Ever since we created our garden six years ago we noticed that we occasionally have nocturnal visitors. These visitors come in the form of very large raccoons and a variety of house or stray cats!

We have a security light at the back porch and it’s regularly triggered at least once each evening and I often notice the light going on in the night as well if I’m up late. Most often when I peer outside the culprit turns out to be a cat.

Now, I tend to water my garden late in the evening. I developed that habit since I had an elderly neighbor who loved to watch everything I did both outside and even inside my home. She’d come outside whenever I was out, stare at me from her porch or watch me inside my home from windows in her home that faced my own. Creepy and stalker like!

She’s a nice old lady, but that watching behavior really got to me. Unfortunately she had a mild stroke in January and she’s now gone to live with her family. I suspect we’ll have new neighbors sometime in the summer.

So, as I was saying, since my neighbor was keen on watching me I was reluctant to go outside for long periods of time while being watch. Not only would she watch every move I’d make but she’d also try to talk to me from her porch. Of course I couldn’t hear her well so I’d have to stop what I was doing each time, walk up to her and find out what she’d said, reply and then go back to my gardening. This made getting anything done outside take sometimes four times longer than it should have!

Hence the late night watering! Oh, I also discovered that at the height of summer when it’s extremely hot and humid here that sometimes the only time it’s reasonable to go out and water is late at night when it’s a bit cooler.

I don’t mind the occasional cat coming through the yard as long as they don’t disturb anything, but late at night any animal making a sudden appearance can be scary. Especially if it turns out to be a HUGE raccoon or a raccoon family, which it has on many occasions.

Now that we have a dog I suspect nocturnal visits from these creatures will occur less frequently. Particularly if I bring the dog outside with me! However, I’d like to get a step ahead of my visiting creatures and do something to keep them away now.

So here’s my idea.

Our puppy just went through a big shed. She’s still shedding a bit, but a few weeks ago it seemed like her fur was coming out by the handful! One day as I was grooming her I thought about my garden visitors and thought I’d keep her fur and then, when the weather got better try distributing it through the garden in order to see if the doggy smell would deter the cats and raccoons.

About 80% of the snow has melted from our yard now. (thank you!) and crocus’ and other plants are beginning to make an appearance. I suspect I’ll be out in the garden this weekend doing a little cleaning. While I’m out there I think I’ll strategically place the dog fur in areas where I’ve seen cats and raccoons in my yard.

I guess we’re lucky that the cats and raccoons don’t really damage our yard. They use it more as a short cut to get to other areas. They come down the driveway, jump over the short gate and then head directly to the back of the garden and go over the fence into our neighbors driveway - or vise versa. Occasionally they’ll stop to search the ground and grass for worms and other delicacies, but luckily it’s not often.

So I know exactly which areas to target with my dogs fur.

Have you tried using dog fur or perhaps another animals fur in your garden to deter pests? Did it work?

I’ll keep you updated on my experiment. Wish me luck!