Urine is free and it seems to work for me. Refresh after rains or at least once per week. Shallow small bowls work fine if avoiding plants.

Expensive, especially as a supplement to fencing and when "free" is readily available. Also quite smelly. Use the search to pull up all the previous discussions here on deer repellents for more opinions.

Here's one: https://www.gardenweb.com/discussions/1417914/liquid-fence-deer-and-rabbit-repellent?n=14

Dave

So are you actually peeing on stuff?

I better drink some beer.

Yes pee a lot on everything around the garden. It's good fertilizer too. 17% nitrogen so pretty hot.

I switch out between moth balls, irish spring and dog hair as a deer deterrent. Deer get use to odors, so you have to switch them up every couple weeks.

I put up a 5 ft fence with horse panels then electric fence to 8 ft powered by a solar fencer.

"So are you actually peeing on stuff?

I better drink some beer."

Ha, nah, my neighbors would talk. Being a married guy I use large plastic containers (gal size such as used bleach or vinegar containers) with a funnel in the privacy of the garage. Pee is used up fast so save it up during the winter months. The smell works by depressing the deer's appetite and puts them on notice that the area is marked by some weird creature. The older the pee the weirder the creature ;-).

On the ground around, not on the plants themselves.

Dave

You can use the spray repellent on strips of toweling or other fabric and attach these to the fencing. Not terrifically pretty but it works and the fabric absorbs the scent and holds it better than if it was sprayed on the ground. Doesn't need to be reapplied nearly as often.

As to the effect of human urine, I think men like to think that they can address all manner of gardening issues with pee :-) It works better for some purposes than others.........studies done by hunters have determined that human urine really has no effect on deer one way or the other.....it certainly doesn't scare them away!!

"Research has shown, however, that the smell of human urine does not noticeably affect deer, if it affects them at all. One research project with penned deer had the researchers spraying all sorts of things into scrapes to see which deer liked best. In one case they used four things—buck urine, doe-in-estrous urine, human urine and car air freshener. Results? With bucks, doe-in-estrous was the most popular, followed by human urine, then car air freshener, then buck urine."

"So in conclusion, human urine probably won’t run most deer off, and it may even pique the curiosity of some of them."

"Penned deer" may not give adequate results as they are used to being around humans. If I forget to refresh the urine then the deer and other critter attacks increase. Also, when I use urine the deer prefer to attack my neighbors gardens over mine. This is an unscientific evaluation but it seems to work on my deer, as well as deterring other critters.

I can only attest to the fact that MY deer herd doesn't like it. They will freely browse all around the open areas of the gardens but I see them shying away from the sprayed garden areas.

Dave

Off thread. I am new here and do not know how to get back into the discussion group. HELP please.

Which discussion group?

Until you get used to it, Houzz can be a little complicated. If you go to the top of this thread (and any thread), above the title... 'Deer Repellents'... you'll see:

"GardenWeb Topics/Garden Forums/ Vegetable Gardening"

Those are 3 'links' that you can use to navigate quickly. It's kind of a filing system to tell you where you are. The first is the 'side' of the site - there are 2 main 'sides'... 'Houzz', and 'GardenWeb'. If you click on that 'GardenWeb Topics' link, you'll go to the main landing page where you can navigate all the GardenWeb forums. On the left of the page, towards the top, you'll also see (along with other choices) a link to take you to the 'Houzz' side.

The 'Garden Forums' link is a subset list of the GardenWeb forums, and will take you to a list of all the Garden Topic forums. The 'Vegetable Gardening' link is the specific forum where this thread is posted.

As you poke around, you'll see that there's a 'Houzz' side to the site, and a 'GardenWeb' side. Each has a slightly different 'feel'. But, even the GardenWeb side is divided into forums categorized into 'Home' and 'Garden'.

I should add that this is how the website is structured on a PC. I really don't know if the links are arranged exactly the same on a mobile app.

oldasrocks, I liked your peanut butter post above. I've actually got a "flag" hanging on a wire on each side of my garden. I pulled in the drive way the other night and it looked like a deer-convention going on. We see them regularly and I figured it was time to instill some respect for the garden fence for this season. So, I charged the fence battery up HOT and set out treats for them. It seems when one samples a treat they spread the word to their friends. I sure wish I had some game cameras to set out there... ;)

There is no scent that will keep them away - they figure out there is no danger fast.

I have only found one solution, and it's practical for only a small area: motion-activated water sprayers. we have 2 set up around our berry patch in our (otherwise wooded) yard. Our local deer herd browse everything to the ground except the 20 feet of berry bushes!

Well.... according to the the old farmers in my area.... hanging a fresh hide on the fence works as a fool proof deterrent. Anyhow, that's what I've always heard.

if you already have low tunnels set up then removing the row cover material and replacing it with cheap plastic deer fencing works. pollinators can get in.