Deer eating my small apple trees

[ericm979]

Two t posts and a roll of 5' hog wire fencing has always worked for us. The deer push it around some but our deer aren't smart enough or hungry enough to go to the next step like yours are. If it didn't work, I'd do four posts, stretch the fencing tight and use the usual wire clips to hold it to the t posts. Dunno what to do about a gate, with the roll we just bend the cut ends over into hooks and that's been enough.

 

[sixdogs]

Good strong fencing least 6' high only thing works found works for me.

When I lived in New England with lots of nuisance deer, this worked. They pushed on plain wire so I went to high tensile barb wire. Still some issues so I hooked up an electric cow fence and that solved the problem. They would get close to smell he wire and you could hear the arc pop inside.

 

[Jstpssng]

When I worked in the orchard they had an 8 foot tall deer fence, which kept deer out most of the time. Electric is probably easier and less expensive to install. For smaller plantings I've seen people put up poles and 4 foot fencing just far enough out so that the deer can't reach over it, but it sounds like you have to many trees to make that effective.

 

[ROUSTABOUT]

'Terminate' an animal for being hungry? Really?

OP, is there something else you can plant that they might like better and allow them better access? Do you have room for a food plot for them?

I was raised shooting deer out of the pea patch. We had a two story barn with Windows out toward the garden overlooking a 40 acre patch. Army cots and spot lights. Uncle's and cousins in attendance. Good times.

 

[plowhog]

Here's a pix of the fence with 3 T-posts. I was wrong about the diameter-- this is obviously not nearly enough. Thinking of expanding to 4 or 5 posts and a lot more buffer.

 

[Jstpssng]

Most that I see use four posts. They also have stiffer wire however, usually 2x4 inch mesh.
I have some concrete reinforcement mesh which would work well, except it’s a real PITA to work.

 

[JasperFrank]

What I'm to suggest is all theory, so take it as such.
If you build an outer obstacle, such as a simple, low, three foot high, post and single top rail fence, right where a deer would normally launch, four feet or so away from the inner fence you already have in place, I can't imagine a deer thinking it could jump over both obstacles in one stride. Between the two barriers, the deer wouldn't be able, to jump over the inner fence as it is tuned sideways, and then can't jump over the inner fence, but could still duck under the outer fence to get back out.

 

[cqaigy2]

We tried many options for keeping deer off/away from fruit trees. The one thing that seems to work for us is heavy duty black plastic netting 8 or more feet high. I use 10' sticks of metal conduit slipped into both ends and secured with zip ties. The conduit is slipped into hooks or eye bolts on wood corner post. Doesn't have to be tight, if it flops over a bit on top, it still keeps the concerned as it wider too. The other nice part of this arrangement is i can pop the netting out of the way and have wide open access to the trees.

 

[KennyG]

I've had good luck with cages of welded wire fencing plus Bobex deer repellant. Bobex seems to last longer than liquid fence and others. I've got a lot of deer but maybe my neighboring farmers feed them better.

 

[MAX-24-Dean]

I had the same problem with my orchard and garden. I tried small fences, electric fences, motion activated lights, and sprinklers. Nothing worked until I built an 8 foot fence around the orchard/garden. I see the deer tracks around the perimeter, but they cannot get in.

Same results with ten foot fence post with 7' - 6" above the ground. spaced 10 feet apart. Orchard is 60' x 80'. haven't had a deer in the orchard for 9 years. Just see the tracks outside the fence.