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Small Cabin Forum / Cabin Construction / Stopping porcupines from chewing wood siding??
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canadaman30
Member
# Posted: 1 Apr 2012 12:05
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Any ways to stop these buggers from chewing on the outside wood walls. A gun I know, but is there some type of paint, finish that will deter them??

MtnDon
Member
# Posted: 1 Apr 2012 14:26
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cement fiber siding ;)

Martian
Member
# Posted: 1 Apr 2012 14:47
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Down in LA, the old shrimpers use chili peeppers to keep barnacles off their boats. Maybe painting a little Tobasco sauce on the lower boards would do it. Then again, they might like it!

Tom

PA_Bound
Member
# Posted: 1 Apr 2012 18:19
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+1 maybe, on the chili pepper idea. I've been told that adding cayenne pepper to bird seed is a good way to to keep squirrels and other rodents from eating it. Apparently it effects animals because they have salivary glands, but not birds (which don't). I could see the same idea here with porcupines.

todd heyn
# Posted: 2 Apr 2012 06:12
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We had the same problem last year with our cabin. The little pests chewed right thru to the insulation... Our cabin was sheathed with T1-11 which we found out that they just love to eat.

We ended up re-sheathing the entire lower portion of the cabin with a textured OSB panel. It looks like T1-11 but the porcupines do not like it. Apparently these panels have some kind of insect and pest repellent additive in them. They come preprimed and ready to install. We purchased our from Lowes.

Since we installed the new panels, there has not been a single nibble on the cabin. Fortunately, this worked for us. Our next step was going to be putting up hardware cloth on the sheathing. This would have made the cabin look lousy.

rayyy
Member
# Posted: 2 Apr 2012 07:56
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I guess they like the glue in the plywood.The only defence I know of is to shroud every thing in metal flashing around the base 2 or 3 feet up..

Ann
Member
# Posted: 4 Apr 2012 16:25 - Edited by: Ann
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Overnight hikers in northern Pennsylvania are advised to put a ring of mothballs around their car to keep porkies from chewing through hoses. I tried that once and the hoses were OK the next day, but it wouldn't be practical for a cabin. Mothballs are very toxic also...we collected them to take home and dispose of after the hike, and the fumes inside the car were awful.

jgiffi
Member
# Posted: 5 Apr 2012 22:59
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I know this is kind of different but a co-worker takes used tires and places them away from his trailer and urinates on them on occassion and I guess that keeps them more interested in the tires then his trailer. He has been doing it for over 20 yrs and hasn't had any problems.

mrmiji
Member
# Posted: 5 Apr 2012 23:04
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They have needles on them, right?

Surround the place with haystacks!

Sorry, couldn't help it. I solve these kind of problems with a dog and a shotgun.

trollbridge
Member
# Posted: 5 Apr 2012 23:17
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We solved the problem at 2AM one night with a flashlight and a bow and arrow! They are fast and he ran up a tree but after he was shot down he was skewered to the ground till morning and we never had another problem!

Aqua
Member
# Posted: 8 Apr 2012 04:07
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Stuff called Ro-Pel seems to work. You have to reapply every 2-4 weeks. Or other similar repellants.

razmichael
Member
# Posted: 9 Apr 2012 09:05
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I remember a friend's cottage I was visiting a few years ago was set up with three strands of horse/cattle wire and a solar fence charger (he used a solar system as he was off grid). Very simple to set up (owning horses I have done lots of electric fencing). He screwed on insulators to the the corners of the foundation (the cabin was about 1-2 ft above grade) and added a "gate" section to get to his wood pile. Solar fence chargers are a lot more expensive than standard 120volt systems but you can often find old 12volt systems at auctions and then add your own battery and solar charger. I watched a poor squirrel try to go under the cabin and hit the wire - needless to say it shot off in one hurry. According to him, once he set the system up, no porcupines, skunks or anything else tried to settle in under his cabin. I know you can also buy systems at garden stores for keeping deer etc out of gardens but I think they tend to be overpriced and less effective. Any country farm supply store could set you up with a good system.

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