A few easy steps will keep deer away

Protecting trees and shrubs from browsing deer has become a yearly autumn chore for many gardeners, myself included. Though the deer mostly stay out of my garden during the growing season, as soon as the weather cools and the leaves fall from the trees, our local deer herd starts jumping the fence and feasting on the trees and shrubs in my garden.

If I don't do anything, the deer regularly nibble the growth off our young apple and plum trees, graze our arborvitae to the nub, chomp the tender new shoots off many of our evergreens and “prune” our blueberries and Japanese hollies. But, if I take a few simple steps now, I can protect my trees and shrubs throughout the winter and early spring.

My first line of defense, of course, is to plant trees and shrubs the deer don't favor. It's why you won't find a single azalea or rhododendron on our property. Instead, you'll find deer-resistant boxwoods, junipers and ornamental grasses.

But, we do have a few of Bambi's favorites on our property, either because I can't live without them or they were already here when we moved in. For these trees and shrubs, I employ a few deer-deterring techniques.

All of our young fruit trees are surrounded with a large cylinder of 5-foot-tall boxwire fencing every winter. The cylinder extends a foot beyond the outermost branches of the tree to keep the deer from accessing the plant. Once the trees reach a height of 6 to 7 feet, I no longer need to protect them as the branches are too high for the deer to reach.

In early spring, immediately after the fencing is removed, I regularly spray the branches with a liquid deer repellent such as Liquid Fence or Tree Guard to keep the deer away from them. I don't have to spray during the summer, but I could if I needed to.

We have several evergreen shrubs scattered throughout our gardens that are regularly visited by deer during the winter months, if we don't protect them. For these, I use black plastic deer netting. I cut a piece of netting large enough to cover the entire plant, plus a little extra for good measure. I lay the netting over the top of the shrub and use clothespins to fasten it closed and hold it in place.

Where I have a row of several deer-plagued shrubs, rather than protecting each individual plant separately, I build a temporary fence around the whole area. I hammer green, metal T-bar stakes every 5 to 6 feet around the perimeter of the planting bed. Then, I attach a layer of black plastic netting to the fence posts. It's easy to take down in the spring, and I reuse the same T-bar stakes and netting every season. Once the netting is taken down in spring, just as with my fruit trees, I apply a liquid deer repellent to the shrubs for the next few weeks.

Lastly, to protect young trees from bucks rubbing the velvet off their antlers, wrap their trunks with chicken wire, hardware cloth or plastic fencing from late September through winter. If you extend the fencing underneath the mulch at the base of the tree, it also will keep bark-munching rabbits, mice, and voles away from the trunk all winter long.

Horticulturist Jessica Walliser co-hosts “The Organic Gardeners” at 7 a.m. Sundays on KDKA Radio with Doug Oster. She is the author of several gardening books, including “Attracting Beneficial Bugs to Your Garden: A Natural Approach to Pest Control” and “Good Bug, Bad Bug.” Her website is jessicawalliser.com.

Send your gardening or landscaping questions to tribliving@tribweb.com or The Good Earth, 503 Martindale St., 3rd Floor, D.L. Clark Building, Pittsburgh, PA 15212.