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deer damage to old teas

7 years ago

we live in a huge subdivision (5000 acres) recently a large portion of the subdivision flooded for 10 plus days, some areas are still flooded our property is on the highest natural elevation in the subdivision and we did not get water, what we got is deer by the hundreds at this moment i have almost 50 in my backyard, withing 250 feet of the roses i used my old standby, liquid fence twice, it is normally very effective, but during this time of stress, the deer just munched right on through my roses, they did ignore my lilies and herbs

my mostly old tea roses are merely sticks now and i'm guessing i should just leave them alone (no pruning) just water they are in raised beds of rose soil, fertilized with an excellent organic soil builder

does anyone else have suggestions on what else i could do for for these less than 2 year old babies?

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Comments (5)

Anne Zone 7a Northern CA
7 years ago
I have had lots of deer damage and now cage my roses. As the deer mainly graze all my plants have come back just fine from being eaten from the top. I trim the hanging parts and make cuts on all the ends so they aren;t the gnaed look but deer often do a nice job with clean bites. It's the bottom feeders (gopher and voles) that do more damage but they too will come back with some tlc. Good luck!
zippity1 thanked Anne Zone 7a Northern CA
jacqueline9CA
7 years ago
I think your ideas about what to do are correct. The roses will recover. After all of the water recedes, hopefully your deer herd will be able to leave your property. Think of your property as Noah's Ark.

After things get back to normal, you might want to investigate fencing your yard. Once deer find a good source of food, they tend to remember it.

Jackie
zippity1 thanked jacqueline9CA
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zippity1
Original Author
7 years ago
Jackie and Anne thank you for your responses Anne, how large are your teas now and Jackie, our yard is 4 acres so fencing would be to large of an expense.....and weedeating and mowing would be a nightmare....actually they have already left, they really really don't like the odor of liquid fence as soon as some of their normal ranges cleared, they were pretty much gone i'm just trying not to make big mistakes with their recovery......
Anne Zone 7a Northern CA
7 years ago
My roses are all in infancy only 1-2 years old, however roses like Gertrude Jekyll are about 6' tall while the teas are 3' and below. I had many that were eaten by gophers and out of 30 I have lost only 2 after burying them deeply to allow own roots to grow on the advice of compatriots here. I now make individual cages for the roses out of 2" chicken wire until they are huge and a little munching won't matter. And I bury them in 10-15 gallon pots. I now have a vole which eats them off on TOP of the ground. I'm hoping something eats it. What made me the maddest is not the excessive damage to the roses but that the deer wait till the bud is about a day away from opening THEN they eat it.
zippity1 thanked Anne Zone 7a Northern CA
Sheila z8a Rogue Valley OR
6 years ago
Anne, How are your roses doing?

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