The deer have picked my purple hull peas for me

Wasn't that nice of them?

NOT.

I might as well not garden, they cleared the peas out last year 3 times in a row, till I gave up,

i've doused my pea plants really good with 7 this morning to keep them off hopefully it will work. they picked the purple hull peas and now I have none to pick fo rus. I have other peas ot there that they've nibbled the tops off of.

I'm sick, of hard work and throwing it out to the deer.

I can't spend alot of money on fencing , we just don't have it right now,

I am considering buying one of those sprinklers that turns on when movement is present, turn it on just at night,

any other suggestions. I hve to go find one see if I can get it to scare off the deer. Maybe I can chain my dog out there at night, although that would be cruel cause he's a house dog.

*ouch*

I feel your pain

kathy, I keep deer away with "Irish Spring" soap cut in chunks and tossed around my garden! Sounds funny, but it works! Now if I could just keep the rabbits away! LOL!

Don't know about Arizona deer. But a little blood meal sprinkled on the plants after every rain usually keeps Georgia deer and rabbits away.

Thanks farmer, my green beans are down to little green sticks! Will they come back? Is it too late to replant?

Yes, I've heard of soap and blood meal. You might also try pepper spray.

Kathy, I feel your pain! The deer here are terrible! The only way to protect the garden when they're hungry is to keep them out with a fence. How big is your garden? The first year I had a vegetable garden, I used inexpensive mesh twist tied to garden stakes and it worked! when they come close and their nose touches the mesh, they leave it alone because they don't want to get tangled up in it. I think it was about $10 or so for a 7'x100' roll at Home Depot.

Thanks for the advice, I make soap and wouldn't dream of buying it when I have 700 bars in my utility room LOL I will cut some of the strongest scented ones up and throw around the edges of the garden.

Bloodmeal? good for plants too ha? have to try that.

and the garden is l/2 acre, i'mgoing to talk to DH abou tputting up an electric fence, I think we still have all the stuff to do that with without buying it. and the guy at the extensionoffice told me to fold some foil around the wire in a few places and scrape some peanut butteron it, and they touch the peanutbutter and shock their noses before they cross the fence and tear up the fence. WE may try this too. Garden is to obig to let go to the DEER.

If it were deer season, man if their around this fall , their gonners for sure.

kathy, "they" say only "irish spring" will work.
farmer, think my beans might come back or should I try to replant?

wonder why? never heard of just one soap working. it's got to be because of thescent that scares them off, I don't know why any highly scented soap wouldn't work, do you?

I have one of those sprinklers and it works pretty well on small areas, but the only way you can be sure to keep the little darlings :) out of your garden is by fencing.I know-- fences can be ugly but I couldn't garden at all unless
I had fences. We live in the mountains and people around here feed the deer, not supposed to but they do it anyway. Sorry that happened to you. Last year I left my gate open and the little devils ate everything.

PLEASE tell me you didn't call those buggers little darlings? LOL I'dlike to have them on my supper table. hah a

I didn't mean it, I fibbed!! LOL

Okay, if you're at your wits end, this may be worth a try. I have no personal knowledge of this, but it makes a weird kind of sense. I was eavesdropping at the Farmers Market, and two of the men were talking about deer and their damage. One said he strings heavy fishing line at chest level, for the deer, that is. He says that when they walk into something they can't see, they don't go any farther. He keeps it about 40 feet from the garden itself. I did finally ask about it, and he keeps two lines, one about two feet from the ground, and one four.

Cheap, anyway....:)

Now that's a n idea.

My neighbor is a beautitian, and I went over and got a walmart sack of hair last night that she'd cut that day. Dh spread it around the garden on the back side and half way up on both sides. we also put out my son's sweaty tee shirt LOL tillered in the garden last night, and no fresh tracks in the garden, although we went out at dark and saw his eyes from accross the fence. so he was there but didn't jump the neighbors fence to come check outthe food in our garden.

