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How to Identify and Get Rid of Rabbits in the Garden

The eastern cottontail rabbit can be a pesky garden companion, so here are tips to help keep him away!

Written By: Catherine Boeckmann Executive Digital Editor and Master Gardener

Got rabbits? These small mammals can do a number on young plants, so prevention is paramount. Aside from fencing, there are many old-time remedies and other solutions that will keep them out of the garden patch! Plus, see a list of plants that rabbits tend to ignore. 

Why Would You Keep Rabbits Away?

Anyone who tills the soil regards the rabbit as more than just a cute threat to the carrot patch. This long-eared animal possesses a voracious appetite for all kinds of fresh vegetation—woody plants, perennials, annuals, vegetables, and berries. In fact, a menu of rabbit favorites is so ridiculously long that it’s easier to list the few plants they don’t enjoy.

Rabbits also have an extremely high reproductive potential, so keeping them around might quickly cause a total garden infestation. They can produce up to three litters of six babies per year in the north and up to six litters of three babies yearly in the south. The first litter appears in March in the north, year-round elsewhere. The gestation period is 29 days. That’s only about 8 days more than a chicken egg takes to hatch!

Your backyard bunny’s primary concern is to eat without being eaten, a difficult task given that rabbits are relished by more than two dozen species of predators. Nibbling your petunias is not a carefree picnic but a danger-fraught mission. However, if your neighborhood bunny can squeeze through a hole in your garden fence, it will find time to be able to munch in safety. 

You can check our tips for keeping your plants safe from rabbits, but try to regard rabbits as Beatrix Potter did—part of a peaceful, pastoral landscape. Then protect the plants that you and the bunnies really love, and don’t worry about the rest.

eastern cottontail bunnies in the yard

Identification

How to Identify Rabbits in Your Garden

Of the nine species of North American cottontail rabbits, the eastern cottontail (Sylvilagus floridanus) that is our most abundant and annoying. Ranging from Boston to Boulder and south into Mexico, this bunny-about-town is rarely found in forests, preferring instead brushy fence rows, field edges, brush piles, and—you guessed it—landscaped backyards. Its fondness for flowers, vegetables, bark, and bulbs often results in pruned peppers and clipped cosmos.

Even though its nicknames are adorable (among them bunny, bunny rabbit, and cottontail), and you’ll probably want to befriend it once you see its cute ears, the eastern cottontail can be a bothersome pest. It is gray or brownish, with a short tail and big ears. It can weigh 2 to 4 pounds, be 15 to 19 inches long, and live for 12 to 15 months. Its vocal call is almost silent, but it will emit a scream when threatened. Its famous features include a short white tail resembling a cotton ball and long, tapered ears.

Security is a pile of brush, leaves, or another animal’s abandoned burrow for an eastern cottontail. Unlike their European cousins, these rabbits do not dig intricate burrows or warrens but make do with what they find. Rabbits rarely leave their shelters in broad daylight, preferring early morning or evening instead. Like most animals, they are sensitive to the change in day length as spring approaches. For rabbits, the longer days signal the start of two things: breeding season and spring dining.

Rabbit Damage

Rabbits are voracious eaters and leave clean-cut damage. Check the leaves and stems of your plants for cleanly cut damage; insects and other pests usually leave jagged edges on damaged plants. This clean-cut damage often happens at ground level, as rabbits tend to eat the yummy green shoots of tulips and other plants.

These low mowers graze close to the ground, sniff out the first tender young shoots, and crop them short. They love to munch on flowers, clover, peas, lettuce, beans, and more. Many of these plants are also the favorites of woodchucks or groundhogs, so check for burrows before deciding you have rabbit damage. Once your plants have passed the seedling stage, they are usually safe from rabbit damage.

Although bunny nibbling occurs in every season, it’s especially discouraging in the early spring when rabbits mercilessly munch the tender green shoots of plants. As a Connecticut gardener remembers, “My tulips were just poking through the snow when suddenly it looked like they’d been weed-whacked. Cut clean off! I blame the bunnies—their little paw prints were everywhere.”

a rabbit sitting in the grass

Cute, yes. But behind those eyes lies an eternal hunger!

Control and Prevention

How to Prevent Rabbits in the Garden

The best way to keep rabbits out of the garden and prevent rabbit damage is through physical prevention methods such as fencing. Though we’ve mostly been discussing eastern cottontails, remember that these tips should work for any type of rabbit that loves to munch on your plants!

