Exclusion is always the solution to 4-legged sharecropping. Winged guests are liable to be all over your blueberry bushes at fruiting time later, so you will probably need to cover those anyway.

Well, I had planned on giving most of the berries to the birds since I enjoy them so much...can't say the same for the raccoons. I guess if I want to have the plants survive I better get busy on a wire fortress!

My dogs seem to keep the raccoons away from my blueberries. Unfortunately, they pee on the bushes so I don't want to eat the fruit anyway.

It's always something! :) At least if the bushes get tall enough the upper berries would be pee-free. I have a dog that would dearly love to get at the raccoons because once, years ago, they cornered him. I figure I could buy a lot of berries for the cost of that vet bill. I'm picking up wire fencing and rebar this week. I only hope that I can get the rebar deep enough that the darn guys don't pull it out of the ground!

Do you think you can keep raccoons out with wire? It will have to be very heavy wire and cover the bush entirely. I can't believe the number of birds and animals that damage our crops! Not fair.

You guys would not believe what they do to my ponds. I only have fish in one but they destroy my plants in the others. They rip waterlilies up out of their pots and take bites out of their rhizomes and toss them. I pot everything but waterlilies in pea gravel so the pots are really heavy but I've had them manage to dump all in a barrel pond when they were all touching, no space to tip without being lifted up. They are sooo smart and so dexterous with their paws. We have not had problems with them in any edible plants though...knock on wood.