Karyn

So sorry, I'm assuming you have been cleared out overnight by Bambi and Thumper of some just about to bloom or carefully nurtured over the winter plants? I'm not all soft and cuddly 'bout these varmints! It's been war for me from the start. My biggest varmint is the teeny tiny vole.

What did ya lose?

Karyn, I hope they didn't destroy a lot of plants! My problem here are gophers and squirrels, oh yeah, and the kids from the neighboring school!

Karyn....sometimes (a lot of the times!!...it's like
fighting a loosing battle with the little varmits. I
TRUELY, TRUELY hate groundhogs with a passion because
they (he's) eaten every one of my flagstaff marigolds
and zinnias that I winter sowed and planted out. He
just turned his nose up at my repellant. :):) Then...
there are the voles. OH WELL!! Try the Liquid Fence
spray for the deer. Good luck.

Margaret

I forgot to mention the tree rats (squirrels). My fuzzy friends devoured hostas, figs, blueberries, sunflowers, hollyhocks, sedums, morning glories, and a bunch of other stuff last night. I have a good mix that keeps them away when I remember to apply it. lol We've had such heavy rains so often that it needs to be reapplied more then every 10 days and I keep forgetting. I have an ugly 4' chicken wire fence around a small side garden and that's about the only plants that weren't chomped. It looks really ugly so I won't use it where it would be visible. The electric fence at the farm works great but that's not an option at the house. We love watching the deer get zapped. We coat aluminum pie pans with peanut butter and attach them to the hot wires. Deer just love peanut butter. Jeez I sound like such a sadist but Bambi and Thumper are really pissing me off!
Karyn

"We love watching the deer get zapped. We coat aluminum pie pans with peanut butter and attach them to the hot wires."

once again karyn, as you know, I love you.

Ria

Karyn,
So sorry to hear the little creatures have hit you where it hurts. I have heard it is because they are hungry or thirsty! Not true! I keep an aviary of over 60 parrots so my critters have some of the finest tropical seed and dried friuts available at all times and they still destroy things.
I have some things I can share with you if any of yours need replacing.

This part is kind of funny, but I planted lots of passie's which I know are butterfly food sources, but then I resented them eating my passies down to nubs...... where is my logic? I must say though, I do enjoy chasing them around with cameras.
Linda (TOL)

Wow 60 parrots! I'd love to see some pics. My one little lovebird drives me crazy. I'm not sure how I'd deal with 60 parrots. lol What kinds do you have? They are beautiful. DH has a customer that keeps exotic birds in his greenhouse. They are all really tame and well trained but tear everything up anyway. They really are destructive. There's no way that the local critters are hungry or thirsty. They just hate me. lol It's not even like the area where I live is overdeveloped. I'm surrounded on 3 sides by acres of protected park land.
Karyn

I was just about to post and ask suggestions for something to plant in my pots at the shop that they won't eat. I always forget about them and as soon as I let my guard down they come in for the buffet. Last night they ate my knockout rose to the stems. They neighborhood above the shop is filled with deer and everyone up there used to feed them and they would eat out of your hands. Well the stupid city council banned feeding them so now they are are really hungry and we are in a drought so I feel sorry for them. Every so often I plant stuff at the shop and they leave it alone for a while then one night bam its gone, lol.

Linda, 60 parrots??!!! A friend had one parrot and that was loud, can't imagine 60! They must be beautiful though.

Kristy, I just read up on the New Zealand flax and it said it is deer resistant, drought resistant. I could send you a start for one of your pots at the shop if you like (email me directly).

I also hate deer when I get the camera going I will post a pic of what they did to two trees out of a row of six didnt eat off all just two.

Thanks Eloise. I sent you an email. I need something to keep in a pot in a car shaped planter next to the door. I hope they didn't bother anything else last night. I have to bring the rose home today so it can recover, lol.

Post pictures of your car planter. I have a hanging truck planter. We just keep it empty.

Linda

Here it is with the ate up rose, lol.

{{gwi:498539}}

Have you tried using milorganite to repel the deer?

I'm using it this year in much greater quantities than I have in the past and it seems to be working.

I have lots of deer traffic and I've been finding ways to outsmart them over the last few years.

One thing I've been doing is watching their pathways and routes in and out of my yard. They are very habitual and if you can mess with their routes early in the spring it helps alot!

They always jump my fence in the same place. So I had an old 4x8 section of re-mesh the kind used for concrete. I have it laid in the grass right where they jump the fence. I've placed it on top of a few pieces of wood so it actually sits about 4-6 inches off the ground. When I go to mow the lawn it moves out of the way very easily and when its down on the ground you can barely see it.

Since I've done this the deer don't jump over the fence in that spot anymore. I think trying to walk over the re-mesh gets them all tripped up. I will be doing this all along my fence line soon.

