North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[Louisa Rogoff Thompson <louisagardener@earthlink.net>]

In response to:

From: nafex-bounces@lists.ibiblio.org on behalf of daniel strum
Sent: Wed 6/2/2004 4:53 PM
To: nafex@lists.ibiblio.org
Cc: danstrum@hotmail.com
Subject: [NAFEX] netting for blueberry protection


I am living in Virginia Beach, VA. and am planning an arbor with some type of 
netting to keep the birds out of the blueberries.  The arbor is quit large 20' x 
35' and 7' tall. I am wanting to put up some sturdy (year around) netting.  I am 
not too sure about the right size for netting.  There is a rubber coated chicken 
wire with a 1" hexagon pattern that would be good for my structure, but the 
holes look too large.  Any suggestions or experiences about this wire product or 
alternatives would be appreciated.

Dan,

It really depends on the size of the fruit-eating birds in your neighborhood.  I 
started with bird netting but found that the birds perched on it and tore through 
it.  Squirrels, too.  I found a couple of chipmunks strangled in it.  Eventually I 
stapled half inch galvanized hardware cloth to wood frames.  The mockingbirds and 
catbirds that had begun to regard my blueberries as theirs would have easily 
pushed through 1" chicken wire.

I only used these panels during the fruiting season, and since I had different cultivars ripening in sequence, I was able to shift them from one plant to - not the next, which had fruit already ripening while the previous plant had ripe fruit - but to the one which ripened after that.  

I never had trouble with animals browsing the stems, so I didn't need year 'round protection.  But the sides were removable, the squirrels would watch me remove them to harvest, and within a couple of weeks they would figure out how to get in.  Your permanent cage would solve that problem.  

Make sure you do something to keep animals from burrowing underneath.  Laying 
chicken wire flat on the ground, right up to the edge, and covered with 
mulch, works very well.  The critters can't dig through the wire and never 
try to back up to find the edge.

Louisa Thompson
Zone 7