Author Topic: Ideas that work to keep deer away from my trees??  (Read 7123 times)

Coach62

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Ideas that work to keep deer away from my trees??
« on: March 16, 2018, 10:31:09 PM »
Deer are driving me freaking nuts.  They killed 2 of my trees, destroyed my tomatoes, and every time my citrus trees get a fresh flush of new growth, they eat it all.  They eat my baby avocados, baby mangoes, strawberries, you name it, they destroy it.  You have no idea how destructive these things are, when I try to scare them off, they just look at me and laugh.  They have my land marked as having a lot of food so they pretty much visit me nightly.  Deer hoof prints EVERYWHERE!

In my garden in the rear, I have one of those motion activated sprinklers, and it works well.  Problem is, that is just not practical to do over large areas as you have to have a garden hose to every sprinkler, and it has to be on all the time.  Plus, they ain't cheap.

Once my trees get big enough, they'll be ok, but they are being seriously stunted because the new vegetation gets stripped as soon as a new flush is pushed out.

I have tried scent crap, it's a joke, at least everything I've tried.

Anyone know of something that is PROVEN to work?  Thank you!
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Donkeys4hire

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Re: Ideas that work to keep deer away from my trees??
« Reply #1 on: March 16, 2018, 10:38:32 PM »
Have a BBQ featuring venison.

Coach62

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Re: Ideas that work to keep deer away from my trees??
« Reply #2 on: March 16, 2018, 10:40:30 PM »
Have a BBQ featuring venison.

Trust me, the thought has crossed my mind more than a few times.  It would be legal here in season, next year I might just get a tag or two.
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baccarat0809

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Re: Ideas that work to keep deer away from my trees??
« Reply #3 on: March 16, 2018, 10:46:47 PM »
Not sure if this will work for you or not, and if there back in the summer you may need to do it often, but goto any dog grooming salon in the area and see if they'll give you the dog hair.

Sprinkle the dog hair all around your property.  In the summertime with rain it'll knock the scent down, but it may be a cheap way to keep them off.

Other than that, like Donkey said, mmmm, Venison sausages.  Or even better, Venison jerky.  Venison jerky is just the best ever.

spaugh

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Re: Ideas that work to keep deer away from my trees??
« Reply #4 on: March 16, 2018, 11:02:02 PM »
Pissing, dog piss, hair, soap, hot pepper....  None of that crap works.  What works is a 7ft tall deer fence.  Tenex high tensile if you dont want to pay for welded wire.  8ft T post every 10ft and fencing material. 

Been there done that, no more deer problem.  They still eat anything hanging over but they don't come in the grove.  I go out in the early AM and they are just hanging out and not touching my garden.  We get along fine now.
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Coach62

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Re: Ideas that work to keep deer away from my trees??
« Reply #5 on: March 16, 2018, 11:15:05 PM »
Fence may work best long term, but will be very pricey.  I just checked, and it is in fact legal to get a nuisance deer permit, but I think I'll have to get declared as agricultural land, which I intended to do anyway.  It will lower my taxes a little, and I do plan on selling fruit eventually.
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spaugh

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Re: Ideas that work to keep deer away from my trees??
« Reply #6 on: March 17, 2018, 12:56:35 AM »
Fence may work best long term, but will be very pricey.  I just checked, and it is in fact legal to get a nuisance deer permit, but I think I'll have to get declared as agricultural land, which I intended to do anyway.  It will lower my taxes a little, and I do plan on selling fruit eventually.

How big is the property?  How many feet of fence?
Brad Spaugh

gozp

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Re: Ideas that work to keep deer away from my trees??
« Reply #7 on: March 17, 2018, 01:40:01 AM »
Deer are driving me freaking nuts.  They killed 2 of my trees, destroyed my tomatoes, and every time my citrus trees get a fresh flush of new growth, they eat it all.  They eat my baby avocados, baby mangoes, strawberries, you name it, they destroy it.  You have no idea how destructive these things are, when I try to scare them off, they just look at me and laugh.  They have my land marked as having a lot of food so they pretty much visit me nightly.  Deer hoof prints EVERYWHERE!

