No, all roses are deer candy. Sellers are always pushing deer resistant perennials and roses. Some plants deer just don't like. For instance, nothing eats my many penstemon, not deer, rabbits, voles, etc. It must taste awful to the critters. Same with Jupiter's Beard and snapdragons, though a rabbit hanging out in our yard tried some Jupiter's Beard leaves, and it looked like he spit it all out. He never tried Jup's again. Hahaha, rabbit. I do think deer prefer big, many petaled blooms over single petaled, and maybe a rose's scent occasionally attracts a deer. I have good luck with a commercial deer repellent. We live in the desert hills where the deer are rampant, and there are plenty of rabbits, rodents, and coyotes. I don't even have a fence, but faithful application of repellent (it's food based), and many huge blockades of shrubs, trees, and many feet of lavender barrier also help with the deer. Diane

@Diane Brakefield thank you! This is why I grow so much Cistus - deer don't touch it! Supposedly Rugosas and Moss roses aren't as interesting to deer, but I have both in my garden and my creative deer did eat them yet left Mrs. B. R. Cant alone.

I've already made changes to the fence that will keep this very skilled deer out, but I'm left with insane curiosity why the huge multi-petaled flowers of Mrs. B. R. Cant were left untouched.

Were the blooms of Mrs BR Cant higher than your other roses? Deer are lazy and I've found they eat the easiest to reach blooms, and kind of proceed in a line down the rose beds eating at the same level. If your smaller roses were at nose level, and the deer wasn't especially hungry, they might have avoided the extra "work" of Mrs BR Cant. Diane

I grow Rosa Rugosa and Rosa Rugosa Alba at the front of my shop in my back yard. The deer won't touch them. I also grow Allias (SP?) scattered around the garden. The deer avoid my main garden now. They don't like the onion smell at all. I've seen deer walking up and down the street and they avoid my yard.

@Diane - no, the B.R. Cant roses are right at deer mouth height, and also above and below. They are large roses, easy to reach, and yet none were touched.

@Ken Wilkinson that is very interesting. The deer do seem less interested in the rugosas and your observation about the onion smell is a good one! Do you mean allium, like a decorative type?

@fig_insanity Z7b E TN yep, that's how it goes with the deer! But why would they skip this one particular rose? My garden is almost exclusively roses mixed with hardy fuchsia, there are no strong smelling herbs or placement that would deter deer.

My humble opinion...the varmint just got distracted at the right moment, lol.

There aren't any roses that are immune to deer feeding damage that I know of. I have seen desperate White Tail Deer eat Blue Princess Holly leaves and the leaves of Yucca filamentosa during winter. Fences here must be 9' tall to keep them out. The large local public rose garden/arboretum not far frkm me, fenced in their entire 3.5 acres in 9' chain link. A large, healthy buck can leap over an 8' fence, no deer smaller nor less fit can do this.

The developing green rose buds are eaten with great relish, then the tenderest lower growth comes next. In the suburbs and more wooded parts of the city here, deer are extremely destructive. Repellents are useless. Even putting out strongly pungent soap bars to discourage them doesn't work. They will eat the soap bars.

A six foot high solid fence, such as the much used cedar boards will keep all deer out. Deer will not jump over an obstacle that they cannot see where they will land on the obstacles other side. Smart cookies.

I remember when before the 9' chain link fence was installed (painted black to keep it as unobtrusive as possible), a stout, but flexible, black plastic netting was initially installed on the 9' high post and rail preliminary fencing. This was done as a test. In the late evening, small herds of deer could be seen walking along the outside perimeter of the flexible plastic netting. They would push into the netting with their heads to test its strength and search out possible access points to the roses.

The plastic netting did work at first, but mischievous teens cut openings through the netting to make shortcuts through the arboretum/rose garden, rather then walk around it. The decision was made to go chain link which solved the problem.

Without fencing there would be not one single bloom in the entire garden of ~1,200 rose bushes.

Moses.

@fig_insanity Z7b E TN maybe that's the moment I came around the corner yelling :-)

@Moses, Pitt PA, cold W & hot-humid S, z6 you are right, the fencing is key and I have about 1/4 acre in deer fencing. It's kept all deer out (and we used to have quite a problem) until this creative little three legged deer figured out a way to get through my gate. That is fixed and she hasn't been back inside a couple of months, thankfully!

