Sunday, September 20, 2009

Deer Fence That Works!

This is a picture of my Dad's garden. Across the back of his property is a three-rail fence, one that does nothing to deter deer from entering the yard. My parents used to live on a 75 acre farm that is not far from here, and is located in a mountainous area. My Dad had a large garden with a 5' field fence, plus 3 strands of barbed wire on top. The deer just jumped over that and he was about to add another couple of feet to the top of the fence. I told him that I read that placing a 3-line strand of electric fence 18" outside of another fence was suppose to keep the deer out. The theory was that when the deer saw two lines of fence, they wouldn't know if there was more, and would not cross it. He added the electric fence and it worked!
This is his garden now and he still used 2 fence lines. He is using 2 electric fence lines that are irregularly placed, between 18" to 3' between the lines. He has a section that he uses as a gate so that he can enter and exit the garden.
This picture shows more of the variation between the fence lines. At the farm and here, the only time the deer have gotten into the garden is when he forgot to close the gate! He also has his dwarf fruit trees behind the electric fence to protect them, too.

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