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A NEW PLAN FOR WARDING OFF DEER

November 19, 2014

I’ve whined about the deer problem in my garden many times before and there is no perfect solution. Every year I learn more in the war in combatting them and what I learned last year was that they can do major damage in winter.

Up until last year, we’ve had many years of mild winters. But last year we had a very cold and very snowy winter. The snow that fell early in the season never melted so it just kept piling up. That meant that the deer could not get to their usual food sources. The deer population by us has also flourished in recent years, so there is a lot of pressure on the environment to feed the herd.

Last year they ate anything they could reach, so even plants and trees that they had never shown interest in before were targeted.

And weather experts are predicting this winter will be as bad as last. So I took some extra precautions in protecting some plants.

This is not a method I’ve ever seen before and it is completely untested, but it’s cheap, easy and easier on the eye than a lot of other protection methods.

To my knowledge, the only way to protect a plant from deer in winter is a physical barrier. If a plant also needs protection from the cold and wind, that may come in the form of burlap, but if it just needs protection from gnawing, that generally means some kind of fencing. Except deer have a knack for biting through fencing, so you can’t just wrap a plant in it; you have to get the fencing away from the plant to create a gap. That means that you have to set poles in the ground.

Lots of deer fencing isn’t pretty either.

So I thought as long as I had to put poles in the ground anyway, why not try something that is a little less noticeable and much less expensive.

When I was researching deer fences for the property, I learned that deer have pretty lousy sight. I also believe that deer are pretty lazy, so they usually won’t work too hard for something that isn’t really special, and in winter, nothing is really special (well, maybe cedar trees but they’ve already eaten everything 7 feet high and lower).

 
I created a large string “cage” around the viburnums that were munched on last winter.

So I used nylon string to create a string “fence” around specific shrubs and trees. I tied clove hitches (perhaps that should be the second in my how-to-tie-knots series) around each pole, spacing the string out about 7 or 8 inches. On some of them where the string got a little saggy, I also created a big string X on each side.

 

At some point I’ll go back and tie a little something onto the string (ribbon, maybe) so the deer can easily see that it’s there. I made sure to place the poles far enough away that a deer can’t just stick its head in between the lines and reach the plant.

I made a large string “cage” around the viburnums on the east side of the property because they were hit by the deer pretty bad last year. I also made one around the new ‘Mariesii’ viburnum by the bird feeders (a favorite deer hangout) and around the Japanese maple, which they also did a number on last year.

Will it work? I have no idea, but I know I’d much rather look at my string cages than big fences. Only time will tell if its enough to keep the deer moving.

Do you have to protect plants from deer in winter?

deer winter
by Erin @ The Impatient Gardener 
2 Comments

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previous post: FRIDAY FINDS
next post: GATHERING THE SUPPLIES

Comments

  1. Sheila says: November 20, 2014 at 2:05 pm

    You might tie tails of rip-stop from an old chute on the nylon line. The flapping might further discourage the mauraders. Your deer's tiny cousins, the Key deer, are a problem year round in the lower Keys.

    Reply
  2. Debra Phillips says: November 25, 2014 at 2:03 am

    i have herds of deer on my property. they wander in and among my cutting gardens, floral borders, well everything……and they touch nothing. my neighbor to the east feeds them and as they wander here they are not hungry. in 20 years of living here have lost nothing to deer. as creatures of habit, one can time your watch to their arrival, from the east. so with pleasure i enjoy their presence!
    debra

    Reply

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The Impatient Gardener

Do you love gardening? Me too! I'm Erin and I garden in Southeastern Wisconsin, zone 5. The Impatient Gardener is all about real-life gardening: the good parts, the bad bits and even the funny stuff. It's part information, part inspiration and a little bit commiseration. Thanks for visiting.

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Here’s a combo I’m totally digging this year: Wicked Witch coleus with Compact White Sunpatiens. I should have planted more Sunpatiens because they haven’t filled in as much as I expected in this part sun spot, but it’s a great look.
When you leave your garden in the middle of summer you know there’s going to be some clean up on the back end. It’s amazing how the little things we do every day in the garden, even when we’re not “working” in it—pulling a weed, propping up a plant, tucking tendrils into a trellis—add up to important jobs. And you don’t realize that until they aren’t being done. 

When I came home after 8 days away I was planning to whip the whole garden into shape and ended up spending all day in the vegetable garden where things went awry quickly. 

I was rewarded though with lots of cucumbers and zucchini and a few pretty bouquets to put around the house. This is Madame Butterfly Bronze with White (a name I don’t understand at because I wouldn’t use any of those words to describe the color) snapdragon and Apricot Shades strawflower. 

Check the link in the bio to see the whole video and what I found when I first laid eyes on the garden after some time away.
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