A rabbit in our yard is eating everything, including bark from the trees and shrubs. We have an enclosed yard, and he lives under a deck. How can we keep him from eating our plants? Can we get him out of the yard?
You can deter rabbits from vegetable or flower gardens by erecting 2-foot chicken wire fencing held tight to the ground or buried several inches. Protect young trees with cylinders of 1/4-inch hardware cloth, use odor and taste repellents, and remove excess vegetation. If you cannot live with this rabbit, consider trapping. Contact the Nuisance Wildlife information line at 1-877-463-6497. This service is provided jointly by the Maryland Department of Natural Resources's Wildlife and Heritage Services, and the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service. They give homeowners guidance on nuisance, injured or sick wildlife. For more tips on dealing with rabbits, click here.
Can I prune my nandina and my barberry now? I was told to remove a third of the old nandina canes to make it fill out and produce more berries. The barberry has berries, but its thorny branches stick out too far, and I have to prune it every year.
Yes, to stimulate new canes, prune the nandina when it's dormant. As for the barberry, those berries are carried by birds to the woods and all over your neighborhood. Seedlings pop up where they don't belong. In parks and wild areas, non-native barberry is slowly taking over the understory, crowding out native plants and increasing the population of ticks carrying Lyme disease. We recommend removing all barberry, and you have a win-win situation: You would be killing invasive barberry and, because your barberry is too big for its location anyway, you'll never have to prune it again.
Plant of the week
Snake plant "golden hahnii"
Sansevieria trifasciata "golden hahnii"
Snake plant "golden hahnii" is special among its species because it grows in a tight rosette that doesn't get higher than about 6 inches. While its taller cousins bear such dreaded names as "mother-in-law tongue" and "devil's tongue," this one deserves the happier name of "lucky plant." These houseplants are tough as nails and famous for surviving black thumbs, but "golden hahnii" does require bright light and a warm atmosphere. To prevent root rot, do not overwater or overfeed. It doesn't mind being root-bound, so it can be left in the same pot for several years.
—Lewis Shell