In my garden in the rear, I have one of those motion activated sprinklers, and it works well.  Problem is, that is just not practical to do over large areas as you have to have a garden hose to every sprinkler, and it has to be on all the time.  Plus, they ain't cheap.

Once my trees get big enough, they'll be ok, but they are being seriously stunted because the new vegetation gets stripped as soon as a new flush is pushed out.

I have tried scent crap, it's a joke, at least everything I've tried.

Anyone know of something that is PROVEN to work?  Thank you!

This may help u.

http://ivorganics.com/product/iv-organic-3-in-1-plant-guard/#overview

This works for me from rodents chewing my mangoes trunk & some other tropical fruit trees.

Protect your investment.

(here is a video i found from iv organics)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kgJQprdMT30



« Last Edit: March 17, 2018, 01:46:26 AM by gozp »

Rannman

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Re: Ideas that work to keep deer away from my trees??
« Reply #8 on: March 17, 2018, 04:39:12 AM »
Electric fence maybe? Not overly expensive and easy to set up. I don’t have a lot of experience with deer but it’s good on nearly everything 🤔🤔🤔

pineislander

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Re: Ideas that work to keep deer away from my trees??
« Reply #9 on: March 17, 2018, 05:52:22 AM »
Many years of experience with gardening with deer in the woods of Arkansas. Run your fence with T-posts and 4 ft woven wire and then add an extra 3-4 feet of 1-1/2" PVC pipe slipped over the top of every other post. You should end up between 7-8 feet tall. Run 2 or 3 strands of wire on the PVC just take a saw and cut small slits barely through the pipe to tie the wire on you can use heavy electric fence wire. Guard the gate same way. I used 2x4 inch woven wire which excluded rabbit and armadillos too. It works very well, I call in my "Reindeer" fence. (keeps out all but Reindeer)





TREESNMORE

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Re: Ideas that work to keep deer away from my trees??
« Reply #10 on: March 17, 2018, 07:07:42 AM »
Let me know I have a crossbow permit.
Mike

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Re: Ideas that work to keep deer away from my trees??
« Reply #11 on: March 17, 2018, 09:41:38 AM »
Nice recommendations. There is a group of 4 deers that easily hop my 5ft property barb fence every night and defoliate a few of my newly planted mango  and ornamental trees before the frost. Individually protecting the young trees is expensive when it comes to 100+ trees.
The Earth laughs in flowers. And bear gifts through fruits.
No where to plant it ...but at least I got it. ;)
F*ck squirrels and deers

WGphil

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Re: Ideas that work to keep deer away from my trees??
« Reply #12 on: March 17, 2018, 10:03:23 AM »
Second the crossbow as way to bbq and not wake the neighbors you will invite to it ...

spaugh

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Re: Ideas that work to keep deer away from my trees??
« Reply #13 on: March 17, 2018, 12:21:08 PM »
I'm no tree hugger PETA member but killing every dear that gets near your fruit trees seems a bit excessive. You cant shoot 1 or 2 deer and fix the problem, more will keep coming.

Building a deer fence isnt that expensive really.  T posts are about 7$ a piece.  Tenex deer fence 7.5ft tall is around 50 cents a foot.  T post every 10 feet.  You can easily work out the cost.

The cost per acre decreases the more acres you fence in.
Brad Spaugh

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Re: Ideas that work to keep deer away from my trees??
« Reply #14 on: March 17, 2018, 02:09:13 PM »
Shoot the 4 this year ....... the savings from not buying beef at Publix for the next 12 mos will pay for the fence next year  : )

Kinda kidding ...... spaugh is prolly accurate ....... more will come

If it's only the 4 deer and they have other options for food taking one or scaring the hell out of all 4 might work.  You may just have 4 deer that have dialed in on your shmorgessboard ( spell check that please )!!

