It was as if they were watching...

I recently took down a temporary barrier I'd placed a year or so ago to protect a sumac tree I transplanted into the ground after it became root bound in its pot.

Why the barrier?  I took the sumac from the enclosed back yard and planted it in a spot in the beds out front, where it would get good sunlight but was vulnerable to browsing deer.

I considered leaving the barrier up for another year until the sumac got a little taller.  We were all tired of looking at it though, so I took it down.  I'd rather not even try to have a sumac there if it means our view must include that green plastic barrier.

I'm optimistic the tree is well established enough, a year later, to withstand the inevitable ruminant pruning.  Because most of the time, deer don't kill my plants outright.  They simply eat most of what they've targeted, leaving a remnant to grow seconds.

As captured here.

This afternoon as I went out to get the mail, Bambi was just finishing up and moving on.  Or at least he moved on once I showed up and loudly "suggested" he do so.  What's left of the small sumac is just visible in front of the opuntia and agave in the top left corner of the image.

From fence removal to deer pruning, it took less than seven days.

This little tree has been a tough customer so far.  It will either bounce back, regrow branches and get taller in self defense, or I'll have to try something slightly less deer-licious in that spot.  Talk about a rough micro-climate!


 

An experiment begins

I wrote not too long ago that I wanted to transplant several bed hogs that were taking more than their fair share of the sunny beds in the fenced back yard. One of the hoggiest of them all?  The garlic chives.

Nobody ought to ever have to buy more than one pot of garlic chives.  Even if you wanted an entire lot filled with them (which would certainly be striking in August when they set blooms) you could have that based upon divisions from one four inch pot in the space of just a few seasons.

Garlic chive clumps are easy to divide, every flower stalk sets a head full of seed with a high germination rate, and they don't seem particularly fussy about their growing conditions.

I plan to put that to the ultimate test.

I had a gap in a front bed, in plain and constant line of sight from the front door, and it has been bugging me for months.  I had a planter there before which I moved once summertime arrived because it was blocking the sprinkler for that bed.  Summer is not a great time to start a new plant anywhere, so I figured I would let the gap ride a while, knowing the perfect plant to fill in that spot would come to me.

But like I said - this gap was part of my front porch view, and guys, I like that view.  I view that view, dozens of times a day through the glass in our door and often, once the temperatures ease a bit, I find that view conducive to sitting with a glass of iced tea or chilled white wine, as I contemplate the goodness of life.  So that gap nagged at me.  It wanted me to fill it sooner rather than later, but with what?

Oho! Garlic chives! Of course!  A nice clump of strappy bright green leaves with the occasional spires of white blooms thrown up overhead in the heat of August, when little else is in bloom.

So I grabbed my favorite shovel, now dubbed "the wire killer" by The Hub after a few nasty run-ins with sprinkler wires, dug out a clump of garlic chives that were absolutely superfluous, and moved them out front.  Gap, meet your filler!

Then I had what just might turn out to be a slightly genius idea.  I'm always impressed with symbiotic plant combinations where one plant offers some benefit to the other.  Nature often does that effortlessly and I find that when I copy what Nature is up to, I often get great results.

MUNCHED

I took two or three of the outlier plants of my garlic chive clump and carefully placed them in among a patch of rain lilies that are routinely browsed down to stumps by our neighbor-herd deer.  My hopes are that the bulbs will coexist peacefully, and once the deer chomp down on tangy garlic chives mixed in with the delicious (to them) rain lilies, that they will find it distasteful.

The "ultimate test" nature of this pairing comes into play because it is August, and this particular corner of the mailbox planter does not get one drop of supplemental water.  Ever.  The rain lilies and opuntia established there survive because they are natives, and do just fine with whatever the Texas weather hands them.  In fact there is very little other than rocks and sandy soil under those lilies.  The stonework for the retaining wall is cracked, and when it rains, the water flows right through that corner and down the drive.

CHIVIFIED

I mixed in a some soil with the chives to hopefully hold a little more moisture while they get started.  I'll hand water the transplants until it looks like they are either going to make it or prove my idea to be just another misplaced gesture.  Fingers crossed the plants in combination will prove to be just the deer proofing needed.  I have a few singleton lilies here and there that I plan to pair with garlic chive plants when the Grand Transplantation Implementation happens later this year in cooler weather.  A garlic chive a day to keep Bambi away?  Here's hoping!

A mystery out back and other signs of summer

I was sitting at my computer this morning, writing a post for this blog, appreciating the faster loading speeds of a new internet provider.  As I sipped coffee I acknowledged the improved turnaround times and enhanced software and hardware for our television and phones were indeed fair trade for the hassles of ditching a long-standing email address.

The Hub came in from his morning rounds outside and asked if I would do him a favor?

"As long as I can do it in my robe..." I answered.  "No problem" he replied, "could you just go out and see if you can figure out what damaged the hibiscus plants last night? Especially the one on the far right.".

I walked over, looked out the window and was shocked to see denuded branches revealing significant defoliation. I rushed out to take a closer look.

The damage occurred from just above the level of the planters up to a certain height where it abruptly stopped. I carefully examined the dirt in the planters, checked the undersides of the remaining leaves, looked all around in the ground cover surrounding the planters.  I found nothing.  No frass, no cocoons, no rolling, no webs, no signs of anything in either size or numbers that could cause so much damage in such a short amount of time.

In fact, if this hadn't happened in our fenced in back yard, I'd swear this sort of devastation could only be caused by browsing deer.  So what in the world could have done this to The Hub's prized hibiscus plants?

The Hub came out to hear my assessment.  I told him I was stumped.  That unless whatever it was had eaten and moved on, we should go out with flashlights tonight and see if we can catch the culprits in action.

"No need" he told me.  Take a look at the dirt in your garden beds and see if that helps you identify what attacked the plants.".  I did as he directed and had to scratch my head.

Deer tracks, leading right over to the hibiscus.  I was shocked. "But how did they get in?".

"We forgot to close the gate last night after the cable installation technician finished up", he said.  And apparently that was all it took. One night, one slip up, one gate left open and a deer considered that all the invitation it needed to casually stroll into our previously protected back yard to help itself to a generous treat of hibiscus leaves.

Mystery solved. (Pilot error.) Deer bugs!  Back to the post in progress.

I wrote recently about the appearance (visually and aurally) of annual cicadas, sure signs that summertime has hit its stride in Central Texas.  Other signifiers of the season?  The mockingbird favorites, berries ripening on the poke salat plants (Phytolacca americana)

and not quite so far along, berries on the beautyberry bushes (Callicarpa americana).

In another ritual of summer we watch for the reappearance of two hummingbirds that thrill us with their aerobatics, consistently vying for dominance of the feeders out back.  

Interesting fact about hummingbird feeders.  Some of the first were designed by and for photographers who desired feeders without a perch to better capture the more visually interesting "hovering" shots of birds sipping nectar. I'm not after action shots so the feeders I favor feature a perch for the hard working little birds to sit and take a load off if they so desire.

Regardless of my intentions, when the two hummingbirds that routinely fight over our feeders are in combat mode, they sip on the fly.  It is only occasionally one of them will have enough solo time to relax and sit while feeding.   I like that.

Even more rarely, one of them will set up a lookout perch on the nearby hanging bells.  That makes me ridiculously happy, because, awwww.

When I see one of these tiny birds perched, I forget for a moment how aggressively fierce they are when establishing or defending what they feel is "their" territory.  At rest, they remind me of sleeping toddlers.  They look deceptively innocent and even sweet.

Happy summer, all!

I have met the enemy...

...and she is adorable.

I am out shooing white tail deer away from my (apparently delicious) plants out front all the live long day. Though I check whenever I cannot sleep, I have never caught one in the act, but the evidence left behind is clear. Occasionally, grazing deer are coming up to our front porch in the middle of the night and gnawing away at the "decor" right by our front door.

I try not to stay angry with them.  I use "deer resistant" native plants and fence off what I cannot otherwise protect.

They are, after all, natives here, just like I am.  They were here before we moved in, and they'll have relatives here long after we move out (or are buried in the back yard which is the only way I said I'd ever leave).

There is one particular doe who has taken a liking to an area out front.  Year after year she leaves her nursing fawns here to wait for her return as she forages.  I try not to be softened by what I cannot resist interpreting as an act of trust.  I try.  But...

Look at that face.

Look at those gangly legs.

Even as I rue their ongoing determination to reduce some of my plants to ground level nubbins, I cannot help but admit to and even admire the appeal of their young ones.

Reminder:  Watch this blog and many others, perhaps even yours? for the inaugural Wildlife Wednesday, July 2nd, 2014 hosted by Tina at My Gardener Says.    

Dang it, Bambi!

I'd been testing out some deer spray recently in my front beds.  I was optimistic it would work just as well as the glowing testimonials on its website indicated.  I did note in reading that most of them were filed from the upper East Coast states.  No matter, New Jersey or Texas, whitetailed deer are whitetailed deer, right?

Maybe.

As of last Thursday I'd only had a chance to put out one first coating of stench.  It's how this particular spray works reportedly, coating the plants and leaving the area around them redolent of Eau de Run Away!

It worked on me.  As soon as I got the spray everywhere I thought it should go I knew I wanted to get away.  Far away.  If a deer nose is any more sensitive than mine, the deal would seem to have been sealed.

The back of the bottle promised the smell would fade to fall under human nasal reactivity levels but remain strong enough to repel the deer.  The instructions advised spraying should be repeated every week for a month, after which the protective effects ought to last out the season, rain or shine.

Just as promised, the morning after the afternoon I'd sprayed the residual smell was barely there, and by the end of a full day in the sun, I didn't notice any smell at all.

Cue our recent torrential rains.

I'd wanted to give the spray a fair trial which meant I needed to get out and re-coat all the areas I was interested in protecting.  I knew this would be especially crucial after getting between 4 and 5 inches of rain in the last round of storms.  Ideally I should have gotten that second coating of spray down yesterday (which was Friday) but life intervened.