I can get all the hair I want, so I may do that for a while, least till th e peas are done. Ihope it works from now on,

I'll tell DH about the fish line too. tha't s a neat idea.

I have laid fencing horizontal about a foot off the ground,cattle guard fashion
They will not walk across it for fear of hurting their legs.
They will not jump over it also,not knowing where it ends.

These are great ideas, I have the fencing also. Thanks for all the help

I use Liquid Fence. Works great and won't harm the wildlife!

www.liquidfence.com/deer-repellent.html

This product has saved both my vegetable garden and my rose garden.

I use Liquid Fence on plants outside of my fence and it does work wonders.

Kathy Ann,

I'm pretty sure you were kidding about chaining the dog out there, but just in case you weren't...............don't. I actually tried that, and the coyotes killed my dog. Sad, sad, sad. I still feel badly about that.

What really worked for me was a 6' tall fence. Our garden covers about 1 acre and the cost was around $700. A little expensive I know, but no more deer, no more rabbits, and no more worrying about the neighbor's wayward cattle.

oh wow! I'm so sorry to hear that, i'd be devistated if something like that happened to my dog. I wouldn't chain him out there anyways. cause he sleeps in side. WE did put up a n electric fence around the garden and I put foil on the line with peanutbutter on it. if they touch the foil to sniff the peanut butter it will shock their noses and they won't break the wire this way. its' working, well, it worked on the dogs anyways LOL I think they had to touch it one tim eto know it was there. It's only a small shock though, meant for small animals, but it was a shock box we alrady had, and it seems to be working, no more deer problems any more. They still jump the fence to eat the pears and apples onthe ground, but that's ok. just as long as they stay out the garden

I live in Fayetteville and we're having reports of coyotes in the city limits and on the University campus. We even had a wolf in our neighborhood a few years back(he got relocated by Game & Fish). I wouldn't consider leaving my dogs tied up outside here! Also have a chain link fence, 4 foot high around the yard. Doesn't even slow the deer down.

We have lots of deer around our place too. We fenced the veggie garden but they were till eating up lots of my flowers. We put up an electric fence all the way around the the house and they haven't touched any of my flowers for the last 3 years. I didn't use the peanut butter trick. Deer are curious by nature and are always sniffing their way around so I figure they got their shock when they were checking to see which flowers they wanted for their snack one night. I haven't even seen any tracks close to the fence anymore. We were thinking like you though Kathy, if it had been hunting season, we'd be putting some meat in the freezer!

I've been leaving our electric fence on during the day cause the deer have been seen out there in the day time, well, this morning I was out in the garden, and noticed the geese up in the front close to teh garden and they were squawking, I went to investigate and one had its beek on the wire and just dangling there, I pushed it off and it hobbled off, seems to be fine now, but I immediately went to unplug the fence so it wouldn't happen again, maybe the deer have got a taste of the fence and won't come around during the day, if I hadn't been there, that goose would be there all day long, it was kind of limpless, I thought it was dead till I pushed it off. and it hobbled off. I felt so bad for it.

I noticed my redbone Dude knows his way around the fence now and knows where to get in and out without getting shocked, so I guess he's been bit a few times too. It' snot a hard shock, cuase I touched it LOL had to know what it would do to the animals around here, but that goose, scared the life out of me. so now the fence is off during the day time.

We inherited my daughter's little dog and she kept managing to sneak into the flowerbeds in spite of the fence (she couldn't resist coming in when I was working in there). She finally came around front one morning while the grass was still wet and that did the trick. She touched her nose to that fence and got bit pretty good. I felt bad for her too but she gives that fence a real wide berth now! But she didn't get hung up on it like your goose. Hope he/she is O.K. Once those deer get zapped one time, they never mess with it again.

Goose is fine now. doesn't even act like it happened.

