Oh no!!! They are worse than my budgies! Can't help but you have my sympathy!

Maybe try a screen mesh on top of the pot surrounding the tree? It would allow you to water it but not for the cats to get into it. My trees are outside, but thankfully the neighborhood cats don't seem interested in digging just prowling through my backyard.

Bacon, that's a good idea. I think we have some leftover mesh from re-screening a window. Thanks!

Thanks for the sympathy Laura, I would love to see pics of your budgies playing in the trees :)

Grin4joy: Free is always the best option!

I think the mesh is a great idea! Grin, last year they would hang out on the branches of my guava tree and chop off leaves! They nearly defoliated a few branches. Luckily, that tree is big and strong.

Grin, oh wow, that is some serious digging. I have chicken wire that I have wrapped around the perimeter of my raised bed. I discovered that my cat thought it was a ginormous litter box, so I kept her out of it by simply putting a chicken wire around it. I know that if my cat really wanted to, she could jump in there (she can scale a full-size fence), but I imagine it is not worth the effort for her as I have not seen her in there since.

Laura, I LOVE the parakeets in your tree, they are adorable!!! I bet they love getting to fly loose among the various plants. Thank you for sharing.

Figs - I will try the chicken wire around my raised bed next year. Those cats think I turn the soil just for them. My daughter uses cocoa shell mulch and that worked great for her.

I have used large pine nuggets. The kind used for mulch. Make sure to use a thick enough layer of about 3 - 4 inches. Worked for me.

The squirrels are always digging and planting nuts in my pots. Even the most unlikely potted plants I find their nuts in. Sometimes it drives me nuts as their damage can be bad. They love to eat the leaves off my clivias. They leave nothing behind. I have to grow my clivias in cages. They will even come in my front porch to get at them or jump down to the pots if I hang them from trees or poles outside. I think my worst critter is whatever keeps digging up my lawn. It destroys whole sections to get at grubs I think although I don't see grubs in my lawn.

Cory

Our hundred yen stores (dollar store) carries plastic grids that have 1/2" spikes formed in it at intervals- sold just for keeping cats off where you've planted new seeds, bulbs or other precious garden materials. Seems like any large mesh that doesn't clog would also work to keep squirrels off your container citrus soil, too. I found this "scat cat mat" @ gardeners.com for $12 that is pretty similar to what we have here.

I used red pepper (giant economy size) last spring when I had a few visiting neighborhood cats using my decorative border as a latrine. Worked perfectly, with none returning this year. If you have pets of your own, I'm not sure that would be such a good idea. The cats we had trouble with were "free roaming" strays that live outdoors. Good luck solving your situation.

Here's the scat cat mat from their website.

Some sort of hardware netting like gopher netting would work great. It can be expensive though. I would probabaly cut out an overlapping circle with a seem from one side to the center. I would make it larger than the pot, then tuck the extra sides down into the pot instead of just laying it on top. Then i would probabaly put some course bark mulch over it. You could try the screen like you said or maybe chicken wire or aviary wire. If it doesn't work to cut it out and place over the pot (horizontally) you could wrap it around like what people do to keep deer away from tender young plants.

If you're fertilizing they may be after the scent of the fertilizer too, or just being brats and digging because they can.

Thanks everyone, you guys are the best! These are all great and creative ideas and I'm going to use some of them in my outdoor pots to keep those pesky squirrels out.

Cory, sounds like we have similar pest problems. We discovered our lawn was being dug up by raccoons searching for grubs. As I remember we sprinkled cayenne pepper around and that seemed to do the trick, though they still come around because of our pond. If we accidentally leave our back garage door open, those bandits arrive in the middle of the night and try to make of with our bins of dog and cat food. They work together and we have even caught them trying to push/pull a 5 gallon bucket of cat food over the fence!!!

We had a family of raccoons removed from under our house and within a month I had the worst grub infestation I had ever seen! The grubs took over my flower bed (I don't even have a lawn - we removed it years ago - but all my neighbors do). I used to curse their digging (and the wild turkeys in my area), but now I'm thankful for it!

Opossums not raccoons is the answer to grubs. Many of my customers rely on moles for their grub removal.

Raccoons dug up all 4 of my 50 gallon blueberries and set me back 3 years growth and production. So far I have caught 4 raccoons and burred them in a 3 cubic foot bag cover with 3 cubic feet of dirt and planted my fall/winter greens.

6b Steve

Yeah I'm still glad we had the raccoons removed. Mean buggers. Like mean little bears.

Something upset the balance in my yard. Maybe the coyotes and mountain lions came down lower and ate all the grub natural predators because of the drought. I tried to take care of the damn grubs with predator nematodes, but I think there were just too many. Resorted to harsher chemicals unfortunately. Damn grubs almost totally ruined my front yard garden.

Sorry to hijack your thread grin4joy!