Looks like others have covered your questions quite well. I’m also learning myself but this will be my 3rd season outdoors this year and have learned a few things along the way that’ll I’ll share. I’m still trying to perfect the transition of my autos from indoors to out and am planning on writing a post today to get some advice so maybe keep an eye out for it.
Either way;
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For my transition to outdoor, in the past I started my auto seeds 4 weeks to the day that I plan on taking them outside and veg them in a tent for all that time in a 1 gal pot. This has worked out pretty well for me, most of the time. Typically I sprout in a jiffy pellet then transfer to a 1 gal then outside in a 5 gal. I let them chill outside in a half shaded area, like under some leaves where the sun is just breaking through then if it’s going to be chilly that night they sleep inside. I honestly have no idea if this helps or not but that’s just what I’ve done and haven’t seen any issues. Then on day two it’s full sun and potted up to the 5 gal. I’ve ran autos more than a handful of times in the 7 gal outside and honestly it’s very unnecessary in my opinion unless you are a seasoned auto grower and know how to maximize a strains potential. I’ve done a 5 gal side by side with a 7 gal and the plants in the 5 gal got bigger last summer… probably just had something to do with genetics but that was the deal breaker for me.
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For deer, as others have mentioned fishing line around your grow at chest level and foot level. Typically if they feel a bit of resistance they will back off from moving towards your plants. That is just something I’ve read though so take that with a grain of salt.
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For high winds, a tomato cage is fine but what I like to do is steak in 4 bamboo poles. I lay them out like a compass. One on each of the 4 coordinates; N, S, E, W. Try to actually steak them in at exactly those coordinates to where you are and put them in the soil at a bit of an angle so that the poles look like the letter Y when you squat down, spreading outwards at the top. Now once the plants starts to stretch in week 4-5-6 you tie down the stem a few inches from the very bottom to the south pole and the very top to the north pole so the plant is sitting like the letter S. This method opens the plant up to the path of the sun moving from East to West and in my experience helps to grow the lower nodes. This is just a low stress training technique I learned from a book somewhere and seems to work very well for me. You will need to move the upper tie at the top of the plant as it grows.
Here are some pic examples of what I did last summer.
You can see how early I start the LST (low stress training) and how it helps the lower nodes grow, increasing yields.
Here’s an example of my 5 gal pot in the front totally crush my 7 gal pots in the back…
Anyway I did a complete outdoor grow thread last summer if you want to check it out.