How to keep rabbits away from pea plants?

[Blackberry18]

This is such a problem for me. I have a fenced in, raised bed garden where I was growing peas along the edges to climb up the fence. I had a ton of good, tall, healthy plants. Then, the rabbits (whose population has exploded this spring) went on the outside of the fence and nibbled them as far down as they could. They're fast-growing, and a couple are starting to grow back again, but how will I keep the rabbits away? I don't have luck with catching them, and I can't shoot every rabbit I see. So how can I keep them away? Someone suggested I spray something on that won't hurt the plants but will keep animals away, like lemon juice or something.

Has anyone ever done that before? What products work the best? Any other thoughts/ideas/advice? Thanks in advance.

 

[MeepBeep]

This season I'm dealing with a bunch of chipmunks and a family of woodchucks wreaking havoc on my garden and flowers... The chipmunks would literally dig up my sunflower seeds overnight... I would wake to my garden pitted with little holes everywhere I had planted a sunflower (and other seeds) and any that they did miss were promptly eaten the minute they broke ground...

I have devoted a serious amount of time trapping and disposing of the offenders (I trapped 15 chipmunks and 5 woodchucks the first week alone) combined with spreading ground cayenne around the plants and also soaking cayenne powder (I actually used an Asian ground version not powder) in a warm water with a little bit of soap and spraying it on the plants, use extreme caution you just made pepper spray!

I do re-apply the sprayed pepper after every rain or heavy watering, the stuff spread on the ground around the plants last for weeks unless you water like crazy or it rains heavily...

In the end, these two methods have slowed down their destruction quite a bit, almost entirely...

 

[Blackberry18]

This season I'm dealing with a bunch of chipmunks and a family of woodchucks wreaking havoc on my garden and flowers... The chipmunks would literally dig up my sunflower seeds overnight... I would wake to my garden pitted with little holes everywhere I had planted a sunflower (and other seeds) and any that they did miss were promptly eaten the minute they broke ground...

I have devoted a serious amount of time trapping and disposing of the offenders (I trapped 15 chipmunks and 5 woodchucks the first week alone) combined with spreading ground cayenne around the plants and also soaking cayenne powder (I actually used an Asian ground version not powder) in a warm water with a little bit of soap and spraying it on the plants, use extreme caution you just made pepper spray!

I do re-apply the sprayed pepper after every rain or heavy watering, the stuff spread on the ground around the plants last for weeks unless you water like crazy or it rains heavily...

In the end, these two methods have slowed down their destruction quite a bit, almost entirely...

Thanks a lot! I've also had problems with chipmunks this year...ate all of my beans and nibbled at my carrots. Different garden with a bad fence, which I'll fix and that will hopefully be done with.

Thanks for the ideas! I'll make sure to try them.

 

[Weehopper]

There is a product called Bitter Apple. Most feed stores carry it. It comes in a spray bottle. Will not harm your plants or animals. Spray whatever the rabbits or other varments are eating. They hate it. I used it as a last resort once when rabbits were nipping the buds off various plants I had. They took one last bite and never came back. It tastes real bad to them. That was years ago, and I still have a load of rabbits around, and none have touched my plants. Don't even ask me why successive generations don't touch the plants, but they don't. You will find it, probably in the horse section. It was originally made to stop horses from cribbing (chewing wood).