This is our backyard at the Windstone factory in Corvallis Oregon. Isn’t it great? There is a little creek if you keep going towards the big trees. The creek feeds into the Mary’s river, which is at the end of our street.
We thought it would be fun to put in a big vegetable garden for everyone to use.The soil has been nicely tilled up where you see the white arrow, but there is an issue with having a garden here. I couldn’t catch a good photo of the three deer that were standing right there, looking at the newly tilled earth with the same expression a cat has when looking at baby mice, so I drew one in. I swear, those deer KNOW what freshly tilled earth means! They were looking all over that area for the new plants.
We need to install a TALL deer fence! So, I went and priced 8′ deer fencing and posts…OH MY it is expensive!
For what a deer fence costs we could buy all the produce we could eat at the farmer’s market! But that wouldn’t be any fun, would it?
But it looks like a lovely area to sit and relax for lunch and breaks. Of course, that would be if and when you have time for lunch and breaks…which doesn’t seem to be very often.
and if there were less yellow jackets around!
Oh, too cute! Well, you could plant stuff that deer supposedly don’t like. Which, in my experience is not much. Besides, the rabbits will take care of the rest. Peppers? A delicacy!! Actually, you might look into planting some stuff that’s supposed to repel deer and whatnot. (Lots of websites with info…this one might help? http://www.northerngardening.com/deerplants.htm)
Wow, thats a big ol back yard! Where are all the animals? I expected to see some running around. Your own… not the wilder ones:)
Well, Clearly you aren’t hip to the Oregon way of creating a deer fence…..Tons of cheap or recycled chicken wire, (or some other weird meshy stuff) random posts and lots of rusty cans for clanging together. Or maybe that’s just how my sister does it. Whatever, it works!
Maybe you could make it a community garden, we have those here, where you are responsible for your part, and part of that would be to help fence it. Just a thought.
~Guess Who~
Haha That’s funny, the title is funny, and very snarky. I know you are hip, don’t worry.
Well I’ll try to be hip. I dunno, new territory for me… Do deer avoid old cars? We could build a barrier out of those!
This is the back yard at Windstone , the animals are at our house. Another big yard. We could use a flock of sheep or something here too. Really need fencing!
At the local farmer’s market every one had tricks and advice, and then somebody else would chime in “that didn’t work for me!!”
That’s about right. Everyone has a remedy for keeping deer away, and the next person has a story about how the remedy didn’t work. The only real cure-all is fencing, sadly! Even then you gotta make sure they can’t jump it or wiggle underneath. You’d be surprised at what they’ll wiggle under…
I know I can’t put a garden in till I can afford some fencing. For now, my veggies are in containers… on my second story deck. It’s the only safe place…. and even now the squirrels and chipmunks get into them!