I had to harvest my sweet corn from the garden too early this year because the field mice were eating it all. Any suggestions on how to keep them at bay? (Please don't suggest a cat as my dogs would eat them for a snack. And I can't use my dogs as they would eat more then the mice.)

animalfarms

start feeding the barn cats out in the corn patch.

Sounds like coons to me.

that leaves traps or poison. Live traps have a good catch rate.

Get some Guinea hens. Mice vanish!

crows will eat your corn too..usually coons will break the stalk over..see if your local animal control has cat traps you can use..these will be humane box traps..steel traps work good too but you will probably catch your barn cats or dogs in them also..if it is rats you can build a box and put a hole in it big enough for rats and mice ..put your poison in the box and put it in the field..your dogs and cats will then be kept away from the poison...a couple of years ago rats suddenly moved into our barn..i mean infestation in a hurry..we keep feed in 55 gallon steel drums..i put some corn in the bottom of an empty barrell and propped a board up from the ground to the side of the barrel..in one night we caught 13 rats,,they would jump into the barrel and could'nt get out...

Coons are eating your corn . Get you a live strap and put a small pan of dog feed in trap and you will catch them .

Squirrels love corn too.