Saturday, June 8, 2013

Deer Fence (Finally!)

Brooks has been talking about a deer fence in the back of our property for years. The terrain is not friendly for fence building however. Our property is odd shaped. We have a 100 foot long driveway coming up from the road and at the end of the driveway the main property is 120 feet by 360 feet. The house is built near the front of this piece with the back 3/4 being very steep with dense brush and trees, home to deer and eagles. It would be an impossible (as in way too expensive) task to fence this whole area off. Instead, Norma had Beau, her lawn guy, cut and remove the brush (mostly horsetails) from a 120 by 50 foot area behind the house.

On Tuesday Brooks and LindaLee drove up and we went fence shopping. We bought two 165' rolls of six foot high deer and rabbit fence plus steel posts. The idea was to use trees wherever we could to support the wire fence and use the steel posts in between the trees. We bought one eight foot wood post and cement to form one corner where there was no convenient tree. The finished product would not be perfectly straight but no one ever goes up there because of the steep terrain and the fence will soon be covered by wild growth in any case. It will soon be invisible and imperfections impossible to detect. It will also completely block off the three main game trails that the deer use to access their favourite flower buffet.

It was a dirty job for Brooks and LindaLee, slipping and sliding up and down the wet bank (45 degrees in places) and reaching into the blackberry bushes to place the fence and posts, with me helping where I could. After several hours of hard work, everyone ended up with deep scratches and muddy clothes. Thanks Brooks and LindaLee!

That same night I watched one of the deer standing on the far side of the fence, wondering how to get to her reserved table at the rosebud diner. Their only access now is up the driveway from the busy road, something one of them actually did on Thursday afternoon. Brooks and Norma are now talking about a swinging aluminium gate to completely block off the driveway. The total cost of the fence was about $700, including material, Beau (the lawn guy), food and beer. About $3.20 a foot but I have about 100 feet of fencing left over if I can find someone to buy it. Norma says this is cheap as the deer eat about $700 worth of flowers a year. That might be a slight exaggeration, but we have spent a lot of money over the years on solutions that did not work.



19 comments:

  1. I can picture Norma looking out the window, just waiting!!!!

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  2. Good luck with your fence. From what we've seen, deer are real smart, and not much will stop them from getting a free meal. You might have to resort to a paintball gun and frozen ammo.

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  3. That was a valiant effort to control the deer and keep them away from the flower garden. Let's hope it works. As Rod and Sylvia profess, deer are really smart.

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  4. Let's hope this fence works and really is the final solution. Would love to see a photo of the deer coming up the front driveway.

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  5. I always thought deer didn't have any problem going over a 6' fence.

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    1. We are hoping that the brush is so thick and the slope so steep that they cannot get a run at it. Also, deer will not jump over something that they cannot see the other side of and it will only be a matter of weeks until the growth climbs the fence.

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    2. Gotcha. Hope this works.

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  6. Croft,how many feet of fencing do you have left?

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    1. We took about 50' off of the 165' roll so there is over 100 feet left. Need some?

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  7. Always seem to need fencing, I have a small acreage on York Rd.

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    1. 165 feet cost $230 or $1.39 per foot (plus tax) so how about the 100+ feet for $100?

      croft.randle@gmail.com Email me and I will give you the address and phone number.

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    2. Email me and you can pick it up!

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  8. The deer we had in Colorado could jump over a six-foot fence from standing sill - just a vertical leap. Pretty amazing to see - but probably not in your case Croft. Hope it works out - at least it should keep the fawns and pregnant mamas out.

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    1. I hope our deer are fatter and lazier than the Colorado variety John. Plus they can't have any of that "good stuff" the Colorado deer can smoke now!

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