You have deer. We have bears. We're visited by anywhere from one to four bears a few nights each week.

I think they're looking for porridge.

quote:

Originally posted by V-Tail:
You have deer. We have bears. We're visited by anywhere from one to four bears a few nights each week.

I think they're looking for porridge.

Oh, we got bears too. We had to quit feeding birds in the Summer. We feed over the Winter when Yogi is hibernating.

Had an opportunity to fire a rubber LTL round at that doe last night.

COMPLETELY underwhelming. Seems to be propelled by the primer only. Almost no noise, ballistics were laughable. At a range of 20 yards at the most (likely less) I could watch it in flight, it curved 6 feet to the right and the doe was more surprised by noticing me than anything else. She walked off about 10 yards and stood there looking at me like "That's all you've got?" Complete waste of money.

I have some .38spl birdshot, I'll try that next, hoping it will at least make some noise. Won't shoot directly at the critter, don't want to take a chance on wounding it.

If you want to simply scare them off and don't need the meat: get a dog. Borrow a neighbors if you have too.

For myself, I leave the deer be and change the plants.

My relatives relied on small orchards high up on the rocky Mountains for food (and not much else). The technique there was to wait until close to harvest time, then kill the best deer for food (easy shot from the house as they were eating your apples) with a high powered rifle right at or close to sunset. The deer was the protein for your 6 kids over the winter. The apples then got harvested, and the deer were thereafter undisturbed and got anything else which then fell on the ground afterwards (plentiful food for them as winter approached).

Well, I give up. .38 made a lot of noise, but she remains unimpressed.

I haven't seen her the last couple of nights, but I suspect that's more coincidence than effect.

I'm REALLY saddened by the fact that they've developed a taste for my oriental lilies. They were beautiful and my favorite flower, but there's not much point in growing them if I have to put an ugly and view-obstructing fence around them to preserve them.

I'd LOVE to have a dog again. We never had a problem with critters outside the occasional skunk or porcupine, but Mrs. PHPaul is allergic and in our world there's no such thing as an "outside only" dog.