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Simply Gardening
by Doug Green
Oh, Deer
...and Rabbits, Mice and Voles

Jan. 11, 2000 (AmpolNS) -- This is the season where gardeners start to lose their Christmas jollies as they wander round the garden surveying the winter damage. There are three main pests out there right now trying to survive with your garden plants as the main source of food. We're talking field mice and voles, rabbits, and deer. As with many things in the garden, there's good news and bad news.

Let's get the bad news out of the way first. You aren't likely going to be able to do anything to stop all those field mice and voles. They're hunkered down in their winter homes in that last bit of garden refuse on your neighbour's property or in the deep grass just over the fence. Those old boards you left lying around after fixing up the garage are likely protecting a family for the winter as well. Any bit of garden debris – or deep snow – will protect them from winter predators. These guys represent next summer and fall projects.

The good news is that if you control for rabbits, there might be some carryover protection for moles and voles. Let's start with the easy stuff first. If you have a shrub that the dad-watted wabbits love to munch on, you can wrap aluminum foil around the stems. This stops them cold. Do make sure to wrap the stems up to three feet high. A big bunny, standing on its hind legs, can reach up quite high on a shrub to get a winter meal. The bottom six inches really need protection as that is where the mice will be snacking. You can substitute aluminum foil for the white plastic tree wrapping on any tender young trees as well. If the neighbours ask what you are doing, simply say "Decorating for the winter solstice." Do remove this foil next spring or you'll find insects such as earwigs will colonize under the wrapping.

You can spray the shrubs and young trees with a noxious tasting mixture. Bitrex is the main component of many of these products – check the shelves to see which one has the highest concentration of this product and choose that one. These sprays come with spreaders and stickers to help them stick to the branches. In my experience (I lost twenty historic apple trees to deer and rabbits one winter) these products have to be repeated regularly. If you have a thaw, get out there (monthly if possible) and repeat the application. There are home concoctions containing soaps, hot peppers, garlic and whatever happens to fall out of the cupboard when the brew is stewing but these have mixed results in any research I've seen. If you do mix and use your own concoction, apply it every chance you get because it will be washed off by wind and weather. Bitrex is supposed to work with any critter that chews bark – from mice to deer.

We live on a deer run and these elegant creatures regularly visit our gardens. Well, at least they used to when we only had one very elderly Old English Sheepdog (you know, the ones with hair all over their eyes). Now that we have two more sprightly canine friends, the deer don't come around. It's the old marking your territory trick. The dogs wander further from the house and the deer can smell them. The deer stay away. Kevin Lamacraft, a former Natural Resources officer, once told a group of us that gardeners could do the same thing, "Mark your territory at half time or between periods and the deer will stay away." This "marking" has to be repeated regularly and according to Kevin, works with rabbits too.

Some gardeners report having success with ultrasonic deterrent devices. You can purchase these through specialist garden catalogues. The best of them are set up on a motion detector so the sound waves are not constant. This on and off feature prevents the animals from getting used to the sound. I know they work on raccoons (sailboat owners keep the animals from nesting on their boats with them) but I'm less certain about rabbits and deer. Let me know if you have some experience.

There are reports that rabbits and deer don't like some kinds of plants. Rabbits for example are said to avoid 'Green Arrow' peas while deer won't browse on Yew trees. While the 'Green Arrow' peas work well because there's often other food sources, the fact is that all animals have preferred foods and foods they'd rather not eat. (Does that sound familiar to the rest of the frig raiders out there?) Given the choice, deer will not snack on yew. Given lots of deer and little food, they will eat anything they can find. Hill Island, on the St. Lawrence River is a deer haven but woe betide any gardener who tries to grow something without a deer fence. The high deer population will eat anything they can reach.

And that is the gardeners sad tale of woe. You can plant, you can spray but when push comes to eat, you have to fence. Electric fencing will work on deer. Coat the wire with peanut butter and the deer (who love the smell) will come over for a closer sniff. They'll get zapped on the nose and will tend to avoid the fence for a long time. Regular deer fencing is almost invisible in the garden setting and works well. Again available through fencing dealers or through specialist catalogues, many gardeners I know swear by this product. Rabbit fencing has to be several feet high and well buried in the ground. Rabbits will burrow under a fence if they sense that a delicatessen is on the other side. You can pay once for the fencing, you can regularly pay for plants, or you can pave the garden.

Next summer we'll get those voles.

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