When I was 3, my favorite movie was Bambi. I learned to love deer at an early age and I carried that reverence well into adulthood. Gosh, what a fool. As much as I’d like to coexist, there’s no place for Bambi on a vegetable farm.
In the farm’s early seasons, we were able to successfully ward off the cloven hoofed menace with a simple, low-cost electric fence (see photo above). The fence uses a mild jolt to scare the deer and two layers of wire to exploit their lack of depth perception. But lately, the neighborhood deer have been crossing it freely, using the wires to massage their full bellies. The sweet potato foliage, swiss chard, and beet greens all sustained damage, and the beans (say it ain’t so!) were the most recent casualty. Truth is, we have a real problem.
Instead of tinkering with the electric fence to improve its efficacy, we’re planning to go all in this winter and erect a bona fide deer fence along the wooded area. It’s a big cost, but so is cultivating veggies that never make it to market. Eight feet of impenetrable wire fencing, endless peace of mind. Sorry, deer–the buck stops here (yeah, I had to do it).