  • The most effective way of keeping out rabbits is chicken wire fencing. Install a fence that is 4 feet high and bury it at least 6 inches deep. Bend the top foot of the fence away from the garden like a security fence so they can’t climb or jump over it.
    • For bulbs, try a dome or cage of chicken wire secured over the bed.
  • To begin with, focus on keeping rabbits from setting foot into your garden. Many old-time remedies rely on spreading various products around the garden’s perimeter, such as dried blood meal or human hair. Sprinkle dried blood meal on the surface around all your plants as early in the season as possible, and repeat after heavy rain. (Note: If you have dogs, don’t try this method because they might be attracted to the scent and start digging up your garden themselves!)
  • Rabbits don’t like to stray far from their shelters, so try to reduce the possible rabbit homes around your yard. Rake away piles of brush and leaves, fill in abandoned burrows, and seal any holes under sheds or structures. If a rabbit doesn’t have a place to live or hide nearby, hopefully, it won’t stay and munch. Rabbits will also breed much more if they have a good habitat available—all the more reason to have no vacancy!

More Ways to Deter Rabbits in the Garden

Hardware

As mentioned above, the most effective solution is wire fencing. But also:

  • Protect tree trunks: Use cylinders of 1/4-inch mesh hardware cloth to keep rabbits from nibbling on young fruit and landscape trees. The cylinders should extend higher than a rabbit’s reach while the rabbit is standing on the expected snow depth, and they should stand 1 to 2 inches out from the tree trunk.
  • Protect patio plants: Some people protect plants with individual “collars” of tin cans or screening so that the plants may reach a less vulnerable size. Put the collar around each stem for protection.

Repellents

  • Rabbits are such great sniffers, and there are several commercially available rabbit-repellent sprays that are nontoxic. They often use smelly ingredients such as rotten eggs to deter the furry creatures. Commercial products using pungent garlic oil are also worth a try.
  • Some of the deer techniques related to odor are also said to work against rabbits.
  • Irish Spring soap shavings placed in little drawstring bags around the garden have been said to help keep rabbits away.
  • Rabbits also dislike the smell of onions, so try planting onions around your garden to further deter the furry creatures.
  • One of our readers grows extra hot peppers, boils them in an old soup pot on the BBQ, and applies the liquid to the garden. Powdered red pepper sprinkled around the garden or on targeted plants also helps; you need to reapply after rainfall.
  • Legend has it that rabbits are terrified of their own reflection, so try an old-time rabbit remedy and place large, clear glass jars of water throughout the garden. Garden centers sell ready-made reflectors, as well as other devices—crouching cats, fake snakes, menacing owls—designed to frighten bunnies away from your plants.
  • You can also make your own spray! See recipe.

DIY Rabbit Repellent Spray

Make a bad-tasting rabbit cocktail by grinding together:

  • 3 hot peppers
  • 3 large onions
  • 1 whole bunch of garlic. 

Add water to cover, and place in a covered container overnight. Strain and add enough water to make a gallon of the mixture. Spray onto plants, repeating after rainfall. 

rabbits in the grass

Plants That Rabbits Dislike

According to bunny experts, rabbits have plant preferences based on taste, nutritional value, the presence of poison or prickles, and ease of availability. Their tastes in food can also vary by region and season, so not all plants work for all rabbits. Be tricky and tend plants that rabbits don’t find very appetizing.

Rabbits tend to avoid some of the same plants as deer and Japanese beetles. If you’d like to control all these pests, check our list of deer-resistant plants and the best and worst plants for Japanese beetles to know which plants might do best. Choose plants such as forsythia, lilac bush, zinnias, daffodils, lavender, and snapdragons for rabbits. This might help to reduce your rabbit population. This is not a guaranteed solution, as hungry rabbits will eat almost anything, but filling your garden with these plants might make your garden less appetizing than another one. Here are more plants that rabbits dislike:

WOODY PLANTS

Azalea (Rhododendron sp.)
Boxwood (Buxus sp.)
Bush cinquefoil (Potentilla fruticosa)
Butterfly bush (Buddleia davidii)
Cotoneaster (Cotoneaster sp.)
Japanese maple (Acer palmatum)
Mountain laurel (Kalmia latifolia)
Rhododendron (Rhododendron sp.)
Tatarian dogwood (Cornus alba)
Tulip tree (Liriodendron tulipifera)

PERENNIALS

Adam’s needle (Yucca filamentosa)
Creeping phlox (Phlox stolonifera)
Foam flower (Tiarella cordifolia)
Lamb’s ear (Stachys byzantina)
Meadow rue (Thalictrum rochebrunianum)
Peony (Paeonia hybrids)
Perennial salvia ‘East Friesland’ (Salvia x superba)
Primrose (Primula x polyantha)
Russian sage (Perovskia atriplicifolia)
Sedum ‘Autumn Joy’ (Sedum)
Speedwell (Veronica sp.)
Spring cinquefoil (Potentilla verna)
Stokes’ aster (Stokesia laevis)