I like to share my property with deer - all I ask is they leave the fenced area alone. There are other roses that are outside the fence, many nice fruit trees, but you can see that the deer really really want the roses as their #1 food!

Of course, ElfRosa,

They have the equivalent of Brussels Sprouts , fresh and delectable... and at a conveniently placed height! No wonder does routinely have twins.

Moses.

@Moses, Pitt PA, cold W & hot-humid S, z6 if they bring the cute baby twins along for the snacking, I might even open the gate for them! :-)

Elfrosa, I agree that soaps, cat pee balls from the cat box, and solid repellents of any kind are useless, but I have had great results with Deer Out repellent I buy from Amazon in the bottle of concentrate and then dilute with water. Our deer here in the arid West are big Mule Deer. Maybe white tail deer react differently. Try this concentrate. It's not cheap, but makes a ton of repellent. Diane

What fig_insantiy said about "deer resistant" roses.

If I have a newly planted/rooted baby rose, we put a "tomato cage" around it, and spray the rose and the cage with commercial deer repellant (the kind which smells like rotten eggs, but is not toxic). That works (it needs to be renewed if it rains, but luckily for us it does NOT RAIN here for 6 months every summer) until the rose is tall enough so that our short mule deer cannot reach the top of it without getting up on their hind legs, which they are too lazy (and not hungry enough) to do. Climbing roses are the best.

Jackie

YES, YES, YES what @fig_insanity Z7b E TN is spot on and discovered through experience. NO rose, and nearly NO plant is immune from Bambi grazing (or Thumper, or any other rodent (rat, squirrel, etc.) not to mention horses, sheep, cows, goats, etc. EXTREMELY strong scents tend to deter grazing because all of these plant eaters share one basic characteristic...their smell is their RADAR, their prime self defense characteristic. They generally avoid EXTREMELY scented plants, no matter what the scent, because if all they can smell is the plant, they can't smell the coyote, wolf or YOU. Yes, you can TRY surrounding your rose with dense plantings of lavender, rosemary, santolina, etc. and it MAY deter SOME of them for a while, but if they're hungry enough, they'll eat. Heavily fuzzy foliage such as Lamb's Ears, are usually rather resistant as they require water to wash down, being gummy to chew. The critter is getting much of their water FROM the vegetation they eat. Grazing fuzzy stuff requiring standing water to drink to wash down is counter productive.

When I worked in The Palisades, we had a customer whose back yard was enclosed on three sides. The fourth had to remain open for fire dept access and the deer paraded down that alley every night to eat roses. We planted a dense, TALL hedge of rosemary on either side of the access path so they HAD to walk down the 20 or so feet of oppressive rosemary to get a snack. They stayed out.

Another HEAVILY applied blood meal (VERY EXPENSIVE, and HIGHLY offensive stench) all over the accesses to his roses religiously. NOTHING entered there because Nature knows the scent of blood and that usually means SOMETHING has eaten SOMEONE recently and they avoid the "diner". But, it became too much for his wife and friends so he eventually saved a lot of money by going with other deterrents. His grass was sure green, though!

Another had the room to build three concentric, four foot high fences around their rose garden, about four feet apart. A deer can jump high but not all that far and they see the multiple rings of lovely things upon which to catch their dainty hooves and usually avoid it. They KNOW they will stumble and fall and that puts them in extreme vulnerability.

We had very good success ridding one garden from deer with a motion activated sprinkler. Start with a brand new hose to ensure strength and set the faucet at a trickle. If something goes wrong, you don't want a $1,000 water bill before you discover the problem. Pressure will build until the deer, a dog, cat, rabbit, YOU or your spouse breaks the beam and receives a VERY startling high pressure squirt of cold water. The homeowner received a rather large number of them as she'd forget it was there and trigger it, but it eventually sufficiently startled the deer and he sought greener (and drier) pastures. I'm sure he didn't what was attacking him but SOMETHING was and it scared him. That's the goal.

An impenetrable 12' - 15' high chain link fence with a locking gate works wonders. Even then, you would be surprised at just how resourceful these hoofed rats can be. One they discover a way in, they go back continuously until something stops them

All of these herbivores (except the domesticated ones) avoid vulnerability like the plague, unless they're starving. If you have a rose which remains untouched, it's because standing there eating it meant the varmint felt exposed, or had too few or too narrow escape routes to use.

