Mice!

[Dorothyrouse]

In the autumn I planted up 2 large pots with red tulips and grape hyacinths, for balcony. One pot stunning, still flowering, the other 2 little hyacinths only! So I emptied this pot yesterday, not one tulip bulb! And only about the 4 of the hyacinths!

Mice must have discovered them during the winter and eaten every one! Every one! Little ‘so & so’s!

[peanut]

Oh no! That happened with all my pots of tulips, but it wasn't mice, it was rats!

[Dorothyrouse]

It could have rats! But I’d like to think it was little hungry mice! At least they didn’t find the other pot!

[peanut]

I have my fingers crossed for you!

[Nicos]

Darn!...how frustrating!!!!
We have voles in the garden munching their way through bulbs.

I have however noticed that if I plant daffs close by / in the same pot, then they are left alone.
Maybe worth thinking about for next year?
Even the little tête-à-tête seem to do the trick.
No idea if mice and rats are put off, but maybe worth a try?

[annie8]

How frustrating. I had mice in the greenhouse this year, which is unusual for me. They nibbled the top off various plants and seedlings. I did put down mice traps which I felt bad about but wasn’t prepared to lose all my plants that I’d been carefully growing for months.

[Dorothyrouse]

I just wasn’t aware that this could happen, they left no trace whatsoever!

[Dorothyrouse]

Just lucky they only found the one pot! The other beautiful

[ameno]

How frustrating. I had mice in the greenhouse this year, which is unusual for me. They nibbled the top off various plants and seedlings. I did put down mice traps which I felt bad about but wasn’t prepared to lose all my plants that I’d been carefully growing for months.

I had mice in my conservatory last spring and the year before that. They ate a lot of my seedlings. We managed to catch them all last summer, and they don't seem to have come back this spring.
We think they originally got in through a window which opens into next doors garden (they had a low roof directly beneath the windowsill, so a mouse could easily climb in), which thankfully means there are probably no little access holes anywhere they can squeeze into, as clearing out the whole conservatory to search for said holes would be a nightmare.

[Mr Bones]

We used to sow peas direct and sprinkle curry powder on the surface so mice couldn't find them. One year I forgot the curry powder, returned two days later to find 360 pencil sized holes where the peas had once been.