ANNUALS

Four o’clock flower (Mirabilis jalapa)
Geranium, zonal and bedding (Pelargonium x hortorum)
Mexican ageratum (Ageratum houstonianum)
Spiderflower (Cleome hasslerana)
Vinca (Catharanthus roseus)
Wax begonia (Begonia x semperflorens-cultorum)

BULBS

Daffodil (Narcissus sp.)
Hyacinth (Hyacinth orientalis)
Persian onion (Allium giganteum)

VEGETABLES

Asparagus
Leeks
Onions
Potatoes
Rhubarb
Summer squash
Tomatoes

HERBS

Basil
Marjoram
Mint
Oregano
Parsley
Savory
Tarragon

Do you have any tips for controlling rabbits in your garden or yard? Please post below!

Garden Pests

About The Author

Catherine Boeckmann

Catherine Boeckmann

Executive Digital Editor and Master Gardener

Catherine Boeckmann loves nature, stargazing, and gardening so it’s not surprising that she and The Old Farmer’s Almanac found each other. She leads digital content for the Almanac website, and is also a certified master gardener in the state of Indiana.

Read more from Catherine Boeckmann

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Comments

<span>Lilli's Granny</span> Tue, 05/07/2013 - 09:26
Since I have to use Seven dust anyway for bugs, the old time hardware store said to go ahead and put it on the new bean sprouts. Rabbits and such can't stand the acidic taste and I shouldn't have to replant this year. I've also heard of taking an old sweaty sock and putting it in a piece of hosiery tied to a stick, and put it in the ground. The human smell helps to deter the little critters.
<span>Skte</span> Tue, 12/15/2015 - 20:35
I looked up Sevin Dust...you misspelled it...and found it to be highly toxic to humans and a pollutant to groundwater. Do not use the stuff...it can kill you along with everything around.
<span>Michael Moore 2</span> Mon, 04/15/2013 - 11:59
Rabbits ate my green beans to the ground. They allowed them to grow until just before running, then, bam! The next morning they looked like some one had taken a weed eater to them, only without the rubble of cuttings. I am thinking of planting pumpkins around the perimeter. I have to put them somewhere, just as well plant them where they will do the most good.
<span>Tgrrl</span> Tue, 05/29/2012 - 16:29
Some great advice here. Last year my garden was blissfully untouched by the rampant rabbits coons skunks groundhogs and deer that live around us. I kept expecting my carrots to be mauled. But they never were I believe because I planted them along the very middle of the garden surrounded by herbs tomatoes and onions & potatoes. I think its a great method- this year I'm surrounding my garden with pumpkin vines to provide a natural barrier since before they were planted the little critters broke in and nearly chewed my collards and brussles sprouts to the ground! I think it'll work! Good luck gardeners!
<span>Fotonut</span> Sat, 05/26/2012 - 11:36
Pinwheels are working for the wascolly wabbit and birds
<span>Shelbel</span> Thu, 05/24/2012 - 12:12
I plant Marigolds every 6" all around the garden and a rabbit WILL NOT cross the marigolds, nor will deere, cats, dogs, mice etc. Smells like a skink downwind and works incredibly well
<span>Yuliya</span> Mon, 03/04/2013 - 14:57
That is interesting - rabbits ate my marigolds! down to a ground!
<span>Katydid</span> Sat, 03/01/2014 - 20:35
I have lots and lots of them-they ate my marigold at 5 inches as well. They are afraid of nothing-I have tried everything including mothballs, The spray and everything-Now they have decided to hit my bushels out front-I am going to try an onion there right now. Everyone has great ideas unfortunately I have tried them all. I will let ya all know about the onion bc I am tired of these rabbits. they have taken up squatting under our shed and have more and more weekly as it seems. Wish me luck it maybe worth putting the onion out I want my bushes back- I have these rabbit- I ant them to just go away! Short of sitting out with a sling shot I will try anything,
<span>Cyndee Gummo</span> Wed, 04/13/2016 - 16:51
I was told to take lots of plastic forks with pronges up and handles in ground all around your plants !! the rabbits don't like the feel of the forks and will stay way ? I have not tried it yet but thought it was worth a try this year???
<span>Shaw</span> Sat, 07/30/2016 - 21:03
I've used plastic forks for many years in my (in ground) veggie gardens and flower gardens they work, sometimes. :-( However; I've watched the rabbits from indoors, they get up on their hide legs and reach for the flower buds (Daisies and Echinaceas, they leave my Autumn Joy Sedums alone.) and chew them off. The forks worked well w/ my garden veggie seedlings (straw bales) as I had 8 forks surrounding all sides of every one of those tasty treats.