permaculture

["Paul A Cross" <charybda@newmex.com>]

Ten years ago I bought an old horse ranch in the southern rocky mountains. The
prior owners had put out alfalfa hay for the deer because they liked having
the deer around. They grew hardly any food, but had flower gardens. The deer
pressure was intense.

They had a useless 3-strand 4' high (1.2 metre) electrified fence for the
flower garden. The deer would crouch down and jump between the strands, or
when startled, would jump over it.

In 1997 I put up the 7' (2.1 metre) high plastic deer fence. It was supposed
to last 10 years. Here in the US southwest at altitude, with very high solar
exposure, it's beginning to break down. In a semi arid climate I don't find
this fencing very "invisible." Maybe in an lush environment it would be less
visible. Anyway, there's no plastic recycling in my area, so all that plastic
is soon to get landfilled. While I found a fence of this height effective, had
it been made of some sort of galvanzied metal I would probably not be looking
at replacing it this summer.

As for eating them, I could probably feed my whole village with the deer that
come through here. I think I'll save the deer for later if or when there's no
food at the grocery store.

-Paul