Good luck.

My wife loves to feed the birds. Well, last night I set four traps for mice and all were 'filled' this morning. Gotta get more traps! Yes, we have deer too, and rabbits and chipmunks and who knows what else that we aren't seeing.

I tried bagging apples this year. It's our first year in the house and we have an apple tree. I read that if you thin out each cluster of apples to one, attach a sandwich bags to it, the moths can't get at them to lay eggs and it keeps them worm-free. Great! Now I have these perfect apples that are developing and I'm finding them all over the yard half-eaten by squirrels. I guess this is why produce is so expensive in the stores!

Have your tried tying an onion sack sort of thing around the cluster of fruit? They can get air circulation but his helps keep birds from pecking and such or throw a net over the whole tree. My whole crop of pomegranated got ruined last year. The deer come to shop down a steep rocky slope at the back of the property. They don't come there very often. Just when I have something tasty planted, lol.

It's quite a large tree. Couldn't squirrels chew thru an onion sack? You'd need a wire mesh 'bag' of some sort. And it would have to extent beyond the stem of the fruit, since the squirrels chew thru the stem to drop the fruits. Some kind of little wire spherical basket with two halfs that can be clasped shut would work. Hmm, how much would that cost? Back to Safeway for fruit, I guess.

Oh, duh, I must have missed the part about squirrels, lol. I was thinking bugs and birds. I see people with pieces of aluminum foil tied all through the fruit trees but I don't know what its supposed to scare off, lol. I just planted some spider lilly bulbs yesterday and guess what there are empty holes there now. I guess my squirrels struck again too dangit. I found some bulbs in one bed the other day that I didn't plant there. I wonder if they are taking them from one place and burying them somewhere else?

The chipmunks here dig stuff up and the squirrels carry it off and bury it. I have bulbs coming up in places I know I didn't plant them. I've tried tying bags around my figs but the tree rats chew through them. I hung bells on the branches, nothing works. I might try spreading some Tanglefoot along the top railing of the fence because they are using that to get into the fig trees. They just jump from the fence into the tree. They love figs, even the unripe ones. If I'm lucky I'll have a dozen left per tree by the time they are ripe.
Karyn

I wonder if we have chipmunks here? We used to have them at the shop and I liked watching them play but they disappeared about a year ago. Never seen them here at the house but Its possible. The squirrels must not like pomegranates. Thats the only fruit tree I have but the bugs and birds took care of those for me. I didn't get a single one that didn't have a hole in it, lol.

ewwww tonight on my way home there was a family of skunks about 8 of them crossing the road, cars were slamming on breaks, that could have been so nasty!!!

Mary

I love skunks! They are so cute and make great pets (descented of course). They are pretty much like a house cat and can be trained to use the litter box. The one bad thing is they are destructive and try to dig up the floor. If they weren't now illegal in MD I'd definitely have a couple.

Kristy we've had chipmunks living under the deck since we've lived here. For the first 17 years it was only a couple and they didn't cause any problem but over the past 4 years there's been a population explosion and they are everywhere. I have no explanation for the sudden change. All I know is that I used to enjoy watching them. Now they just get me angry. The worst was finding a dead one in the pond. Ewwwww!!!!!!
Karyn

I know I would see those same few in the moning and John would toss them some leftover bread from his breakfast and they would scamper around and play all morning then leave for the day and one day they were just gone. we started having a lot of cats coming around the shop so I think they hunted them all and ate them. I wasn't growing any thing then but wouldn't want them in my yard no matter how cute, lol.

When I was a teenager, my mother thought chipmunks were cute. My Aunt next door cut down on the amount of cats & Mom was feeding them (the tree rats). The next thing we knew, there were chipmunks EVERYWHERE. Dozens of them, digging up all the bulbs & everything we planted. Emptying all the bird feeders. Running & playing & most of all multiplying. My Uncles were poisoning, trapping & shooting them until they finally got down to a manageable number. In later years, I had a Sheltie who thought it was her job to be on chipmunk patrol & she took it very seriously & kept them away. My Newf isn't that excited over such a small mouthfull but we have an Eskie who likes organic dog toys (mice & such are organic cat toys).

Linda

I love that, organic cat and dog toys. lol My cats are strictly indoor pets and my dog doesn't scare anything except strangers and that's just because she looks mean. She's really a great big creampuff. Unfortunately the critters have the run of the yard. They only scatter when we're outside and even then the squirrels are pretty bold.
Karyn

I am worried about my dogs killing and eating the wild critters since we have rabid animals reported at least once a summer and people that poison the wildlife. My dogs get their shots but I don't want to take any chances. Mercedes got so sick she nearly died a couple of years ago and the xrays showed small animal bones so she must have eaten something that died of poison. I try to keep them from eating them now.

Deer is good eats. You fed 'em, now eat 'em!