How To Deter Wild Rabbits From Your Garden

Wild rabbits, unlike their cuddly domesticated cousins, are considered a nuisance and a pest by many gardeners. This is primarily because wild rabbits will thoroughly enjoy munching on your flower beds and vegetable patches as well as pretty much any vegetation you may have in your garden. Let’s also not forget about the constant and persistent pooing across your freshly cut lawn.

So, how exactly do you deter wild rabbits from your garden? Well, if like me you have had or are currently dealing with wild rabbits destroying your garden this article aims to answer exactly that question, including several deterrents you can use.

What Attracts Wild Rabbits To Your Garden?

Before we get into how you can deter wild rabbits from your garden it is important to know what attracts them to your garden in the first place. 

Like any living thing wild rabbits need food, water, and shelter to survive. Unlike their domesticated cousins’ wild rabbits need to find these three things all on their own, hence your garden starts to look like an attractive place. Fortunately, wild rabbits are usually found in the British countryside and therefore are unlikely to be found too often in an urban garden.

Food – wild rabbits are not that fussy when it comes to food and will eat a huge variety of things such as vegetables, grass, flowers, leaves and virtually any other vegetation. Wild rabbits however do chiefly rely on a huge volume of grass to make up the core of their diet. In other words, your garden looks like a vast, attractive buffet.

Water – if you have a garden pond, a bird bath or if you leave a bowl of water out for a pet then these can make great sources of water for a wild rabbit. This in turn, will increase the attractiveness of your garden.

Shelter – wild rabbits will make shelter anywhere they feel safe. So, if you have lots of thick vegetation such as bushes or overgrown weeded areas this can an attractive place for a rabbit to create a warren, especially if the area has lots of escape routes such as a hole under a fence.

What Is The Law On Killing Wild rabbits In The UK

In short, wild rabbits enjoy very little protection under UK law primarily because they are considered pests. In fact, except for the City of London, the Isles of Scilly and Skokholm island the whole of England and Wales is classified as a rabbit clearance zone. In other words, you are legally allowed to humanely kill a wild rabbit if you find one on your land.

You can legally kill a wild rabbit in a variety of ways under UK law such as via ferreting or trapping. One of the few legal protections wild rabbits do enjoy however is that once trapped the rabbit temporarily becomes classified as protected which in effect means you cannot prolong any unnecessary suffering or generally be cruel to the animal.

How To Deter Wild Rabbits From Your Garden

If like me, you would prefer to avoid killing any wild rabbits then there are several rabbit deterrents you could try. These preventative measures have varying levels of success, and we would recommend using a combination of deterrents to achieve the best results.

Grazers Eco Spray

One way you could try to deter wild rabbits from your garden is through smell. Rabbits are easily scared therefore both sound and smell can sometimes be enough to deter a group of rabbits from your garden.

The grazers eco spray is designed to deter grazing animals, such as rabbits, through scent. The idea is that the rabbit will smell the scent and become spooked thinking there are predators about and therefore making your garden far less attractive.

The grazers eco spray is harmless to pets, humans and even the wildlife it is trying to deter, making this a safe product to use. The spray will even help boost plant growth and thus making your vegetation more resilient to any hungry rabbits.

Rabbit Repellent

Similar to the grazers product mentioned above this rabbit repellent is designed to deter rabbits via smell. The main difference is that this rabbit repellent is specifically designed with rabbits in mind.

In essence, the product works by stimulating fear within the rabbit via a scent. Whilst the odour is unpleasant for the rabbit it is barley noticeable to humans which is always an added bonus.

The rabbit repellent is also straightforward to use, simply spray the bottle over the affected areas of your garden and within no time you should find the rabbits have been successfully scared away.

Chicken Wire

Deterring a rabbit through smell alone is not always a guaranteed thing. Therefore, as a backup chicken wire should do the trick in keeping the rabbits physically out of your garden.

Although, it is clearly not practical to cover the whole of your garden in chicken wire it can do a good job at keeping the rabbits out of specific areas of your garden such as vegetable patches or flower beds.

You could also use chicken wire to patch up any entry points to your garden that the rabbits could be using such as a hole in the fence.

Conclusion

In conclusion, wild rabbits can be a real nuisance, causing untold chaos to the vegetation within your garden. Unfortunately, most gardens will be attractive to a wild rabbit in some way, whether that would be for food, water, shelter or all three.

The good news is you do have a variety of deterrents at your disposal to deal with any wild rabbits you may be having a problem with.