Gardeners who have the best luck use a combination of strategies and vary them to keep the animals off guard. My new vegetable garden is smack in deer country, so we plan to have our deterrents in place before planting. A few months ago, Country Living Gardener magazine published an article singing the praises of crows and suggesting we welcome them to our gardens. Now crows are big, noisy birds with some real unpleasant habits. They don't sing, they talk to each other in loud screeching voices using 24 different sounds to converse.
Crows usually hang around in groups, so there is the extended family to consider.
They may nibble on a bit of corn bread, but the bulk of their diet is made up of small rodents, bird's eggs, baby birds and meat scavenged from dead animals and exposed garbage. Nancy Szerlag is a master gardener and Metro Detroit free-lance writer. Her column appears Saturdays in Homestyle.