I know that tankage (putrefied meat scraps) is sometimes hung in orchards, but has anyone tried using putrefied blood as a deer repellent? I ended up using it in the early fall of last year after having mixed up too large a batch of powdered blood meal (i.e., Plantskydd, which also has a sticker in it) in the late summer. This mixture sat around in the basement with a loose foil cover for a month or so and ended up full of maggots and smelling like ripe roadkill. I figured that if it smelled that bad to me that it might be even more effective at preventing rutting damage from the numerous deer on our property. I ended up having absolutely no deer damage this fall and winter, even though I often saw herds of deer running right by the orchard (as well as munching untreated tulips a few feet away). I also used a variety of repellents, such a milorganite bags and soap bars, but I'd used these in prior years and still had substantial rutting damage (e.g., last year I lost two newly planted trees and had substantial rutting damage on five 3 year old trees out of a total of about 50 trees).
For anyone interested in trying it, I added a tablespoon of cayenne pepper to the mix (dogs had previously broken a few branches while pulling down a repellent bags with a mixture of milorganite and blood meal) painted it on the trunks and scaffold branches with a 3" paint brush. You definitely don't want to spray it (or obviously apply anywhere near harvest) and I wore protective gear b/c even a drop takes repeated washings before the smell disappears. The orchard smells terrible for a few days, but it isn't noticeable to humans after that unless you're a few inches from the trunk. One application stuck around for over 2 months. Other than the smell, the only downsides I found were that it really darkens the trunk so disease/pest detection is more difficult (especially fire blight and borers) and the chance of sun scald is probably increased (although I used white plastic spirals during the winter). I was also concerned that I might spread fire blight or canker bacteria through using the same brush and solution, although I did at least avoid painting diseased tissue.
IÂm sure someone has done this before, but IÂve never read anything about it, so I was hoping there wasnÂt a reason for this. Anyone have any thoughts on any of this? IÂm planning on using this again next year, post-harvest through early spring (with homemade and store bought Liquid Fence spray in late spring through harvest).
imred
djofnelsonOriginal Author
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imred
djofnelsonOriginal Author