A DIY PVC Pipe Project That'll Help Keep Pests Out Of Your Garden

Gardening is widely regarded as good for your health, allowing you to free yourself from stress, frustration, and overstimulating interpersonal activity. Many home gardeners take on a love for the craft due to their desire to get closer to nature, get in touch with their inner self, and harvest farm-to-table ingredients. Unfortunately, this hobby is not without its frustrating components, as fruitful gardens can attract pests, rodents, and invasive bugs. Luckily, however, there's an easy DIY solution for this issue, which should allow you to rid yourself of any stressful run-ins with these pesky critters and maintain a clean, healthy garden without the use of pesticides. The solution is to build a hooped shelter around your beds.

To build a protective shell around your own garden, you'll need some PVC pipes, a few untreated wood planks, and some netting or chicken wire, along with a few other simple items. Simply cutting and bending the PVC pipes over your garden and attaching the netting on top offers a simple solution. However, keep in mind that PVC does break down in the sun, so this will likely need to be replaced over time. After following this brief guide, you'll have several different options to easily combat everything from aphids to mice to full-grown deer.

As stated, a simple solution for keeping pests out of your garden involves building your own clamshell mesh cover by cutting ¾ or ½-inch PVC pipes into pieces long enough to stretch over your bed. Then, bend them into a "U" shape and attach them to pieces of wood, which can be lifted off the bed when you need to access the plants. You can attach them with metal straps. The wooden frame should be large enough to create a perimeter around your afflicted bed, while the PVC arches can be bent over top and connected to the wooden piece on the other side. The pipes can be used to support an array of different netting types, depending on what you're attempting to keep out of your garden. Attach your preferred netting with zip-ties, nails, or twine and create a sort of lobster trap covering designed to keep your plants safe from any lurking predators. 

Those looking to ensure pollinators such as honeybees can maintain access to flowers while also keeping larger creatures like deer or raccoons away from their crops can employ chicken wire or bird netting, which leaves ample space for insects to get inside. Alternatively, if bugs are a problem, you can swap out chicken wire for a fine veggie mesh. There are many variations of this PVC set-up to accommodate gardeners of all backgrounds. While there are a number of existing hacks to keep small critters away from your garden, this one offers a low-effort, high-reward project that will leave you feeling like the king of your domain.