Groundhogs might look harmless, but they can wreak havoc on your yard if you don’t move them on their way. Since they’re a bigger animal, they have larger, more extensive tunnels that they call home. If you let them dig unchecked, they can move up to 700 pounds of dirt to create a single house. But the question is: How do you keep groundhogs out of your yard? It turns out that your hair clippings can help. As funny as it may seem, these furry creatures don’t like to hang out near humans, so catching our scent near their dens can scare them off and cause them to find a safer dwelling.
This is a great hack to try because it’s eco-friendly, humane, and free. Rather than using poisonous fumigation methods that can affect surrounding wildlife or your yard — or traps that can hurt or kill the animal — you’re using organic clippings to scare them away. You can also use your own cuttings after an at-home trim, or stop by your hairdresser and ask if you get some trim leftovers to help with your pest problem. Curious how to pull this off? Here is how to use hair clippings to keep groundhogs from burrowing all over your yard.
How to use hair clippings to deter groundhogs
There are several ways you can go about this hairy solution. The first is to simply step outside and add thick wads of hair clippings near every tunnel entrance in your yard. You can also sprinkle them around your vegetable patch, flower bed, or anywhere it appears the groundhog is finding food. The only downside to using this method is that a blustery day can blow away all of your efforts. If that’s a worry, you can use the second method, which involves putting the hair in mesh bags and attaching them to stakes positioned near their tunnels or your garden. This ensures the hair stays contained and sits in place. Just make sure you use a mesh bag rather than a plastic or cotton one since the scent needs to be easily detected.
This hack works because groundhogs have a sharp sense of smell. They use it to locate food and old tunnels they can reopen and take advantage of. But that same sense is also used to avoid danger, and since they’re not used to being around humans, they will register our scent as a threat. And since they’re relatively skittish animals, they won’t linger in an area that seems threatening.
