LOL! I've been so lucky not to have to deal with deer ... if I did, I'd be just as frustrated as you are. Poor Yuccas!

Go get 'em, Mara! Report back. :D

Have you tried that orange plastic fencing? Of course, I have no clue how much enough of that would cost.

Actually some fence post , I have and some of that netting, not orange thank god. Aw hell. I will just throw a wad of that tangled up netting up there with the rest of the stuff.

My Yuccas are big enough to defend themselves. Can't get near those things without getting pricked.

What about tying on some balloons. Will that scare the deer away?

Can you cover the blooms with bird netting?

I really like the balloon suggestion. LOL big time. And gdpossehl, that is exactly why I bought this guy. He was smaller when I bought him I figured the deer couldn't get to it.. My land came with the rupicolas, gobs and gobs of them, and they are pretty when those small rosettes throw an 8' bloom, muchless three in a small area.. I like those Yucca arkanasana and Y harrimaniae, but they are even smaller and I sure wasn't going to spend money to feed the deer..

I am sitting here giggling like an idiot, wantonamara....the on going battle with the deer. My Mom and Dad had a place on Lake Travis for years and it was never ending. Our new house is in an infill subdivision in Cedar Park and I thought ok, no deer. HA!! We drove by the lot the other night after dark and there were about 8 head at the end of our street. So, it will be interesting to see what they do to our new yard. I feel your frustration!!!

A lot of people FEED the deer , especially in developments. I have a development near me and there are large roving gangs of them and the yards are stripped bare, but you see the deer feeders out. I just want to make sausage out of them.

HAHAHAHA!!! Well, with the feral hogs roaming everywhere, we could make sausage...I have a grinder and stuffer. I like to see the babies, but I like baby everything. I don't feed the deer, never have. I just don't want them eating my yard and pooping on the sidewalk and bringing the ticks. But I'm a country girl and I've seen plenty of them in my life. So a neighborhood sausage party anyone???

I've been spreading light dustings of Milorganite granules (a sludge byproduct) around my yuccas. The fertilizer's smell does a pretty good job of keeping deer off my lawn and, so far, has kept them away from the yuccas which are in full bloom. It would probably take regular application - maybe every three weeks?

Thanks... I will pick up a bag next trip into town. These guys will be the most fertilized yuccas around. LOL I will experiment with another group of yucca.. These will keep the barricade.

At a talk by Michael Shoup, he suggested an idea that sounds pretty simple & cheap, esp. if you have scrap wire around: lay chicken wire on the ground, slightly raised with 2x2s or whatever. Ground cover plants will disguise it & deer are reluctant to step on it.

Good luck!

(say, were you looking for nierembergia Starry Eyes? I saw some at Rainbow Gardens)

You think you are mad! I'm spitting nails over the stupid deer. The have eaten so many of my glad and DLs blooms. Deer were not a problem when I had a big black Labrador but I can no longer keep a large dog. They chase the yippee dogs we now keep.

i put tomato cages around precious plantings. The could stick their mouth through and munch, but as posted above, they will move on to plants easier to destroy. So yes, any kind of barricade will deter deer.

This is my little yard muncher. :D I was having coffee on the back patio this morning when some friends joined me--

Awww, we never see bunnies here. The deer have only eaten a few plants, lucky I suppose.

Milorganite has kept the browsing to a minimum on my row of limelights out front. Although, it may just be the time of year. Plenty of other preferred greens to eat as opposed to the fall when they were picked bare. I like the chicken wire idea.

Pkponder beware! If they sense tolerance they will be by your front door, Staring back at you, as they munch on your precious plantings, I'm not kidding.

I just burst out laughing reading that. (sorry) Its just that I was telling my husband today that Mara calls these deer asparagus. I told you about that newly ID'ed king-sized version of hesperaloe on the Natives Forum--my first thought was how the deer wouldn't be able to reach the top flowers 8ft up but I bet they'd just bite that stem in half and eat it no problem crunching it all the way down to the leaves in about 2 minutes.

Laugh all you like TxR. Laughter is all one has left sometimes. It is really irritating when the deer clip them in half and then walk off deeming them to tough to eat. That really gets me going for the guns.. They have gotten the hesperaloe flowers before. and the whole manfredas down to the root..

"going for the guns."

