One can see the path that the deer have made from the ravine next to our acreage right past the garden plot. Each spring it's only a matter of time before they discover the greenery there, like their own private salad bar waiting for the taking! LOL!
Of course it doesn't help that in the winter I put sunflower seeds out in a pan below the bird feeder for the deer to find. It all started one evening when we looked out the big bay windows in the kitchen to see the deer sneaking into the back yard by the bird feeder. The bravest one came close and gazed longingly at the bird feeder high above their heads, which I had just filled with oiled sunflower seeds that day. The deer contented themselves with scrounging in the snow for the fallen seeds that the messy, fussy blue jays had thrown out of the feeder in their search for the perfect seeds.
There were usually only 2 or 3 at a time, but one day we counted 10 deer here... only got a photo of 6 at once, but we were amazed!
What to do to keep them at bay in the summer months? One way is to grow things they don't like.
What kind of vegetables don't they like to eat? Rhubarb is one. There is a huge rhubarb plant out in the yard within striking distance, but it always gets ignored, so that's a safe bet to plant.
What else? They stay away from anything with fuzzy or sharp leaves, so squashes might fall into that category. Deer are suspicious of anything with odd looking leaves so red leaf lettuce might work, too. But if your heart's desire is to plant green lettuce, beets or carrots, broccoli or cauliflower, they all start out as tender irresistible young green plants that deer love to nibble on!
The first year we tried to plant a vegetable garden, the broccoli plants which I had chosen, purchased and so lovingly put into the ground, lasted 3 days before the deer found them. Deer don't like smelly plants either, so I thought I would try planting a geranium plant or a marigold next to each broccoli and so I bought more broccoli plantlets and tried again. Three days later, same result...
The deer are smart. They didn't eat very many plants whole, they just slowly nibbled them down to nothing taking days to do so, that way stretching out the 'salad bar' pleasure.
I tried the Irish Spring soap in a nylon dangling beside the tender enticing greenery and it worked for a little while, but then a storm knocked over the stick with the soap and we were back to square one with munched plants.
About that time my tiny new carrots starting disappearing. They just vanished without a trace from one day to the next. Just like that Bugs Bunny cartoon where Bugs is underground and pulls the carrots down from the garden above to eat. It reminded me of that....
Turns out I wasn't far off. Now, not only did we have deer decimating the garden, we had moles, better known as Pocket Gophers. They are long black rodents who spend their time digging tunnels under the yard and in my garden beds only to dig a big exit hole with the resulting mound of dirt usually right next to my flowers, completely burying some of them!
We tried pocket gopher traps, but the gophers outsmarted us 4 times out of 5. Every fifth time or so we did find a dead one in the trap. Phoenix, our big orange and white cat had a better track record than we did. He catches them with great regularity and puts them to good use, too, not wasting any parts nor leaving much of a trace behind.
The odd time, when Phoenix has had more than enough to eat already, he brings them to the front door and lays them down on the mat as gifts to be tripped over by hasty humans the next morning, as we exit the door. After a few surprises, we have learned to step out the door onto the door mat with a certain amount of vigilence each morning ...
One other thing to try in regards to the pocket gophers is to plant castor bean plants in the flower beds. They grow huge dark brownish green leaves and take up quite a bit of room, but apparently their roots are poisonous (as well as the leaves) and the gophers will move their tunnels out of the flower beds to avoid them or so the theory goes.
Back to the deer...
For 2 years we solved our vegetable stealing deer problem with a bright orange 5 1/2 foot snow fence which we strung around the veggie garden in the spring after planting and took down in the fall after we had gleaned all we wanted out of the plot. But Mother nature has a sense of humor and she would, from time to time, after a stormy night, leave a low spot in the fence for the deer to discover. Not only that, but the plastic was fairly wide and it kept out the much desired sunlight to a certain degree.
Now we get to the good part... We built a permanent 6 foot wire fence around the vegetable garden this week, which will let the rain and the sunshine in, but keep the deer and rabbits out. (Did I mention we had rabbits, too? Yup we have those critters roaming around here, too, much to the dogs delight, as well as a marmot pair and some overly friendly porcupines. Never a dull moment! LOL!
So once we get the gate built, we'll see how well this works....
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