Contributed by: livin 4 now Submitted: 29-07-2003
Soap: Heavily scented soaps work at repelling deer. Among these are Irish Spring and Zest. What you do is shave the soap in thin slices around your plot. The pros are that it works, but the cons are that you must replace the soap once a week. This gets very old very quick, as well as cost you money every time.
Human Scents: Deer dislike the smell of human scents. One method of spreading your scent around is to urinate all around your site. What you may also choose to do is urinate in a 2 liter soda bottle, and pour it around your plot when you visit. Urine, like the soap, will need to be replaced every week. Another, more cumbersome, yet more efficient solution is to spread human hair around the area. This may be retrieved from a barber shop. In this case, you simply throw fistfuls of hair around the area, and it is said to repel deer for a few weeks, unless rain washes it away.
Fencing: Ive found that simply setting up a physical barrier around your plot will keep deer away. You’ll want to pre-measure the perimeter of your area. Make sure the fence is at least 3 feet past your plants on all sides so the deer doesnt reach in and snack on fresh shoots. Then go to a local hardware or superstore and get 2 lengths of dark colored fencing that are long enough to reach around your plot. This fencing can range from wire to rope, just anything thats strong and will resist stretch. You’ll need multiple lines to prevent small babies up to large deer from eating your grow. A line about 2 feet, 3.5, 5 ft and 7 ft should suffice. It is my understanding that fawns are copying their mothers actions for the most part, but you should not underestimate their curiosity. Fawns probably won’t ruin your grow, larger deer will. I’ve personally seen a deer hurdle a 5 ft barbwire fence. 7 ft should be plenty. If you have extra line feel free to make more wraps. If you wrap your plot with the above suggestion, you are not guaranteed protection from deer, but they will surely not jump the fence unless necessary.
If you are paranoid about it, you can hang branches from the line as camouflage. This will not “hide” the fence, but it will break the outline.
Ive found that the fence method works best. It works just as well as the others, but is also reusable. After harvest, simply cut or untie your fence, roll it up and store it with your other supplies until next season.