The Garden
Freesteading group focused on the discussion of gardening.
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Deer fence
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Deer fence
Hello just curious if anyone has had luck using fishing line as a deer fence for their garden. I watched a couple videos and could see where it might work. I always welcome first hand experience more. I planted a larger than normal garden this fall. So still new to the fall part of gardening other than turnips.
In the spring and summer I make a pepper juice and apply it to the plants. It keeps them from bothering it really good.
My problem now, is a herd of several deer are hanging around and have eaten most of my peas, cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower, turnips, carrots, collard and turnip greens since yesterday evening. It went that fast and what was left, I applied the pepper juice this evening. I don’t mind sharing as I plant a little extra for them to eat. But eating almost everything is a bit too much. So now considering a fence. I hate to start hunting them as my neighbor’s wife likes to feed them in their pasture. They have been gone lately and with the drought we are in in North Georgia this might explain why they are turning to my garden.
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23 Replies
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I’m no expert on this or anything but I’d be careful of using such a fine line like fishing line. Deer may have trouble seeing it and could get badly tangled in it.
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Hello All -I saw MIGardener do that in one of his videos so I had to give it a try. NOTHING stopped the deer this year. I started with fishing line around the perimeter with no luck. By the end of the season I had it back and forth, corner to corner and shinny tape dangling and nothin sensor lights. The deer got almost everything this year… guess who is going in the freezer soon 😉
We are in Wester NC zone 6B… best of luck to you.
BTW the deer got in but not tangled in any of it.
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When I lived in the Hudson Valley in NY we had deer everywhere. They traveled through our yards eating everything so I slowly learned which flowers they didn’t like and was successful in having those. As for the vegetable garden I had a welded wire fence held up by t-posts and a gate. the fencing was about 6′ high. One trick I learned to protect my Japanese pieris was to take a 4′ x 3′ welded wire fencing or any size you want and bow it lengthwise. Put that in front of any bushes you want to protect. The deer step on it and it freaks them out because it bounces as if they aren’t on solid ground. It’s not economical for an entire garden but it protects plants out in the open.
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I had thought about something getting tangled. Definitely don’t want that to happen. That’s why I was asking here if anyone had any experience with it. Looks like it may be hit or miss if they are determined.
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I happened to notice the topic and remembered I’ve had something on my scamazon list for a while. I was thinking of possibly using it for a completely different application but it should work for your purposes
Tenax 2A120054 Economy, 6’x330′, Black https://a.co/d/fMjQKzY
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Thanks, I’ll check it out.
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Living Traditions Homestead (Sara and Kevin) use a double fence system. The two fences are approximately 6 to 8 feet apart. They said the deer don’t have good depth of perception so they won’t jump over two fences like that. Just an idea. I am going to try it next year.
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A friend was telling me the same thing. He knew a guy that had problems with deer and built a double fence and this year they didn’t bother anything.
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Mid-Missouri- We have lots of deer also; so the decision was to build a fence. We enclosed 1/2 acre for our garden and orchard with a 5 foot tall horse fence with 2 x 4 inch woven wire. We do have several strings of LED lights strung along the top. No deer in our garden for 3 years. And the 2 x 4 wire keeps out adult rabbits, coons, opossums, etc.
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I have some 2×4 wire fencing left from my horse pasture. I thought about using it. Only problem is I have watched numerous times deer jumping over it graciously without any effort. It is 4’ high with a tensile above it. I guess after seeing the damage from yesterday evening I have cooled off some. I was ready to start putting deer in the freezer then.
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Oh’ Bluesky63, I like your profile pic. I keep bees too and often just sit watching them come in while thinking problems through.
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I put up a 3 foot high fence to keep the rabbits and chickens out. I then put up a one strand solar electric fence about 3 feet away from the small fence, 3′ off the ground. We’ve been growing sweet potatoes for 5 or 6 years now here in S.W. Missouri and this is the first time deer haven’t got them.
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For years, I had used a three strand electric fence, two strands down low (for raccoons) and one strand up at about 5 1/2 ft., at the top of the T-post. Deer could jump over that, but after getting close and bitten once they would stay away. At the beginning of this year I learned about the 3D Deer fence (inside strands at 20” and 48”high and outside strand 36” away and 34” high). Doesn’t have to be energized. My understanding is that since deer’s eyes are on the side of the head (and not at the front) they have no depth perception and the 3D fence confuses them and they stay away. Has worked very well for me.
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The double fence or 3D fence seems like the route I’ll take. I have since sprayed a pepper juice I make as a deer deterrent and they have left what is left alone.
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I am very interested in your pepper sauce recipe. I back to undeveloped park land that has deer, coyotes, fox, owl, hawk, raccoon, possum and probably a sasquatch. The deer love to behead the sunflowers and I planted sweet corn 3 times last year. The rabbits loved the peas. It was like a salad bar🙄.
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I hope I do not offend anyone that sells a deer deterrent but I’m always happy and willing to help others. The deer deterrent consist of 3 eggs, 3 table spoons of milk, couple of spoons of garlic and onion powder, couple of spoons of cayenne pepper powder, and a cup of water. I mix this in a blender and then pour into a gallon jug. Then I fill with water. This mixture will clog a sprayer so I just punch a few holes in a gallon jug lid and apply from the gallon jug. It’s cheap and works for me very well. You will need to reapply after a heavy rain though.
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does this also work for other critters…??
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I haven’t had any problems with any other critters but I’m sure it would work for anything that doesn’t like the taste of pepper/ garlic/onion.
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