Deer fence for orchard

[ReeferMac]

I've got a bunch of small apple tree's I'm getting ready to plant (along w/ some other fruit tree's, and berry bushes too...), and they're in an area that's got a lot of deer.

I've offered up the area for friends to hunt there to cut down on the population, but plan to fence them in for a few years as well, until they grow and get established.

I've read deer have very poor depth perception, and placing a fence  at an angle, will go a long ways to deter them from jumping over.

I've got access to a ton of small straight tree's of whatever length I want to cut them to, so far I've been making them 12'. I was thinking of placing them at an angle outwards, and putting a few strings of electrical wire around the outside, getting a solar charger to electrify. Costs are an issue, need to be as cheap as possible, but I'm thinking between the angle and electrification, it should be enough to keep the deer from jumping inside and feasting?

Any thoughts, advice, or suggestions are welcomed and appreciated!

Thanks.

 

- Kevin

[Sidecarist]

In my experience there's not much you can do to keep deer from jumping any reasonable fence. I've seen them clear some remarkable obstacles both in height and width.

On the other hand I've never seen them pick apples from a tree. They WILL go to great lengths to get the ones that have fallen to the ground...

There are several ways to wire an electric fence. Deer can be resistant to traditional wiring where all the wires are hot, and the energizer is grounded with a rod in the ground. They don't transmit the electricity through the hooves well. Wire the fence with every other wire + and -. Space them about 6in apart. This will keep most anything out. Bears, possums, skunks, raccoons, deer you name it. This is how I wire the fence around my bees.

Come to think of it possums are probably a bigger problem for picking g apples than any other animal! I know they will pick peaches and plums and damage the trees in the process! Angry little buggers too...if only until they see the flash...

[dralarms]

11 minutes ago, Sidecarist said:

In my experience there's not much you can do to keep deer from jumping any reasonable fence. I've seen them clear some remarkable obstacles both in height and width.

On the other hand I've never seen them pick apples from a tree. They WILL go to great lengths to get the ones that have fallen to the ground...

There are several ways to wire an electric fence. Deer can be resistant to traditional wiring where all the wires are hot, and the energizer is grounded with a rod in the ground. They don't transmit the electricity through the hooves well. Wire the fence with every other wire + and -. Space them about 6in apart. This will keep most anything out. Bears, possums, skunks, raccoons, deer you name it. This is how I wire the fence around my bees.

Come to think of it possums are probably a bigger problem for picking g apples than any other animal! I know they will pick peaches and plums and damage the trees in the process! Angry little buggers too...if only until they see the flash...

Need to show you pork chop. He stands on his hind legs and pulls apples of my red delicious tree in the back yard

[Omega]

I planted small fruit trees at my place, deer would eat the leaves leaving them bald.  I placed 4' welded wire fencing around each tree with no room to jump in and not close enough to the tree for them to eat the leaves, about 2' away from the branches. 

[RED333]

Took me a bit to find it, check out "The Yearling" movie. Deer can jump very high.

[mikegideon]

Nail one of these to each side of every tree. Deer won't come near them. None of us will either

[peejman]

My parents use this, it works reasonably. 

http://www.liquidfence.com

[VERO1]

The old timers around my parents place in North Carolina swore that hanging a bar of soap, or a mesh bag containing human hair would keep deer away from the trees. Never tried it, but it's cheap enough.