How to Deter Rippers

It seems like there are million ways to try and keep people from snatching ones crop. From dogs to trip wire alarms to battery powered security lights…
I don’t have much to work with but I can put up a 4 or 5 row hot wire fence. I know if someone wants in they will get in but it will at least make them break in. Kinda like that saying good fences make good neighbors.
Anyway I would love to hear any method or technique that would have some kind of impact on making people think twice…

7 Likes

Plant 2 instead of 1.

Booby traps that injure people will send you to jail.

15 Likes

I’m t talking about injuring people

5 Likes

I have never had to deal with that particular problem, but I’m fairly well versed in physical security.

Movement activated lights, pointed at access points to your plants (but not at your plants, obviously) will do a lot to deter people. Make them really nice and obvious. The riskier you make it look to take your crop, the less people willing to take the risk.

Along with visible lights, visible cameras (working or not) will also help.

Now, these will draw attention, so it’s a balancing act. You want people who know about the grow to know about the security, but you don’t want to advertise the grow with your security. You could make the cameras non-visible unless you’re in the grow space, or you could “hide in plain sight” and rig your whole property with cameras, again working or not, hiding the fact you’re monitoring a single spot.

Also being in a legal jurisdiction vs. a non-legal jurisdiction will impact your solution too. Non-legal means you have to be more discreet, but at the same time, more obvious because your actual enforcement ability will be non-existent (unless you’re the type to go crack skulls, in which case people probably already know not to fuck around with you).

Ultimately I’d go with at least lights, and working cameras if in a legal jursidiction and fake cameras in a non-legal one. Figure out good places to mount it all and… pray for the best?

8 Likes

@pufferfishfiend that’s good advice. I spent 2 hours all over and only got about half your advice. Yeah my spot is legal and I’m on a budget. Hopefully I can get some battery powered security lights soon. It’s nice to know about the legalities on this stuff too. Great advice!

5 Likes

Trellis netting is super strong I have it in spaced layers and wrap my plants . They sure in hell won’t be able to rip them out of the ground bells attached to the top netting will sound the alarm for the dogs . I also have electric fencing . Thieves are normally stupid and will try anything even risk being shot for something they could grow themselves if the weren’t so lazy and stupid did I say stupid and worthless . The real danger is the value of your grow they come armed and have no value for human life . You can only do so much try to hide your grow . Now they can fly drones with cameras we have one and can look in everyone’s backyard within a range of a couple of miles . The closer to harvest the more reason too be worried . Those little bells for night fishing work great also motion sensing lights or hire a armed guard lol.

10 Likes

Thanks! :smile:

Legal is great, even on a budget you can piece together a pretty nice solution.

Battery operated security lights will be a good start, upgrading to wired when you can.

Depending on how handy you feel, you can buy a Raspberry Pi (~ $45 for a gen 3), slap a cheapo camera module on it (~ $10 - $25), SD card (~ $30), the various Pi accessories (power adapter/cable, case, battery pack if desired ~$20 - $50), do a little research on a good Linux package for continuous recording and you have a neat little local only security system that will let you grab screen grabs for LE if you suffer a loss.

The best part is you that you can piece it together as your budget allows, and it gives you full control over where your data goes.

6 Likes

Also the trellis idea is great. Make them so much a pain in the ass that just yanking the plants is going to be non-feasible.

4 Likes

Great advice!

3 Likes

I will definitely use bells

1 Like

That why its best to grow giant ass plants they can’t pull them up and will have to trim in place . Gives you a lot more time to beat the hell out of the rippers .

10 Likes

When I was a kid in the mid-1980’s our rule was to plant 4 for every 1 we wanted.

One for us
One for the animals
One for the cops
One for the rippers

24 Likes

Hopefully nothing nibbles on their leaves in the middle of the night, waking you up!

2 Likes

Lol. Yeah I would prolly develop some parinoia

1 Like

That just saved me a ton of research and I have no idea about security technology. And yeah it’s nice I can buy little by little

3 Likes

Ha! Yeah they would need a chainsaw or truck to pull them out

2 Likes

Years ago some rippers parked on the highway to sneak into a local grow . When they returned their car was destroyed lesson learned maybe .

9 Likes

The bottom line is if the lowlifes want in there’s no stopping them . Just don’t make it easy!

11 Likes

I totally agree @gramps. Just make it hard for them. I hope them people didn’t get away with enough smoke to buy a new car… I’m gonna start with a fence and bells and then hopefully start a budget for a security camera system. At least with that I can make a ripper known to everyone in the area. Be bad to be known as a legit ripper

5 Likes

that is why I moved inside :slight_smile:

I thought dynamite was the answer

my dear wife told me if you blow up a cop they

will stick a needle in your arm

all the best

Dequilo

8 Likes