So it’s happened again. You’ve spent months working on your garden, and a few days before the harvested deer come by to harvest it for you.
While 8-foot tall deer fencing may be effective, it’s not practical for most gardeners. How do you keep deer from destroying the garden without spending a fortune?
Fortunately, deer don’t know that humans haven’t quite yet mastered force field technology. If they run up against a barrier that they can feel, but they can’t see, it’ll confuse them. A confused deer gives up quickly and moves on to easier forage.
A few strands of fishing line on stakes wrapped around the garden can be incredibly effective at deterring deer. Of course, they could walk right through it, or jump right over it, but they don’t know that.
A deer will spot the tasty produce in your garden, and start going for it. If their nose bumps into an obstacle that they can’t see, they’ll stop. Simple as that.
The trick is to pick low test fishing line. The first time I tried the “fishing line trick” I got the heftiest fishing line I could find. Quite simply, I didn’t want them to walk right through it.
The problem is, anything sufficient to catch a marlin on the open sea is also thick enough that the deer can see it. They’ll just see it as a regular fence and hop right over.
Choose something light, like 10 to 15-pound test fishing line. Tie it to stakes about 3 feet above the ground, or nose height for a deer.
Run a second strand about 18 inches above the ground too. I’ve watched deer grazing, walking with their head down, go right underneath the higher strand without even touching it. Trust me, you need 2 strands and that second strand only takes an extra minute and another 10 cents worth of fishing line.
We have gardens and orchards throughout our 30 acres, and it’s impossible to deer fence it all. Each small section has a fishing line fence, and in some areas, I put 3 stakes and fishing line around individual trees.
For trees near the house, the fishing line goes up in the wintertime and comes down during the summer months. The deer in these parts tend to strip the bark in the winter, but in the summer there are easier pickings. That allows me to mulch and harvest the trees in the summer without bothering with the line, and quickly put the line back up in the winter to keep the trees safe.
Angel Bogart
Thank you for suggesting to get only the toughest 10-15 pound test fishing line to tie around your stakes at about nose-high of your most frequent deer visitor to keep your vegetable patch from getting eaten by these wily forest creatures. This is just what my grandpa needs to keep his mountainside garden safe from forest animals. However, since he’s too old to do the fencing himself, it would be best if he gets professional fencing contractors to suggest the best deer-deterrent fencing for his garden patch. Although his ranch is just too big to be fenced around completely, he’d need to come up with the best win-win fencing option that won’t harm these gentle creatures.
Kathy
I use 30 lb fishing line, 4 strands. They break anything finer and see anything stronger. Don’t tie anything to it.
Sandra
I have fishing line up 6 feet spaced every 12 inches around entire garden. Last year it worked amazing. This year and actually today I went out and all four rows of beets gone, three rows of edamame gone, cucumber tops gone, and a kahlorabi leaves eaten off. What a sad day today is as my garden is destroyed!
Administrator
Oh no, I am so sorry. That is incredibly disappointing and frustrating.