There's your solution. Fill your freezer with deer sausage.

In truth, "burst out laughing" was an exaggeration. Its just computer speak such as LOL or ROFL, you know the person didn't actually roll on the floor laughing or even laugh out loud most of the time. Computer isn't real life. Is it?

It was the timing and coincidence that got me because I'd just had the exact thought not 2 hours before reading the post. I get real upset when a plant I'm watching or care about gets injured or killed. I can relate. I even get upset when those beetles chomp the stems of my liatris and they die in the middle leaving the top shriveled.

I really wish "going for the guns" was a legal solution in my case. My county prohibits the discharge of ANY weapon within 1k feet of a residence--which is basically nowhere. I even checked if spear hunting was an option, but no dice. You're not even supposed to let your dogs go after them, but I don't think these domestic deer are even afraid of dogs. I had a deer square up on my 85lb dog that was creeping up on a buck to induce a chase. I called him back to avoid any confrontation.

Mara, I actually got 2 of mine to bloom this year but only with constant sprayings of "I Must Garden" deer spray. they got my red yucca and my dyckia. it also helps that the 2 that bloomed sent their spikes into the native persimmons above it.

OK now, I found one Y. rupicola blooming 8' up in a cedar tree.It is playing hide and seek with the deer. I took the cages away from mu yucca spears by the house. The blooms are starting to open. I hope to get some photos if the sun ever comes out.

I took the cages away yesterday after deciding that they were to tough . Well , Last night they struck a clump that was 8' away from my protected clump so I put the cages back. There are two stalks gotten here and one was deemed too tough for consumption after destruction. AARGH!

awww, destructive beasts!

Electric fence charger from Tractor Supply has proven to be the best chaser offer I've tried. Can't use it if kids roam the property. No need to set up an elaborate fence,just ground the charger and hang wire where deer,hog or what ever will come in contact. Scare's the living bejeebers out of any thing that touch's it. They have some that are battery or solar powered which saves stringing extension cords.

We had a electric fence and the deer just jumped over it.

That's why I don't try fenceing them out,booby trap suprises seem to work better. I have an idea that might let you catch them in the act so you can unleash on them. A few years ago I realized someone was going inside our rv parked in back. Courosity wouldn't alow me taking the easy way and lock the door so I devised a plan. I moved the driveway alert to rv door and reciever hooked to bedside buzzer. A few nights later buzzer went off and I tippy toed out to rv with shotgun and flashlight. One of the kids,now a married man said he was thankful it was me instead of the girl's dad holding the gun.

Klem, that's a funny story! Mara, a single wire electric fence kept the deer away from my roses in the front yard for years. The 'secret' is to make sure they touched the electric fence. As recommended we put peanut butter on strips of aluminum foil and attached them to the wire. It seems that once it's licked is all it takes -- for deer anyway. A squirrel was much more persistent and went into all kinds of gyrations to try to get the peanut butter, but it finally gave up.

OK, I did get 3 flowers out of my actions, but between all the rain, wind, cloudy skies, growing between three trees, they did not grow how I would have liked, but bloom they did. I consider it a success. I so wanted them to be straight and nice but they grow too tall and thin. I had to stake them up but the stakes are a little short and ill done. I will have them for a few days if the deer stay away. My friend and his son came by and shot off their guns for three hours. Maybe that bought me a week of peace. That's not asking too much, is it?

Before staking

And you can see, it is pretty overgrown out there. Don't worry, Next winter will be a dry La Niña and the grass and plants will be short and brown. I wonder when the faucet gets turned off. Maybe we should do a contest . I just hope it is AFTER September.

i use liquid fence and spray their favorite plants sprayed it once a week at first after a couple of months i went to every two weeks and after a year and 8 months i spray about every three weeks i grow mostly roses, daylilies, salvia and herbs the deer pretty much stay away from the herbs, no spraying there but the roses and day lilies have to be sprayed the stuff stinks to high heaven, so i spray in the evening and by daylight the odor is totally gone it takes about 15 minutes and just a light misting from the pump up sprayer .... i keep it at least half full trees which they like mostly for rubbing those antlers on we have to keep surrounded by wire cages til they can handle the "action" this plan works great for me there are 9 deer in my backyard right now lying down in the shade less than 50 feet from the roses.....