When I was a kid I’d occasionally see a deer while playing out behind my grandfather’s property which was in a rural area. You’d occasionally see them way back in the woods, behind the farm my grandfather grew up on. Occasionally, as in if you’re a kid playing in the woods for half the day all summer long, you might see one or two. Nowadays I’m living in a "city’ of about 40,000 and the deer are out every night. Some of them travel in large groups. “Deer-resistant” plants like arborvitaes aren’t always safe from the deer. Driving around there is sometimes visible winter damage on people’s arborvitae plants but only within the reach of deer. They get all plump in the summer eating people’s hostas, flowers, etc but then in the winter they’re getting by on whatever they can reach. It’s not good for people or deer.
we have a metro zone here. You can hunt with bow. You have to be so far off trails/roads/etc. They also have special hunts for disabled in areas near town. I think there isn’t enough hunters and the future looks bleak. I doubt many youtube generation kids are going to take up hunting.
You’re right, if they can’t figure out if they’re a boy or a girl…they’re not likely to be into forging for supper or shooting a deer or bear.
7 trees (all in ground) removed so far. 4 plum, 1 sweet cherry, 2 apple. Saved all the big chunks and chipped everything thinner then a half dollar or so. Still have a couple more trees to go. Cut them all about flush with the soil line… They’ll probably sprout but i’ll just keep mowing them until the termites do their thing.
Why did you decide to remove them?
Rob,
Would you like to post your thought on this thread. Love to hear your reasons.
I have been buying very good cherries, now over 24 lb over 2 months. Done for the year. I Am surprised about the big size and tasting.
The drought has something to do with the taste, sweeter than normal years
I’m not sure how I can combat this. My entire peach crop is under attack primarily by honey bees. The wasp traps have caught wasps but the peaches are destroyed by honey bees. They are close to ripe but still hard. I was hoping to pick them when ripe but they will never make it that long. I can’t spray anything on them since they are at harvest and I don’t want to kill honey bees. Guess I can pick what is left and hope they soften up. Darn it.
Clemson bags 
If honeybees are the only problem…put out some sugar syrup. That’ll get their attention.
What actually ripped into the peach and caused the initial damage? Surely not the honeybees…
I think you’re right. Honeybees aren’t known to cut into fruit like hornets and wasps…but will take advantage of high sugar juice, beverages, etc.
Birds? Hornets?
(Incidentally, honeybees aren’t fooled by artificial sWeeteners.)
I just really found out about them a week or two ago and didn’t have time to order them.
Probably wasps but I’m not certain. I have a wasp trap in the tree that’s captured a lot of wasps. The wasp trap has a sugar solution and seems pretty effective. I didn’t notice any honey bees in the wasp trap.
We have smaller deer here than in a lot of places - we call them swamp deer. A couple of years ago a virus (something to do with their tongues?) knocked down their population almost to nothing. But now they are ‘back’. And they cause the same havoc that you and others describe. The first year our trees were planted they rubbed a lot of bark off - so I put wire around the trunks and prayed that the trees would heal. Apparently - they did. Even though a lot of bark was gone. Now I routinely put wire around the trunks of my fruit trees.
This year I really wanted to protect my grafts - so we got chicken wire and strong metal posts and created ‘cages’. These worked, amazingly enough! No more nibbling.
There are many car accidents, too. My daughter had a deer try to jump over the hood of her car and it landed on her windshield - committing ‘death by auto’, scaring Sarah to death and damaging her car. Funny thing . . . a local ‘venison lover’ showed up to nab the deer even before the police arrived at the scene!
Back to cages . . .
For some reason the deer did not try to get past the chicken wire or the Tenax deer netting that we used for the cages. We just removed a couple of these cages to let the branches ‘breathe’. These cages worked well - but ‘worked us’ too! We have to move the posts out farther every so often to allow the tree branches to spread. It’s a pain . . . but if we didn’t we probably would not get any fruit.
You might try chicken wire, Jim. I don’t think the deer like the sharp little edges. The black heavy-duty deer net works well for me - but I don’t have large deer.
Okay, so here’s a little more of the story. The township is trying to take away my chickens. We have had hens for 7 years now. Before we got the chickens, we called and asked and got a verbal okay to proceed. Nearly 8 years later, the zoning officer came to my house (and was awful to my wife (glad I wasn’t there)) and issued us a violation for the chickens. We are currently in the process of filing an appeal, so we’ll see how that goes. They said someone complained, but I don’t buy it. We have asked all our neighbors and they all signed our petition.
Anyway, I am trying to avoid putting a lot of fencing around the trees this year until this blows over. I would surround the entire orchard with 10 foot fence if they would leave me alone about it. I do have the black netting wrapped around a few of the trees, which now seems like it may be working after the deer ate the pears around the outside.
Next year I’m planning on making a fence of the deer netting surrounding the trees. I’m thinking like one foot away from the farthest branches so they can’t jump over it.
Right now I’m doing my best to keep our chickens. They are our pets and have names and feed my family. We haven’t bought eggs in 7 years. I know I’m preaching to the choir, but they are soooo important to us and how we choose to live. I won’t rant, yet, but 1.5 years ago there were no eggs in the supermarket. Families in my neighborhood were able to dye Easter eggs because we gave them eggs. The entire situation makes my stomach lurch.
One does wonder if the wildlife start carrying a disease that is easily spread to humans…what government might do for a solution. (Hopefully not order hazmat suits for humans or something 
)
Carrying ticks …