Long term though a fence is the only way ........ they drive the farmers crazy where I hunt

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Re: Ideas that work to keep deer away from my trees??
« Reply #15 on: March 17, 2018, 02:23:03 PM »
Getting a dog out of the question? My dogs are a bunch of sweethearts but chase after everything that moves. Rabbits, coyotes, people etc. One of them has a wireless electronic collar, the other won't wander off without his buddy.

Daintree

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Re: Ideas that work to keep deer away from my trees??
« Reply #16 on: March 18, 2018, 09:28:44 AM »
I'd go for a 7 ft electric fence, and use the white electric tape instead of wire.  You only need the lines of tape spaced about 30 inches apart, and then tie some strips of bird flash tape to the rows of tape. More visible that way.  Electric is handy because it is fairly cheap, and easy to remove if you ever feel that the trees are big enough (although they can be pretty acrobatic when they want to reach something). Worked great for me in Oregon to protect our apple and Asian pear trees.

Carolyn

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Re: Ideas that work to keep deer away from my trees??
« Reply #17 on: March 18, 2018, 11:28:38 AM »
Shooting deer is great and all but wont keep their extended family from eating your food.
We could have this same conversation about Pigs.
Put up a fence around your fruit tree's, Not that expensive or difficult.

pineislander

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Re: Ideas that work to keep deer away from my trees??
« Reply #18 on: March 18, 2018, 02:22:24 PM »
I'd go for a 7 ft electric fence, and use the white electric tape instead of wire.  You only need the lines of tape spaced about 30 inches apart, and then tie some strips of bird flash tape to the rows of tape. More visible that way.  Electric is handy because it is fairly cheap, and easy to remove if you ever feel that the trees are big enough (although they can be pretty acrobatic when they want to reach something). Worked great for me in Oregon to protect our apple and Asian pear trees.

Carolyn
I found with the electric fence some of the deer will get shocked and jump forward tearing up and ramming into the fence then they can get inside and I had to repair it.

Coach62

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Re: Ideas that work to keep deer away from my trees??
« Reply #19 on: March 18, 2018, 03:22:28 PM »
It's not that simple with my home, I'd have to fence my entire 2.5 acres with deer fence, including an electric gate for my driveway.  It's the only way considering how my property is laid out.  The cost of 2.5 acres of deer fence, plus the electric gate for the driveway in, PLUS I would have to clear the property line for the fence to go up, it would be  easily $40-$50K, if not considerably more.  I would really need a nice decorative iron fence and gate for the front, adding maybe $10K to that.  Remember, we are talking Naples prices here.
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Re: Ideas that work to keep deer away from my trees??
« Reply #20 on: March 19, 2018, 10:52:05 AM »
What I have done over the years was both shoot and fence. I put around deer sensitive trees  simple fence barrier. Some trees deers don't really care about so can be skipped. It isn't fool proof as bucks apparently do not care one way or the other when it comes to a tree to rub its antlers on thus destroying said tree. I have taken a lot of mango, lychee and sugar apple damage that way. But on the other hand, they wont eat those same trees. Same with loquat. The don't eat it but love to use them as a scratching post.  Trees I find they eat the hell out of are apple, citrus, plum, mulberry. Mulberry isn't a big loss, as it seems to bounce back bigger and bushier with more fruit than before, think of it as natural pruning. The other two are more disastrous as they are very slow growing. I use simple 4 foot wire fencing and try and get a good distance around the tree. To make life easier I fill the area inside the fence with mulch.

At night when I come home later I will often drive into the yard hoping not to see eyes looking back at me. When I do I go inside, grab my shotgun loaded with birdshot and go hunting. Wife calls me Elmer Fudd. Bird shot will sting them but wont penetrate their thick hide at the ranges I am shooting them. I have been hit at that range on bare skin and aside from going "ouch ouch ouch, hot hot hot" I had no other reaction except to yell at my dad for shooting in my general direction. Thankfully(or not) we have had a large group of coyote enter the neighborhood as well as more frequent panther sightings and I have seen a correlating reduction of deer sightings. Unfortunately have also lost our resident turkey population I always enjoyed watching stroll across the yard.

