UGC Reader Question: How Do You Banish Bambi And Thumper From the Garden?
By Vanessa Richins
An UGC reader asks:
“Suspecting an Obama win my husband and I decided months ago to planta garden this year. Already a fan of your blog I’ll look forward to checking in and learning as much as I can on how to proceed. Big question, though: How to keep the critters away? We have at least 15 deer grazing on our lawn every day, not to mention a dozen rabbits.”
Good question - but unfortunately there isn’t an easy answer. Both deer and rabbits can be pretty persistent, though there are ways to try to foil them.
A book I suggest reading is Deerproofing Your Yard & Garden
by Rhonda Massingham Hart. She discusses the nature of deer, what damages they cause, ways to design a deerproof garden, deterrents, and fences.
For example, her basic principles for Deer-O-Scaping (as she calls it) are:
1) Avoiding the use of plants deer love
2) Choosing plants you love and deer don’t
3) Combining deer-resistant plants with deer-resistant garden designs
You may need to take out plants if you have noticed that they especially like a certain one. You may also need to put in a fence.
You could also try repellents. Some she names are: scented bar soaps, human hair, garlic and rotten eggs, chicken feathers, ammonia, fish fertilizers, fabric softener strips, blood meal, peppermint spray, predator urine, hot pepper spray, or scarecrows.
As for rabbits - a lot of the same may repel them, or a fence would help. They are hard to deter - my folks have lost a lot of their lawn this past year due to bunny visits.
I wish you luck, and hopefully your library has this helpful book.
November 10th, 2008 at 2:52 am
What is the connection between Obama and gardening?
November 10th, 2008 at 9:24 am
My friends and I just send hubbies and older teenage sons out to pee around the perimeter under cover of dark. If you try this in the daytime, the neighbors will complain. It’s a cheap source of predator urine (we are the top of the food chain, after all), unless you have to feed your hubby a whole lot of beer to get him to do it :).
November 10th, 2008 at 1:20 pm
An old Lakota trick was to put hair clippings in the garden. Tahca (Deer) do not like human hair.
November 10th, 2008 at 4:33 pm
I’ve never heard of that book before, but those are definitely the best concepts for deer-resistant gardening. I’ll see if the library has it!
November 19th, 2008 at 9:29 pm
Pee and hair!
Well, it does make sense, but I never would have thought of it!
Rabbits are a real problem. Chicen wire fence, and chicken wire below so they cannot dig. lot of work!
I have enjoyed your blog.
Best,
Philip