In article ,
Pat Meadows wrote:

On Tue, 16 Sep 2003 00:32:57 -0500, Phaedrine Stonebridge
wrote:

Neighbors feed them which is totally stupid. Unafraid of
humans, they are in the yards constantly, grazing. Today I counted six
near the lower garden, just itching to eat some more of my raspberry
bushes. They have even come into our garage.

Our garden is *inside* our dogs' fenced area. Even though
the dogs sleep in the house at night, so far this has kept
the deer away. I think it's the dog smell which must
permeate the yard.

I have my fingers crossed that it continues....

I can remember when I lived in northern NJ and had four dogs
(three of them large). The deer would be calmly picking up
fallen apples from the ground, about six feet outside a
chain link fence - inside of which four dogs were barking
hysterically. Brazen deer!

So far, the deer here in rural northcentral PA don't seem to
be made from the same cloth as the brazen NJ deer. So far.



Never fear, they'll catch on to domesticity soon enough. Here, you
have to have a minimum 6 foot fence (7 is even more reliable) to keep
them out. We could never afford that much fence and it would look like
a prison yard at that height. LOL The dogs here chase them constantly
to no avail. The neighbor's boxer has made it his mission in life to
chase them. When my DH confronted a young buck in the garage, it
screamed in surprise (i did not know deer made any sounds actually) and
then dashed off, running through the upper garden like a charging rhino.
Occasionally, I get out the sling shot and nail one in the hind quarters
just hard enough to sting really bad. That also helps for a day or 2
lol. Black bears are reported in Eastern Missouri for the first time in
like a century so it will be interesting to see what happens.