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Re: Ideas that work to keep deer away from my trees??
« Reply #21 on: March 19, 2018, 12:18:09 PM »
Wife calls me Elmer Fudd.
No deer around my property so no problems with them.

My wife also says Elmer Fudd is gonna get you when she notices a rodent invading my property.

I just say it's amazing how many meteor flying projectiles from space hit rodents on my property.

pineislander

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Re: Ideas that work to keep deer away from my trees??
« Reply #22 on: March 20, 2018, 06:05:01 PM »
Many years of experience with gardening with deer in the woods of Arkansas.

This was a 2 acre market garden and at one time I made my living with it so having deer would have put me out of business. I started with electric but it didn't work. When you invest time and money to see it get destroyed you learn pretty fast. If I start having pig trouble I may have to fence my 4 acres in Florida, so far so good. I was able to stop armadillos with a specialist trap. I'm able to do stuff myself and found used T-posts, recycled pipe corner posts, mixed concrete myself, it was all a one-man job, doesn't have to cost $60k.

Coach62

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Re: Ideas that work to keep deer away from my trees??
« Reply #23 on: March 20, 2018, 08:55:52 PM »
What I have done over the years was both shoot and fence. I put around deer sensitive trees  simple fence barrier. Some trees deers don't really care about so can be skipped. It isn't fool proof as bucks apparently do not care one way or the other when it comes to a tree to rub its antlers on thus destroying said tree. I have taken a lot of mango, lychee and sugar apple damage that way. But on the other hand, they wont eat those same trees. Same with loquat. The don't eat it but love to use them as a scratching post.  Trees I find they eat the hell out of are apple, citrus, plum, mulberry. Mulberry isn't a big loss, as it seems to bounce back bigger and bushier with more fruit than before, think of it as natural pruning. The other two are more disastrous as they are very slow growing. I use simple 4 foot wire fencing and try and get a good distance around the tree. To make life easier I fill the area inside the fence with mulch.

At night when I come home later I will often drive into the yard hoping not to see eyes looking back at me. When I do I go inside, grab my shotgun loaded with birdshot and go hunting. Wife calls me Elmer Fudd. Bird shot will sting them but wont penetrate their thick hide at the ranges I am shooting them. I have been hit at that range on bare skin and aside from going "ouch ouch ouch, hot hot hot" I had no other reaction except to yell at my dad for shooting in my general direction. Thankfully(or not) we have had a large group of coyote enter the neighborhood as well as more frequent panther sightings and I have seen a correlating reduction of deer sightings. Unfortunately have also lost our resident turkey population I always enjoyed watching stroll across the yard.

I agree with pretty much everything here, except 2.  1. They eat my mango blooms and fresh flush growth.  I also have been doing the fence around the sensitive trees, but it makes cutting the grass a pain in the deer.  You need to add avocado to the trees that they eat.

2. If I'm going to shoot one, it is to kill.  I would rather kill one (and of course eat it) than risk injuring one, like blinding them.  Just my opinion.

I'm going to work on getting a depredation permit, while working on other things.  It's going to take time, but I'll work on putting in motion activated sprinklers at multiple locations.  The do work, as I've found out in one of my 2 vegetable gardens.  The other one is not protected and is all but ruined.  I didn't know they eat tomatoes, but they to love the newer shoots, and yes, the tomatoes. 
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Coach62

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Re: Ideas that work to keep deer away from my trees??
« Reply #24 on: March 20, 2018, 08:58:13 PM »
Many years of experience with gardening with deer in the woods of Arkansas.

This was a 2 acre market garden and at one time I made my living with it so having deer would have put me out of business. I started with electric but it didn't work. When you invest time and money to see it get destroyed you learn pretty fast. If I start having pig trouble I may have to fence my 4 acres in Florida, so far so good. I was able to stop armadillos with a specialist trap. I'm able to do stuff myself and found used T-posts, recycled pipe corner posts, mixed concrete myself, it was all a one-man job, doesn't have to cost $60k.

I like that, and will implement it in some places, but I just can't see that between my driveway and my front yard, and it would have to connect to my house.
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