"Deploy Varmint Repelling Shields, Mr. Sulu!"

Varmint Repelling Shields

"Varmint Repelling Shields deployed, Captain!"

At least they've been deployed in the first of the two new raised beds.  The second bed will have to wait until tomorrow, and the much larger original raised bed is going to take a lot longer, but this bed has the newly transplanted TOMATOES!!!, so it took first priority.

The bottom part of each piece is hardware cloth and the top is plexiglass.  Unfortunately, these things don't photograph very well, so we left the brown protective paper on one sheet of the plexiglass to make it show up better for the picture.  Each panel is screwed to stakes that fit into PVC tubes strapped to the inside the bed.  Cindy has developed this system over the last ten or so years, refining it as needed.

Original Panels

The three remaining original panels can be seen in the background of this photo around three sides of the old raised bed.  The old panels consist of plexiglass attached to the stakes which were originally just stuck into the ground.  That got harder as time went on, so Cindy added the refinement of the PVC tubes, which can be seen in the corners of the new raised bed in the foreground.

The old panels were very effective at keeping the various tomato-eating varmints, such as ground squirrels, raccoons, skunks and neighborhood cats out of the vegetable beds, but they also cut down on the air flow to the plants.  Some of the plants seemed to get overheated, so we're hoping that they will do better with having more air circulate through the hardware cloth at the bottom.