I've had three years success with the inexpensive deer screen from Lowes. It is 7'x100' like what was mentioned above. There's just one problem. I now have a deer that has learned that the vinyl mesh can be lifted. It never gets fully in the garden, just eats around the edges. I believe it reaches in as far as it can by lifting and stretching the vinyl fence. I have had about a week now with no further intrusion - I have weighted the bottom of the screen down on all sides. All the intrusions into my garden are during the day. I know that sounds crazy, but I go out every morning to look everything over and see what I need to do that day. I don't see any damage from the night, then after work, I'd find the edge of my beans razed off.

Kathy_Ann sorry to hear about your trouble with the deer!!!! My SIL that lives in Texarkana just paid $35.00 for a bushel of purple hull peas and they weren't shelled!!!

That deer had a gourmet meal at that cost!!!

Oo Wee! Jeri,
where in the world are they selling a bushel of purple hulls for $35.00? I don't think any of the vendors at the market I sell at,had peas for over $25-$28.00 a bushel? Me,I didn't have nary a pea to sell because the the blasted deer.

P

We can buy a quart of shelled purple hull peas for $5.00. Why are Yalls so expensive?

I told my SIL I'd send her some of ours from down here and we'd split the profit!!!! LOL!!!

Don't give up on my visit!!! Things have changed for now because of the floods in Iowa. Jim left Thur. to start pulling houses up there. They had over 200 brought up there in the last couple of weeks that when they inspected them they all had mold. So now they are bringing them up to Waterloo, Iowa and starting to return the 200 moldy units back to Hope. So they are pulling both ways!!!! With it being a start of emergency still they can pull 24/7.

I haven't a clue as to how high they are here, i've never bought, if I didnt have any someone from church always gave them out. Someone gave me a 5 gallon bucket full, I picked them but they were free LOL

Deer ate mine too jeri, won't have any purple hull but we put that electric fence up and i'm getting tons of zipper cream and lady finger pea and soon i'll ahve the red ripper. fence worksgood!

I've seen more and more people enclosing their entire vegetable gardens. Too much work to feed the deer or the rabbits!!!

jeri,
Just say when. ...if and when you get to come,please excuse my weedy yard. I've been busier than a one-legged man in a butt-kicking contest and the yard has been low man on my VERY long "to do" list.

Kathy-ann,
can you save me a couple pounds of dry cream zippers. Be happy to pay you for them. Couldn't find them anywhere here this year and I need some for next year.


P

I thought they didn't store well? the southern peas that is?

I'll do what I can to save some for you. I just started picking them and picked a 5 gallon bucket so far. I miss them and get dry ones all the time, i've been canning them too LOL

will start saving the dry ones. I need to save some for me too.

I didn't know they wouldn't store well. Maybe that's why they're so hard to come by.

P

Yep, I hear southern peas don't germinate well if stored for along time, I figure that's why we all have to plant them several times. although I know folks that save their zipper peas locally and have no problems the next year, I'll save some .

Saving this years crop for next years planting is no problem. Unlike most seeds, they don't keep for years. Germination drops drastically as they get over a year old. You can beat that by storing the dried peas in the freezer, but they don't retain viability like beans.

Thanks so much farmerdill. I will save save save now that I know they will be good next year LOL

Thanks from me too Farmerdill. I've been doing a little researching but wasn't finding much on storage. I was just about to ask about putting them in the frig/freezer. I put all my seeds,purchased(origainal pkg) and harvested,in paper envelopes(harvested seeds) or brown paper lunch bags( for large quanity of seeds such as beans and peas) then put the bags/envelopes in zip lock freezer bags before putting them into my seed frig. I have great germination on most seeds stored this way. Even decent germination percentage on carrot and lettuce seeds after being stored over winter.

P

I had the same problem; no beans-deer; not peas-deer; no sweet potatoes-deer. Tried everything,electronic;motion activated lights and water; repellents etc. This year I bit the bullet and drove metal fence posts every 15 feet and clipped woven cattle fencing (5 ft) 2 feet up from ground level, then filled in the bottom two feet with 2 ft chicken wire. IT WORKED!