Jeanie, Deer can and will eat daylilies, although in our yard, they normally don't. Usually, if it is deer, they are eating only the young buds and not the foliage. Other animals that eat daylilies are rabbits and possums. Rabbits can stand up on their hindlegs and reach a pretty good height, so it might be them if you don't have a fence that's a least 2' tall around the daylily bed. We seldom have them go over a 2' tall chicken wire fence to get to flowers. Possums eat daylilies as well.

Not all deer are the same either. Some will eat a given type of plant and others won't.

Dawn

Dawn,
AHA! I THOUGHT I had read somewhere that deer would eat daylilies, but this is the first time it has happened, and they DID just eat the young buds. Had no idea that rabbits and possums would eat them. No fence, as this is an island bed and would look a little weird with a fence in the middle of the yard. They did not pay a return visit last night, so here's hoping, as I have lots of varieties of daylilies, and they are budding heavily now. As always, thank you for your info. You are like reading a good gardening book. By the way, my son's name is Tim as is your DH.

Jeanie

Jeanie,

If there is anything at all that I have experience with, it is deer. We have a herd that has lived on our land for generations and we carefully avoid the places on our property where they like to hang out and bed down because we don't want to scare them away.

Normally, in a drought year, the deer will eat a lot of things they don't normally eat. So, you might see them eat your buds in drought years but not in so-called 'normal' years....not that I have any idea what kind of weather passes for normal weather in Oklahoma. We're only in our 13th year here, so I haven't observed it long enough to understand what's normal weather and what is weird weather. Some years it all seems weird.

I have put up chicken wire fences at various times to protect new beds or new plants while they become established. Then, even after I take down the fence, the wildlife still seems to avoid it...almost like they think the fence is still there. Our property sits back 300' from the road though, so no one driving by can see my oddly placed and unattractive wildlife fences, and my friends are used to my weirdness.

Tim is a pretty common name for guys of a certain age, I guess. We have three Tims on our volunteer fire department, and they all have nicknames so we know which Tim we're talking about at any given time. Otherwise, it gets too crazy. Two of our Tims are father and son, so their nicknames include the words 'Big' and 'Little'. It probably isn't fun being the one called 'Little' because he's not little....just younger than the other two Tims.

Dawn

I love deer, too, so try not to discourage their visits. I NEVER hurt anything, even when it is being a pest. I'm learning to try to remove temptation out of harm's way (such as bringing in my bird feeders at night, and keeping locking lids on my trash cans, etc.), because I so enjoy the gentle wildlife around me, and have had only minimal damage to my plants. After all, I moved into THEIR territory, not the reverse.
My Tim is 41 yrs. old. I'm as old as dirt. HA.

Jeanie

Jeanie - I have a friend in MS that has planted Rosemary intermingled around ANYTHING that she doesn't want deer to eat. They live rural around Starkville. It's worked for her the last 2 years. Maybe this might help? It's a pretty plant and you can use it in cooking too!

Paula

Paula,
Thanks for the Rosemary hint. What a great idea! Did not know you could use it for a repellent. I love the fragrance, so this is not a sacrifice to include it among my plantings........

Jeanie

Jeanie,

We don't hurt anything as long as it isn't hurting us. Well, the exception is venomous snakes. We let them roam freely on the rest of the 14.4 acres, but if they're on the 2 acres around the lawn, gardens, house, garage, barn, shed or chicken coops, we shoot them. We also shoot anything that kills one of our animals,and shoot any skunk out in the daytime. We try to keep all our animals in predator-proof housing, but it is hard to keep them safe 100% of the time.

We tried to have a strict 'no kill' policy and all that meant was that all our domestic animals kept dying and the wildlife lived. We have too much wildlife, much more than we had the first few years. I think that when they built the Winstar Casino and all the surrounding development at Thackerville, all the wildlife migrated in our direction because we probably have 4 times as many wild critters as we used to.

Dawn

Dawn,
I live alone and don't own a gun (although, I'm considering getting a pistol), so don't shoot anything, yet, but wouldn't hesitate to lop off a snake's head if it ventured close to the house. I think the coyotes got my favorite cat a couple of years ago, and no doubt, I would have waded into the midst of the pack, if I had seen it happen! Yes. Anything threatening I would definitely go after, and that includes the two-legged critters, also.

Jeanie