One of the eventual most effective deterrents are the Repellex Systemic Tablets: These use capsaicin (hot pepper). Once absorbed by the roots, it travels to the foliage and stems. When a deer takes a bite, the fiery flavor immediately deters them. (from Google) They used to rely upon a nasty chemical which would absorb QUICKLY into YOUR bare hands and you'd taste the heavily metallic flavor for many days. It won't wash off. Handle anything systemic with gloves...leather, chemical resistant, whatever stuff won't quickly and easily soak through.

Or, you can chicken out and move where there are NO deer, rabbits, squirrels, etc. I don't miss ANY of them even a little.

@roseseek thank you for this very detailed summary! This would be a great comment to end up as a featured answer, since it contains so much information and lots of options for those who are struggling with deer damage in their gardens.

I'm thinking about setting out a rose bouquet for Bambi to see if she eats all of it or rejects some of it. That would be the ultimate test, right? I could even set it up in front of a camera so I can see which are her favorites.

Mostly I'm just glad so many of my roses are very ramblers and the deer can't reach them!

You're welcome, @ElfRosa, but that probably won't provide accurate information. What if he was nearly full when he began and didn't eat some he traditionally ate? The most common reason they DON'T eat something is usually something interrupted them or otherwise spooked them causing them to stop feeding.

There are NO roses that are immune to Deer browsing. If you discover that they have neglected to eat one or two of your roses, it's just a coincidence. They're probably just saving it for next time.

@roseseek that might be true, but it would be interesting to see which roses would be selected first and do be able to observe those prefererences on camera. Which one is the broccoli and which one is the chocolate cake? :-)

• @ElfRosa perhaps with enough perfectly identical repetitions some preferences may be inferred but usually, when someone has mentioned "deer don't touch that rose" it turns out to be the most exposed plant offering more perceived danger to the animal or the one from which quick, easy, unobstructed escape is less possible. Smell and ease of escape are their main defense mechanisms and they KNOW it instinctively.

@roseseek you're right, but if my non-scientific animal behavior trial reveals that some of my roses are generally less interesting and could maybe be moved to the exterior of my deer fencing, I'd be very happy. It's getting a little crowded in here! :-)

I was talking to someone today about deer and roses, and he casually mentioned that Elk can also be a problem and they are a LOT taller than deer, so yikes.

@ElfRosa just put the ones you've moved past out there. The varmints are going to eat all of them easily accessible. Would you believe moose also eat them? They DO. Friends couldn't figure out what was eating their climbers they planted around their horse corral along their road. I didn't even have to look, "HORSES". They were incredulous. Sure enough, they watched and one horse in particular, made a bee line directly to the climbers when turned out to the corral. He LOVED them. The horses don't worry about predators as they are secure you're watching out for them so they'll eat them anywhere they can access them. If an animal eats plants, it WILL eat roses. I read eons ago the form of sugar in the rose sap is the same as table sugar. I'm sure animals can taste that. I know they taste bitter and avoid it. Bitter traditionally indicates toxicity, so they instinctively don't eat bitter.

@roseseek outside the deer fence is generally where I put the teeny tiny flowered roses and the inexpensive landscape roses, and any damage they get is pretty minor. I haven't seen elk or moose yet, though - I guess in that case only the 30 ft ramblers will survive!! A friend of mine who lives nearby posted some video of the mountain beaver on her property a couple of days ago - I guess I'm lucky I don't have them around, as they could mow down canes of any height all the way to the ground!

My grandmother's horse Chubby would eat any rose she could reach over the fence. It was amazing how far she could reach, and she wasn't that tall.

The extensive gardens and orchards around my grandmother's ranch house were not deer-fenced at all. They were protected, however, by the yard dogs, a strategy not yet mentioned. However, you have to have the right kind of dog and a well-trained one at that. Chubby, of course, wasn't bothered by the dogs.

@catspa_zone9sunset14 dogs would be great preventative, as long as you live where they can remain off leash. I think most of us don't, but a good yard dog where appropriate should be a wonderful protector of roses.

My little three-legged friend was out there today (outside the rose garden fence) so I selected a hearty Mrs. B. R. Cant flower and left it in her path. What happened next is best illustrated in photos :-)

Surprise twist! She gave birth a few hours later

I hate to say it's adorable But it is! I guess she has to feed her baby.

It really is quite adorable! I put out a bucket of water and a few roses as a "welcome baby" gift, I think we are stuck with her now :-)

With that treatment I think you'll be seeing Generational

No photo yet, but her efforts doubled - it's twins!