Something has been eating my garden?

Question

what ever it was ate all my pulled beans and string beans and ripped a couple of them out of the ground they ate a little bit of the tomato plant and sampled a green pepper plant. there was like a flowered shape black p**p black in color green inside next to the garden maybe about 2 inches round in size does anyone have any idea what it was and how to prevent it from happening again.THANK YOU

Answer 1

Probably not a rabbit based on your description of the scat. It might be a woodchuck if you are in their range. They are h*ll on gardens. You can fence or you can spray diluted castor oil on your plants (don't forget to wash it off when you want to eat the plants).

Here's the recipe:

Mix 6 oz of castor oil and 2 oz of dish detergent in 1 gallon of water.

Dilute 1 oz of this mixture in 1 gallon of water and spray on your garden. Repeat every three days and after every rain. This is moderately effective against woodchucks, depending on where else the 'chuck can find food. If (s)he is very hungry all bets are off.

Answer 2

I've had the same problems before.  That's why I now grow my root vegetables in a container called the Roottub.  Instead of being in the ground, where insects would eat the greens and my roots would rot, I put them into this tub which was specially designed to grow root veggies like beets, carrots, rutabagas, globe turnips, turnips, parsnips, etc.  Apparently this tub was designed especially for growing Scorzonera and Salsify, which I haven't tried yet.

http://www.roottub.exofire.net/faq.html

I have a bad back and this saves me from all the backbreaking work at harvest time.

I suppose you can also grow beans, tomatoes and pepper plants in them, just set up a trellis for them to climb on.