@jamesgallagher3317]

Can I book it up to 240v main outlet My hope is that each rat will get catapulted with the force of the shock over into the neighbours garden so they can deal with it

[@tv510]

Ha! A very entertaining image right there.

[@epiccoconut5995]

This is what im talkinf about! No amount of cinnamon, garlic, onions, plugs, has helped.

[@tv510]

It really does work, thanks for watching.

[@babiescloset]

does it harm bees?

[@tv510]

I've never seen it harm bees. I wouldn't use if it did.