Deer Repellant

Hi Y'all,

Not sure if I'm posting this in the right place or not, but HorseShoe suggested I tell Dave my secret formula for keeping deer away from plants.
Rotten Eggs!
I use a whole egg when I plant my plants. You can either bust them or plant them whole. Seems the combination works pretty well. Deer don't seem to like the smelly eggs.

Good tip - I'll pass it along to Trish. With all her hens, perhaps we'll have a surplus of eggs this summer to utilize!

thanks for the tip!
dave

With all the deer around here Belledonna must be doing something right! They seem to walk AROUND her garden area!

Hope Trish's chickens start laying soon!

Belladonna, Do you let the eggs rot first. I put an egg in the garden last fall and noticed it was still intact the other day. I shook it and it sounded liquid, so I gave it a toss about 25 feet and it broke. OMG no wonder deer don't like it. I hope it rains soon. I'm using Irish Spring Soap in a plastic onion sack. Also using Predator Urine but I'm not buying that anymore because no one can tell me how they get the stuff. It can't be nice for the coyote or wolf. Also making cow bell type things out of soup cans with a wire inside holding washers and nuts and hanging on a wire about neck high for the deer. I'm trying everything this year. So far so good.

OK,how do you keep hens out of the garden?????

CC, only a fence can do that (that I know of).

I just bought a huge roll of 4ft. fencing! Hopefully this will keep the deer and turkeys from trashing my garden this yr. also i bought some chicken wire to go around the bottom of that to keep lil bunnies out too. Now to go get a few boxes of eggs, lol

Tootsie,

I hate to rain on your parade, but just so you're not disappointed: A whitetail deer can clear an 8 foot fence from a standing start. Four feet is barely a challange to them.

There are ways to work with shorter fences, but they cost more in terms of land use.

If a four footer is the best you can do, you might consider topping it with an electric fence. One wire will do it if you first train the deer to recognize it (you use peanut butter bait cups for that). An electric fence probably is the most economical way to go; along with several non-fencing options.

I went to a talk on deer deterents and the one message I gleaned was deer are very cautious, they do not like anything new but when the newness wears off they are no longer afraid.

Anything scented like herbs they don't like, also marigolds. New scents they will avoid so if you hang dryer sheets out, you have to change brands every few days. If you use human hair, you have to get somebody elses hair after a few days. The same with soap, Lifebouy one week, Irish Spring the next. They become accustomed to things. Pie plates crackling in the wind will work for a few days but if you neighbors have been doing it they already are accustomed to it. Other methods mentioned were Milorganite, dried blood, male urine, (one woman had her husband mark his territory). That produced a lot of raised eyebrows! Glad they don't live next door to me!!

The one method that seems to be working pretty good here is the Scarecrow, a motion sensor sprinkler. It squirts them if they come into the sensor range which is only 100 degrees and as far as your hose can spray. I got one for my vegetable patch which isn't in yet thanks to our lovely NY weather. It cost me $80.

Deer also have poor depth perception. They won't jump into a pile of brush because they can't determine it's width. Some people report success with putting a 4 ft. fence up and then about 18" in put another 4 ft. They can't tell if it is 18" or 3 feet so they don't try. They won't jump a solid fence they can't see over.

The truly only sure way is a fence about 8 to 10 feet high and you have to be sure they can't push under it. And if for some reason they get trapped inside your property, they can do lots of damage.

They are very adaptable. They may not bother certain plants for years and then all of a sudden develop a liking for them. I have grown trilliums for 10 years with no problems. Last year they ate most of them. I was able to cage the rest.

One place that offers deer fencing that looks pretty good is Benner's Gardens in PA and CA

http://www.BennersGardens.com

They will send you a catalog and a sample of the fencing material.

Has anyone tried "Liquid Fence" ? I read about it somewhere and don't remember anything but the name and some rather extravagant sounding claims.

I have tried Liquid Fence (which smells so bad it would gag a maggot) and it worked pretty well and also Tree Guard is very good and lasts through the rain. Switch on and off with them and they really do seem to work. I have had lyme disease twice so I try to be diligent with the spraying.

A lady spoke to our garden club when I lived in TN, she lived in Oak Ridge which had a terrible deer problem. She said the most effective thing she used was a single strand electric fence about 4 ft high with little strips of aluminum foil every few feet. The strips flutter in the wind, the deer are curious, they stick their noses on them and zap, shock to the nose. They don't usually come back.

Calalilly...YEP! That works (especially if you bait the foil strips with peanut butter!).

Heheheh.... ;>)

Of course you could get a gator. We don't have a deer problem, lol.

That does it! Cala, I'm gonna git me a gator! Course now...last gator I saw seemed to be a bit perturbed w/me. Ya see...it was like this...

...My girlfriend at the time (we was living in Florida, near the Everglades) wanted a high dollar pair of alligator shoes. I was ordered to get her some. (She even said "please" so I obliged.)

I found me a big gator in them Everglades, chased that big boy for over a mile, through the swamp, the muddy ditches, across a couple paved roads, then back into the woods of the Everglades! I was getting mighty tired, but I had to keep my promise to my sweet heart!

Finally I caught up to that monster. We fought, and wrestled for over an hour! Turning over and over, in the yucky mud, wrestling, wrestling, grappling! I finally succumbed that big gator though! Whew!

However, to my disappointment, when I flipped that gator over once last time, thinking I had fulfilled my sweethearts request...dagnabbit!....

That dang gator wasn't even wearing no shoes!

Oh well. Story of my life!

(Now, what was we talking about? Dear? or Deer? Sorry, I got distracted with my memories) ô¿ô

I bet he lost his shoes in the mud while you were chasing him! That swamp mud is pretty sticky and will just pull the shoes right off your feet.

Over the last few years, we have lost thousands of dollars of plants, including fruit and nut trees, berries, grapes, etc. to the deer and rabbits. :-( Before we spend any more money, I am looking for something to keep the deer from eating individual trees. I have tried sprays, hair, soap, and scary/moving figures. If I get deer fencing, how far from the tree must (or can) it be? Can I surround each individual tree? Do I have to have the fencing over top of the tree? Ditto for rabbits especially the blueberries). The area is too large to competely enclose, and it would cause mowing and other problems, anyway. It would also be very impractical to use electric fencing to surround each tree. We are in a very rural area and like having the deer, rabbits, etc. around, but we don't want to purchase "expensive deer feed" anymore.

Thanks, in advance!

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