Last night, a deer ate all my sprouts...

[TreasonousBastard]

Just bent over and started chowing down-- leaving a few bottom leaves on each plant. I really thought I might have a pretty good crop of Brussels sprouts this year, until I looked at them this morning.

Now, I'm thinking venison stew.

[NJCher]

1. Aww, TB

I'm so sorry to hear that. One thing about our area is that a garden almost has to be behind a fence and even then, it's no sure thing.

I visited my gardener mother in the midwest last week and her garden is right out in the open yet nothing is ever eaten or stolen from it. Here we have to contend with groundhogs, squirrels by the dozens, and deer. Plus raccoons and possums. I love 'em all (well, maybe not groundhogs) but it sure is frustrating tgrying to have a garden with them around.




Cher

[TreasonousBastard]

3. I know well the wildlife problems from....

when I lived in NJ. But, then I just commiserated with people I knew who fought the good fight for their gardens, not having one myself then.

Never had a problem when I lived out here on LI before, but with all the new development the woodland critters (and we almost have all the ones you have, even foxes-- no bears or coyotes, though) seem to have lost their normal feeding grounds. Just like in NJ.

I'm used to not feeding the outdoor cat at night because the possums and raccoons get the food. I'm also used to the bluejays and crows hitting the dish during the day when she's off hunting.

But nothing, not even the rabbits or the moles and gophers, have bothered the vegetable garden before last night.

At least it's just the sprouts, and everything else is OK-- eggplants, melons and squash seem to be critter-proof so far, and the sugar peas, lettuce and stuff are long over. I've got some sprout seeds left, and if we have a late enough winter, they might do after all. I never got around to planting the spinach, so maybe I'll try that and hope for a really late frost and deer who have found something else to eat.

Worst comes to worse, there is a small geenhouse next door that is unused.

And I'm still thinking roasted venison goes mighty well with butternut squash.

[Kolesar]

2. We put in an electric fence

One wire at 4", one chest high, and a third wire midway. We have been seeing a doe and triplets around and they never got to our corn. Killed a cow bird today though. Second bird this year. Wah. Don't like doing that. Sorry about your brussel sprouts. They are one of my favorite crops too.

[TreasonousBastard]

4. It's a small patch I put down...

because I never grew food before, just years of growing ornamentals, and this is more of an experiment than a real food-growing enterprise. So, I don't know if the expense of an electric fence is worth it.

Gotta admit that I've got a couple dozen melon and squash hills going strong, and if the critters have a taste for that stuff, I should do something.

I'm thinking along the lines of venison stew.

Venison and butternut squash soup-- with lemon grass from the herb garden.

[Kolesar]

6. 250,000 to 25,000,000 deer in this country in fifty years.

A thousand times more. They have exterminated many species of flowers in the forest understory in my county. I read that the deer are going to change the nature of our forests by selectively browsing the new shoots. The wonderful variety of trees that we have will be replaced by birch trees (IIRC).

I am a vegetarian because I don't like the lives that farm animals have to live. I always tell people I would make an exception for game, but in reality that only means an occasional salmon dinner (or perch once a year).

I don't think the lives that deer live are so swell, with overpopulation "pushing" them into suburbia--scraping by on insufficient forage and getting struck by motor vehicles and dying of trauma in minutes or hours. If I shot a deer I don't know what I would do with it. The closest I ever got to dressing game was deboning chicken breasts.

[TreasonousBastard]

7. One problem we had in NJ was that...

in some of the parks and preserves the deer had scrubbed the place clean up to 6' high. That meant that the ground birds, chipmunks, and whatever else lived there were pretty well starved out, along with the deer. Then the red-tailed hawks, foxes, and other predators were left with little food. It was pretty bad.

The usual fights broke out between the kill-em and no-kill-em factions, and even within those factions nobody could agree on a plan. In one park, the state ended up sending in State Police sharpshooters at dawn to wipe out half the herd before anyone would notice. All hell was raised when the word got out, but the deed was done.

Here on LI we've got pretty much the same problems, but there haven't been too many fights about it lately. When they do break out, though, town councils have been dissolved over it.

For a city boy like me, there is something really neat about walking out into the yard and coming face-to-face with a deer and her fawns, and I don't relish the thought of killing them, but the problem is really overwhelming in some places, and nature is seriously out of balance.

[TygrBright]

9. We eliminated their predators....

...with stringent hunting rules and driving out/killing wolves, bear, etc.

Nature can be redder in tooth and claw by FAR than human agency in some cases.

Deer are seriously overpopulated in most parts of the country, and many areas haven't examined their hunting rules/laws for decades. Regulations should be focused on safety, and limits lifted to allow a greater cull of the population. Unrestricted buck hunting would be a nice start. Thin the buck population and the breeding goes way down.

Whatever you may think of human bloodlust and the ickiness of walls decorated with bits of dead animals (that school of decor grosses me out although I've no objection to hunting otherwise,) it ain't NEARLY as cruel as what nature does when a population becomes too large for a habitat to support. It's not even as cruel as the normal predation cycle. Bears don't often go after adult deer (unless the deer is injured, slow, sick, etc.) But if not focused on scavenging human food, many of the larger bear species will go after fawns. Yogi vs. Bambi.

All life lives at the expense of other life. Humane methods of hunting, fishing, and farming and slaughtering domestic animals is normal, not cruel. Cruelty is mass farming, mass fishing, 'efficient' slaughter, etc. IOW, the stuff that makes food both poor quality and cheap.

We have lost all respect for our food.

sadly,
Bright

[Ecumenist]

5. AMEN, Treasonous!!

I told DH when we were looking for property that if we ended up buying in an area known for deer, we'd be eating "Bambi Suprise" and sporting the Daniel Boone look in regards to clothing. Needless to say, we are in a area where there are no deer problems. Our property has HUGE black hares from Chernobyl. I've never seen a rabbit like creature so large in my life.

[NMDemDist2]

8. we have desert hares out here the size of a welsh terrier

they are HUGH!!!

I'll get a pic soon as I get the deck cleared off enough to sit out there :)