I'm glad the baby wrens are okay, David!

I peeked in two of the bird houses in my backyard today and saw nests, neither one with eggs.

sallyg said:Here's a new deer idea from Cinta on another thread.
Buy cheap small balloons from the dollar store. Blow them up and stake them to the ground. The deer step on them, pop them, get scared and run off.

Plant stuff the deer don't like. There is a great list HERE!

http://njaes.rutgers.edu/deerr...

I am planting an island in the shady front lawn made up of Atilbes, Japanese Painted Ferns, Ajuba, Bishop's Weed, and Lenten Rose. I hope these dissuade the deer from munching.

I recently learned from my mom that deer don't like lilacs. If something in her yard goes unmunched during the winter, it's a safe bet -- they have a literal herd that visits (and feeds) nightly.

Deer have not munched on my lilacs either, so I can confirm that along with Jill's mom that in two heavily deer browsed gardens, lilacs are left alone

The deer don't touch my lilacs either.

Same here.

I have had three tiger lily trops eaten and a hosta near them that has been munched on, but none of my other hostas have been touched.

They're saving the other Hostas for a snack on another day, Jan.

After having 5 newly planted Hostas eaten a few years ago, I asked the nursery what is the best deterrent to keep the deer away from my Hostas.

The guy looks at me really seriously and asked me, "You REALLY want to keep the deer away from your Hostas?" I nodded, eagerly awaiting his advice. To which he replied, "But a whole bunch of Hostas. Then plant them in your neighbor's yard".

Deer Candy.

This year I'm trying the systemic pellets "Repellex" that Muddy recommended. They are working great for her. I'll keep at a foliar repellent spraying regime as well, but the systemic treatment should do the trick if (more like when) I miss a round of the foliar spraying.

I wish I had known about Repellex before I suffered heavy losses.

Several years ago a deer came to the neighborhood. The that one deer became two, three, and then a herd. I have lost numerous plants, including about a dozen mature azaleas, 10 mature euonymus (15 years old), and several hydrangeas. Deer chewed them all the way down. In the spring, there were half a dozen leaves on each, if any at all, not worth saving. I had never thought anything could ever kill euonymus. Well the deer did. They ate all the leaves in the winter. So the shrubs all froze to death.

Joyanna excitedly called me to the window a couple weeks ago to watch a deer walk through the back yard. Instead of appreciating the wonder & beauty of nature with her, all I could do was mutter, "Oh no oh no oh no oh no no no no no..."

One time when mom was living with us I heard the kitchen door slam and heard her hollering. She even marched down the steps waving her arms and hollering at a couple deer in the garden. Sweet lady!

Aspen, Repellex is supposed to be taken up by the plants' roots when the leaves are growing, so it might not be as effective with Hosta that are already fully leafed out. It'll work great with Azaleas, though, because the tasty flower buds are forming now.

haha Jill. If it is any consolation, we have had these sightings once and only once here: horse, cow, turkey

Good to know Muddy. I'll pay special attention to keeping up with foliar application to the hostas. The Repellex should still work with the oriental lilies and daylilies which haven't flowered yet though, shouldn't it?

Yes, although you can still lose blooms to "sampling," because all it takes is 1 bite to lose a lily bud. Friend told me the other day that she lost 25% of her daffodils (she ordered 100 in our group buy) to squirrels who wouldn't stop digging them... they'd gnaw a bit, go oh phooey!, and drop the bulb. Sometimes she found the bulb and replanted it, sometimes not.

I've never tried Repellex with anything but Azaleas and Rhododendrons, so I can't speak from experience, but I agree with Critter: Deer will probably try the buds before deciding they're inedible, especially if they remember how tasty they were last year .

Deer are supposed to be browsers, always watching that they are not prey. Since they have no natural predators they have become feeders. They strip all vegetation in their path. They also aren't very bright, they have been found in areas of sever drought and over grazing starving to death with bellies-full of undigestible stuff they browsed on.

We seem to have decreasing numbers of deer in our neighborhood in recent years, probably thanks to annual culling every winter in a field not too far from my house.

My daughter spotted this little Garter snake while we were pulling honeysuckle vines out in her backyard. We didn't know what kind it was until later, so her boyfriend tossed it over the fence to keep it away from the dog.

I can say that not all hostas are equally loved by the local deer. For the past 2 years, they ate my June and Paul's Glory and Blue Cadets right to the ground. But they never even nibbled on the big Blue Angels or Sum&Substance.

So early this year as they were just emerging, I dug up all the deer candy and moved them into the fenced back yard where the deer have never jumped, and divided the 3 Blue Angels into 13 pieces and replanted them to cover the entire former various hosta beds. They are thriving.


The deer have been around (they pulled up a few newly-planted astilbes but did not eat them and I merely replanted them). But they have not so much as nibbled a Blue Angel.

I don't think that is just good luck.

Yardenman said: But they have not so much as nibbled a Blue Angel.

I think they are waiting for daylilies to bloom.