"Saturday!"  I thought to myself.  "Tomorrow morning early I will get out and spray the beds.".

Fast forward to this morning as I was lying in bed idly trying to decide if it would be better to have my morning coffee  or go out and spray first before enjoying my coffee at leisure.

But it was Saturday morning, officially the start of a new weekend, and there was just no contest.  Coffee first won hands down.  As the drip coffee maker was chorgling out it's "I'm wrapping it up guys, get your mugs ready" noise, I glanced out through the glass insert in our front door at the areas designated for my aprés-coffee Spray Session the Second.

And that's when I saw her.

So gardener lady, these are the areas you want to protect?  Right about here?  Here where I'm lying down right now?  

A large doe, situated not 18 inches away from the Jewels of Opar plant babies I was getting ready to spray, lying down actually slightly pressing up against one of two small pointy agaves I'd recently transplanted there in hopes of preventing exactly that.  She was calmly chewing her cud, looking like she'd been comfortably situated there for quite some time.

I opened the garage door, grabbed a broom and then whacked it on the driveway hard, making what I hoped was a noise close enough to the alarm the deer send each other by stomping when they spot anything that might present any danger.

It was only after the doe got up and ambled off that I noted this guy, who had also been bedded down, just a few feet away in the ground cover on the far side of my daughter's parked car.

He had been shadowing his lady, (or his lady-to-be?).  Far from being alarmed by my presence, he stepped carefully over to where the doe had been bedded down, and thoroughly checked out the scent she'd left behind, before moving down our drive.

I honestly believe this had nothing to do with the potential efficacy of the deer spray.  The instructions clearly stated it would take more than one application to establish a base coating even under dry weather conditions, and we've surely had the opposite of that recently.

The sad truth is, these beds have been hosting this doe (or others in her herd), and on occasion her babies,

OK they are cute, but they are cute eating machines.

and now apparently, her boyfriend wanna-be.  That grazing and associated bedding down out front has been going on for years.  I'm guessing it might take more than an intermittently applied bad smell to overcome that sort of natural history especially just now, in rutting season.

Actually?  According to the map (and yes of course there is one - you mean you don't follow the Rut Report?) our area is currently about half-way through the "pre-rut", and moving towards the "seeking and chasing" stage.  Which is pretty well supported by what I observed this morning.

Hope springs, however.  As soon as I got this post up I went back out with my spray bottle to apply another coat of Deer No More (not the real name) on the area.  So far there is no reason to think the spray doesn't work just as promised when it is used as directed.  Time will tell (and so will I).  Stay tuned....

UPDATE:  I did in fact get out and spray all the plants and the generalized area I wanted protected from deer browse.  For the record, not a single plant suffered further nibbling damage.  Yes, the deer were sticking around, but more importantly, while here they did not seem inclined to treat our landscape as an all-you-can-eat salad bar.

I put another coating on the plants I'd like to keep off limits, and though it is supposed to rain again next week, I'm going to continue using the spray at the recommended intervals and see if we achieve ongoing deterrence.  Frankly, Bambi and his lady friends are welcome to chill out here occasionally as long as they leave the leaves (and flowers and branches) alone!

Eating Machines

I shot all the following in the span of about 5 minutes, standing in my driveway.  Some of these whitetail deer are foraging across the street, at least two of them were busy working the landscape in my yard.  All of them were methodically working their way through the neighborhood, heads down, munching away.

Below is a shot of the sort of damage they leave in their wake.  Multiply this by several foraging trips through each day, and you get an idea why folks in this area are so keen on plants that are "deer resistant".   They may be picturesque, but these whitetail deer are ravenous all the time.  The plants they like to eat (and a few the young ones haven't figured out yet aren't so good) don't stand a chance.

They especially enjoy the flower stalks of coral yucca.  This plant has had several stems chomped down to stubs multiple times.  Fortunately it won't kill the plant, it just means we won't get to enjoy any blooms.

I try to co-exist peacefully with all the natives in our area.  When it comes to these voracious deer however, I feel no qualms heading out and noisily driving them off.  I realize they'll be back when I'm not out there to shoo them away but I feel obligated to at least try and keep their damage to a minimum.  

A city gal at heart

I don't think of myself as a country type (as in - city type vs.country type).  Not because I live in a large city, I most decidedly do not. No, I think of myself as a city gal mostly because I so thoroughly enjoy the perks that come right along with life in the 'burbs.

I'm talking about perks such as city water, paved streets, and proximity to the grocery store, pet store, bank and library.  I can do most anything I need or ever want to do all while dealing with businesses situated less than 5 miles from our house.

As much as I might enjoy and even insist we are living La Vida Ciudad however, there are those moments I think to myself I may not have quite nailed that designation.

Like today, when these freelance landscapers showed up for the early shift.   They bring a whole new level of meaning to the idea of "edible landscaping".

I am never quite as stealthy as I think I am being, and this especially frisky crew quickly decided to move further on down the line where there were fewer to no folks balancing cameras while liberally sloshing coffee on their driveway.

I feel a lot less urban, under the circumstances.