22 June - Those Darned Venison-Americans
Jun. 29th, 2014 03:23 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
fenchurchA few weeks ago, we'd noticed that the birds seemed to be going through an insane amount of birdseed (we were having to refill our rather large feeder nearly every day) and while we *have* had a lot of birds coming to the feeder, it just seemed oddly extreme. Then, while I was on my Kentucky/Ohio trip, rackham spied the actual problem... as he told me over the phone, our bird feeder was being raided by Venison-Americans. Yep, our deer neighbors (of which we have quite a few) had apparently decided the birdfeeder was an all-you-can-eat buffet. Also, since I'm fairly sure this is one of last year's babies who has pretty much grown up in our backyard, it's pretty obvious she's not even remotely scared of us.
The day after I snapped this photo, I went up to the Lowe's in Monroe and bought some deer and rabbit repellent (since the deer were also going after our strawberries and it's likely the rabbits that live in the yard were as well) and sprayed a little bit around those two areas. And it's been VERY successful. Maybe a little too successful, because the deer have been leaving our yard alone entirely, and I really miss having them wander through every day. I'd even gone over to the feedstore after getting the repellent spray and had picked up a deer feed brick to put in another part of the yard (the lady at Lowe's recommended that or a salt lick... saying it had worked well for keeping the deer away from her horse food), but it looks like even that little bit of scent from the few sprays I did was enough to make them shy away completely. :-(
Crossposted from my Livejournal.
rackham spied the actual problem... as he told me over the phone, our bird feeder was being raided by Venison-Americans. Yep, our deer neighbors (of which we have quite a few) had apparently decided the birdfeeder was an all-you-can-eat buffet. Also, since I'm fairly sure this is one of last year's babies who has pretty much grown up in our backyard, it's pretty obvious she's not even remotely scared of us.The day after I snapped this photo, I went up to the Lowe's in Monroe and bought some deer and rabbit repellent (since the deer were also going after our strawberries and it's likely the rabbits that live in the yard were as well) and sprayed a little bit around those two areas. And it's been VERY successful. Maybe a little too successful, because the deer have been leaving our yard alone entirely, and I really miss having them wander through every day. I'd even gone over to the feedstore after getting the repellent spray and had picked up a deer feed brick to put in another part of the yard (the lady at Lowe's recommended that or a salt lick... saying it had worked well for keeping the deer away from her horse food), but it looks like even that little bit of scent from the few sprays I did was enough to make them shy away completely. :-(
Crossposted from my Livejournal.
