We have spent the summer being reminded that we seem to have a neighborhood herd of deer that wander around the backyards, eating fallen birdseed and munching on garden plants. They seem to have little fear of people and cars driving by and don’t even wait until dark to check out the feeders. We do bring them inside at dark. Unfortunately, a few wander too close or try to cross the street in front of our house. We frequently see mangled deer on the side of the road near our front yard. As lovely as they are, we’ve all struggled to find ways to keep them out of our gardens.
Our neighbors have hung shiny pie plates around that wave in the wind. We’ve tried spraying the plants with odd mixtures…which need to be reapplied daily! So far, we’ve been lucky that our garden fence on the hill has kept the plants a little out of reach. We really don’t mind sharing a little bird seed, but they don’t seem to read signs to stay out of the garden! When we saw deer prints inside our garden fence we knew it was time to do something!
Here is a view of our backyards looking from our back patio. The deer move from the upper right by the white shed and amble towards our bird feeders.
They often stand around on the hill by the garden…we can tell by what they leave behind.
Then they amble down the hill to the bird feeders. They clean up any fallen bird seed and drink from the bird bath. In the winter, they leave quite a trail in the snow so we know their path.
We’ve tried to scare them away by yelling or just walking out the back door, but they don’t run far. All they have to do is wait a few hours and we’re asleep. Entertainment value aside, I’m always worried we’re attracting the deer with the feeders and they they are vulnerable to traffic on the road out front.
Bert has been exploring solutions online. He finally ordered a motion-sensitive product that has a recording of a barking dog called, “A Barking Dog!” He attached it to the tree right by the garden and in their pathway. It isn’t really very loud, just has the startle effect. the neighbors could sort of hear it so we explained what we were trying to do. They were fine with it.
At first, we discovered the motion sensor picked up all the tree limbs that were waving in the breeze…continuous barking! Haha! So, Bert set it to be activated only at dark. That helped. We know it works because a neighbor boy walked across our yard after dark and walked by the tree. He was really startled and stood there to try to figure out what was going on. I notice he now skirts our property instead of cutting right through the yard! Guess it works!
Since the box was installed, we have not seen any deer at the feeder in the middle of the night and there is no evidence the deer even tried to get to the feeder…no worn paths in the wet morning dew. I’m not sure if we will leave the box on the tree all winter, but for now it seems to have helped to change their behavior. Hopefully, fewer dead deer on the road too.
