Deer are lovely animals and are always good to see them. However, when they get into your garden and eat your plants and vegetables, are not so welcome anymore. Right?
Whoever lives close to forests or in a rural area knows what I am talking about.
Deer are animals that will eat almost any foliage of the plants’, and your tomato plants are not an exception.
I bet that you hate the idea of seeing your tomatoes, which you’ve been caring for for so long and with so much love.
Luckily, there are many ways how to keep them out of your garden. In this article, I am going to talk about these methods and tricks.
Do Deer Eat Tomato Plants?
According to the Extension Office of the Oregon State University, deer eat over 500 plants.
Unfortunately, deer love to eat tomato plants as well. I mean the whole plant: the fruits, leaves, stems, sometimes even the roots.
But when a deer gets into your garden, these will eat your other plants as well, like strawberries, cucumbers, sweet corn, raspberries, and more.
Now that you know these facts, you may ask yourself: how can I protect my plants from deer? Let me introduce 6 techniques in how to keep away deer from your garden.
How to Keep Deer Away from Tomatoes?
Many people chose to shoot deer rather than find out solutions how to keep them away from tomatoes.
I think this is cruel and unnecessary. They are only searching for food. It is not their fault that “we are in their way”.
I know, it is annoying when your garden gets destroyed by deer, but there are other friendlier ways to keep them away and no deer or tomato will get hurt.
1. Commercial Deer Repellent Spray
Like many other repellent sprays, deer repellent spray can be bought in gardening or hardware stores.
Deer have a sensitive smell because they are prey animals. With the help of their smell, they can stay away from danger. They can smell the predators or any other potential danger and they will stay away.
Deer repellent spray should keep away deer from your garden because its smell is the KEEP OUT message for the animal.
2. Homemade Deer Repellent Spray
If you don’t want to spend money on commercial stuff, then you can make your homemade repellent spray.
Making a spicy spray is not complicated. Here is how to do it:
- Take some hot sauce from your pantry
- Mix it with 16 parts of water
- Pour the mixture into a spray bottle
- Spray your tomato plants with the mixture.
Sounds easy, right? The smell of the spicy spray will keep away the deer and your tomatoes will remain untouched.
However, you should reapply after it rains, and you should wear gloves and protective goggles while applying.
A downside of this homemade spray can be that its smell might also disturb the person who is caring for the tomato plants.
3. Soap
As I said, deer are sensitive to smells. They hate the strong and strange smell.
Hanging soap bars around your tomato plants can be a good solution to keep away these animals. Just put them in a cloth or nylon stocking, and then tie them around your plants.
Instead of soap, you can also use human hair. I know, for some of you can sound creepy or weird, but it seems that deer don’t like the human smell either.
Using these little “talismans” can help in repelling deer from your garden. You can also use other strong smells, like eggs mixed up with water, dog or human urine or other stuff that could disturb the deer’ sensitive nose.
4. Fence
I think the fences are the most effective way to keep deer away from our garden. However, this must be at least 8 feet/ 2,5 m. This also will keep other animals out of the garden.
If the fence is smaller then deer can easily jump over, as they are quite big and can easily jump very high.
If you don’t want to put a fence all around your garden, then you can build an individual cage around your tomatoes. This can be made out of chicken wire or mesh, around each tomato plant, or as a big cage that protects all your tomato plants all at once.
Make sure this cage has a top cover as well, otherwise it is unnecessary because will not protect your plants.
An electric fence is also a good idea. This can provide a mild electric shock to the deer. The animal will not touch it again because they hate the feeling of this mild electric shocks pain.
However, electric fences are not for everyone, and this must be activated during the night because that is the time when deer are searching for food.
5. Plant Deer Deterrent Plants
Deer love to eat tomato plants, however, there are some plants that these hate because of their smell.
Planting these repellent plants around your garden, or next to the tomato plants can be a good idea.
Here are a few of these deterrent plants:
- Rosemary
- Hot peppers
- Garlic
- Lavender
- Sage
- Chives
- Iris
- Yucca
- Foxgloves
- Bee balm
Many of these plants will keep away other pests as well, like aphids, so it is a double win.
6. Ultrasonic
Ultrasonic products are another way of keeping deer but also other animals away from your garden.
Deer are also having sensitive hearing. These products emit a high-frequency sound that humans cannot hear, but the animals can.
These high-frequency sounds will disturb the animals and will keep them away.
Wrap Up
If you live in a rural area, or just near a forest where deer are living you might get some surprise visits from them.
If you grow tomatoes or other plants in your garden or around your house, it is a big chance that deer will eat them during their visit.
To keep them away you can use different deer repellents from the garden shops, or you can make one yourself at home. If you have a dog, you can let it in your garden to urinate things around, so deer will stay away.
Deer have sensitive nose and ears, so scaring them with strange smells or ultrasound should work wonders.
However, if you think that these tricks one by one are not working and these visitors are still coming back, then a combination of them, should definitely work wonders.
