How can I keep squirrels away from my Nectarines?!?

I have a 3rd year nectarine tree that is producing a lot of fruit, however last year squirrels devoured every last one way before they were of large size or even anywhere near ripe so I got nothing!


How can I keep them away from the fruit this year? The tree is pretty tall and wide and the branches start very low to the ground so I cannot picture a way to fence or wrap/net it.How can I keep squirrels away from my Nectarines?!?
Sorry Mr. Answers, I have to disagree with your suggestion of live trapping and re-locating. You are giving advice which probably contravenes the Wildlife Act in that person's state or province. By re-locating you are upsetting the natural ecosystem and giving the problem to someone else. Are you suggesting this Fruit Grower break the law?


The abundance of squirrels and they are most likely Grey Squirrels are not in any way endangered. As a matter of fact they are considered a pest and in British Columbia an introduced Alien Species. They came here by means of live trapping and re-locating perhaps by someone like yourself. The Grey Squirrels are now decimating the local Environmental Habitat which were home to our Native Western Red Squirrel.


The best suggestion would be to have a Wildlife Pest Management Company come in and permenantly remove the Squirrel.How can I keep squirrels away from my Nectarines?!?
Well it's pretty hard to keep squirrels out of ANY tree!!! Trees are there homes!!! But there are many different types of fencing availible today! It doesn't matter that the branches are very low to the ground! Squirrels are very great jumpers, and they can run right up the tree trunk anyways! so cutting the lower branches would be nothing more then a waste of your time!!!





Setting up a squirrel feeder, far away from the tree, would be your best bet to try first! It seems the nectarines are more important to you, then spending a few bucks a week for some shelled unsalted peanuts, peanut butter and some popcorn!





Set up a a little platform on top of a 3 ft high wood pole, a 4 '; x 4 '' pole, the dagwood fencing type pole! Put the pole into the ground, then nail a 3 ft x 3 ft square hunk of 1/2 '; plywood flat on top of the pole! Nail a little 2'; ledge around the whole hunk of the outside of the plywood so the stuff you put out there on it won't fall off of it! Put the feeder close to a different tree so the squirrels can get onto the feeder easily from a tree branch of a tree!





Then mix, cooked popcorn, and shelled unsalted peanuts together, then heat up some peanut butter so it's more liquidly , about 4 table spoons and mix that into the popcorn and shelled unsalted peanuts, then put some into the squirrel feeder platform, and in a few days, the squirrels will tell others and your nectarine problems should come to an end! as long as you keep the squirrels feeder well supplied!





If by some chance, that doesn't cure your problems! Then you can fence the tree off with 4 ft high fencing, with chicken wire type fencing, with a 2 ft wide prison type top of the fence, so even if the squirrels try to climb the fence, they can't get over the outword angle to get to the tree! But if there is another tree to close to the nectarine, tree, then fencing any type will not stop the squirrels, squirrels can jump, tree to tree, from branches to branches of other trees! They run on power lines and up power poles! And then jump to trees that are close!





Squirrels jump from trees to garages, to garages to houses etc. They can go just about anywhere they want! And are very sneaky too! But just by making a feeder for them, with there daily everyday goodies can detour them from other things!





If all efforts fails, get a live trap cage, put the squirrels mixed feeder food in the live trap as bait, and when you catch them in the live trap cage, take them for a long drive and then release them by a farm, woods or park! It would be a lot better then shooting them with a pellet or bb gun!