How To Keep Deer Away From Pumpkins

It’s so rewarding to see your pumpkin patch grow, only to one day find some of it stomped and eaten by deer!

It sinks your heart to see the fruits of your labor all torn to bits.

Though deer are majestic creatures, they can become big-sized troublesome pests!

So, how to keep deer away from pumpkins?

So, how can you tell if deers are eating away at your pumpkin?

Let’s find out and get into the details of how you can keep deer away from your pumpkins!

5 Ways To Prevent Deer From Eating Pumpkins

There’s nothing more heartbreaking than waking up one morning to see your pumpkin patch invaded and wrecked.

The problem is that deer can eat the skin, seeds, flesh, and pumpkin leaves. This can destroy your garden.

Your only choice is to prevent the deer from entering your pumpkin garden in the first place.

Here are five ways you can do just that:

1. Place Tall Fencing Around Your Pumpkin Patch

Installing tall fences is the best foolproof method to keep deer from entering your pumpkin garden.

The word ‘tall’ is important here as deer are one of the best athletes in the animal kingdom, able to perform Olympic-level jumps over fences!

Imagine a hungry deer passing by your big juicy pumpkin patch; it’ll put all its energy into its jump to get through to have a tasty meal!

Because deer are good jumpers, you must put up fences at least 10 feet high.

This is because deer are agile and can easily jump as high as 8 feet. So, make things impossible for them by installing tall fences.

2. Motion-Activated Sprinklers

Deers get startled easily, so using a system that can scare them away without hurting them is the perfect deterrent. This is where motion-activated sprinklers come into play.

As the name suggests, the sprinklers are activated when they detect movement in their sensor’s range. You can install them on the borders of your pumpkin garden.

If deer or any other animal tries to get to your pumpkins, the sprinkler will activate and spray water in that direction.

This sudden stream of water will startle the beast and scare it away. And the best part is you’re not hurting the deer in any way!

3. Scare Them Away With Spooky Lights

Building upon the motion-activated sprinklers, you can also install motion-sensing lights.

The goal is to startle and scare the deer and any other animal, so installing scary predator eye-shaped lights can also help.

You can add the sound factor as well. By placing flashing lights and predator sounds on the border of your pumpkin patch, you can ensure that no trespasser comes in without tripping on the alarm.

4. DIY Loud Metallic Sound Traps

You can make metallic sound alarm traps if you’re not into motion-sensing alarms. