I've got a garden filled with all sorts of tasty plants -- roses, japanese iris, azalea, canadian anenome, perennial geranium, oriental poppy, peony, boltonia, columbine, daisy, and probably more I'm just not thinking of. I've also got a patch of siberian iris Caesar's Brother in there that got munched to the ground earlier this month when all my other siberian iris was starting to bloom. Well, it started to re-grow... and got munched again. It's the only plant they've chosen. The yard is a veritable salad for critters, hosting all kinds of plants. This is apparently dinner.

Any thoughts as to what I can do to protect this one apparently tasty iris? I'm not sure if it's rabbits or voles, but my money's on the bunny. I've got rabbits that sneak in and voles that probably live here. I don't think it's the squirrels, and that rounds out my critter collection. We never get woodchucks or chipmunks or deer. I haven't noticed skunks. It could be a mouse, I did have one this winter (although I caught it, he could have had friends).

I don't want to apply something that will burn up the plant with the drought and heat we've had. I've got a have-a-heart trap big enough to catch mice and rats and can be used to catch the voles, and while baby and grown squirrels have both gotten accidentally stuck in it the rabbits tried desperately to get in this winter to get the bait (bird seed) and only got their heads in. (I never trapped the mouse or vole in the trap, but I got one of each in an empty bucket they jumped into. Some animals are not smart.)

My dog was trying to catch some critter in the bed yesterday, but didn't succeed. Anything I use has to be pet safe. And no, it's not the dog eating it :)

Any thoughts? I really wanted to see the iris bloom, and that's clearly not happening, but I thought next year. If they keep eating it there won't be anything left. Help.