If deer do not browse pawpaws (which is what I have read but can't attest to personally) and given that pawpaw leaves do have that distinctive smell (which makes the claim more believable) you wonder if an extract from pawpaw leaves or bark could be used as an effective deer repellent if sprayed on other plants. Or, better yet, a cheaper synthesized version.

Someone at the workshop said that pepper, in some of the sprays, is not good for bees. I am worred about all pollinators .After I sprayed early in the season, all insects avoided the plants for several weeks. Now I just spray the foliage I have used Liquid Fence but prefer I Must Garden. It appears to last longer, through more rainy periods. It also smells not quite so bad...has cinnamon, mint, and lemon grass oils as well as the eggs and garlic, of course. Don't want to hurt the wildflie. Here we only kill copperheads when they get close to the house. Unfortunately, this year our dog was "fanged" on the nose and has had extensive vet treatments and medicine. The cost of living in the woods. Thanks for all input.

I live smack dab in the middle of a small town and we have developed quite the deerherd that comes down from the woods and roams the streets (when, I don't know, probably early early morning since I have never seen a deer, only the nibbled plants that they left behind) and dines at their leisure. Since fencing my yard was not a practical option I tried a number of folk remedies including moth balls, hot pepper, "Not Tonight Deer", etc. As far as I could tell, none had any long term effect and the munching continued. The day before I ordered my Ouzi and camos, I attended a Spring plant day organized by my local Cooperative Extension and picked up a couple of newsletters. One had a very simple remedy for a deer repellent in it. Damage was beginning to escalate since I apparently had the tastiest selection in the neighborhood. I decided to try the repellent recipe. I bought one and one half dozen eggs and cracked them into a bowl. I beat them enough to break the yolks and mixed the white and the yolk thoroughly. I stretched a piece of cheesecloth over the mouth of a jumbo size mayonnaise jar and held it in place with a large rubber band (final container has to hold a little more than two quarts of liquid). I poured the eggs through the cheese cloth. The cheese cloth caught the big slimy bits and I threw it away. I added two quarts of water to the beaten eggs in the jar and mixed them together. I used a funnel to pour the egg mixture into a cleaned out Windex sprayer (any sprayer that can be adjusted to spray a mist can be used) and sprayed every plant in my yard, leaves and all. I didn't drench the plant, I just tried to leave a light coating on most of it up to the height of a tall deer. I refilled the bottle and kept spraying until I used all the egg mixture up. I swear I had no more deer damage at all the whole summer. This stuff lasted through rain just fine and I have not reapplied it. Why did this work? Well, the guy who submitted the recipe said he thinks it's because deer have a very keen sense of smell and rotting eggs don't smell very good. The smell to humans is very faint to begin with and non existent after several days. I did not have to reapply for the same reason you have to scrub so hard to get eggs out of pans . . . egg really sticks and it's hard to wash off! I also applied it on a clear day and the egg had a good few days to dry and get adheared before it rained. I should point out that dried eggs are the basis of "Not Tonight Deer" but I found it very expensive and hard to mix and apply. The man who submitted the recipe has a commercial Christmas tree grove and suffered costly and unsightly damage to his trees every year until he tried this. He sprayed only the surrounding outside row of trees and claims that three years later deer still avoid his trees to the point that they won't walk past the smelly outside trees to get to the untreated inside trees. Sorry to write such a long answer but I wanted to be clear on how to try this. I owe a huge debt of gratitude to this guy as he really saved my whole yard and garden. I wanted to pass it on. Its such a wonderful solution . . . it's organic, it's earth friendly, it's long lasting, it's cheap and it does not involve hurting or injuring the deer.

A hippopotamus is supposedly a strict herbivore. When we lived in Western Kenya, we used to drive down to the Masai Mara for weekends, and one time, we were there just at the start of that huge wildebeest migration. As seen on National Geographic specials, they all pile into the Mara River, which is full of big crocodiles that eat them. So we showed up along the river, and there are a about a hundred stuffed-to-the-nine huge crocs on the banks burping away, a whole bunch of drowned wildebeest in the river stinking the place up, and all these hippos gnawing away on the bodies. No body believes me. But it's true!!! I just saw the gaping hole in the fence where the deer have been jumping in and out. It is soooooo muddy there, the fence is going to stay that way for a while.