Protecting Your Plants from Deer

Defend your plants against deer attacks by offending their sense of smell and taste!

If you have mature plants that are being devoured by deer,  it's time to take action! Deer repellents can be very effective and easy to use. Deer will almost always stay away from plants that offend two or more senses. Therefore, if a plant tastes and smells offensive deer will not only avoid the plant, they'll avoid the general area. Deer resistant gardeners use this knowledge to their advantage.

We recommend using two deer deterrents together -- one that offends the sense of smell and one that offends the sense of taste. The best combination we have found is Tree Guard or Hot Pepper Wax to offend the sense of taste in conjunction with Coyote Urine to offend the sense of smell. Deer hate hot and spicy foods! After one nibble of a plant coated with hot pepper wax they will definitely say, “No thank you!” when it comes time for seconds. Hot pepper wax combines hot cayenne pepper extract in a food-grade wax. Unlike some solutions, the wax will not wash off of your plants for several weeks.

Apply hot pepper wax to the surfaces of your plants and hang dispensers filled with coyote urine for possibly the most effective method of protecting your plants from deer browsing. Why do predator urine and hot pepper wax work best when used together? Most deer deterrents work on the premise of “offending” one of the deer’s five senses: sight, taste, smell, hearing or touch. Predator urine works on the sense of smell, while hot pepper wax works on the sense of taste. Using these two products together more than doubles the impact as you will offend two of the deer's senses.