My Current Garden Area and Improvements - Animals Be Gone!

  As I am popping popcorn for the squirrels right now, I am scheming plans on making my gardens work. Gardening in the yard has been a disaster. I used to think the problem was because I wasn't out there everyday, but now I know the real culprits that are destroying all my hard work.

  We live in an area that is behind a wildlife conserve. We have a group of turkeys that come around, and lots of hawks, squirrels, raccoon, and opossum. We even have a stray cat that comes around for food.

Our stray cat who comes around looking for food. Could
he be one of the culprits destroying the garden?

  I have fed popcorn to the squirrels and actually watched the squirrel population decline. I think that the hawks were having a tasty meal of popcorn filled squirrel. We had a dozen squirrels, then we were down to only 2. Every once in a while, I will hear an animal scream. Another one bit the dust, or rather, was chosen by another animal for dinner.
  After spending so much time making the garden work, only to have it destroyed by some animal(s), I decided to try container gardening. Only the containers are going to be on a balcony instead of on the ground. Now, these animals wont be able to touch my plants!

Tomato plant with Alpine strawberries, sage
and carrots growing toward the back of pic.

I wonder just how many Smart Pots will fit on the balcony? The 20 gallon pots use 3 bags of potting soil each. What's going to be cool is to see the plants as the vines grow and attach themselves to the railing. What will squash look like on a balcony rail?

                                       

                                        Greenhouse on balcony

But, here is one of the neatest things about the gardens on the balcony. A hydroponic set up which finally got set up yesterday. Alpine strawberries are in the pots.

Ebb and Flow Hydroponic setup

So, as long as we can keep the animals off the porch, we should be ok in growing food.  But there still is one problem left.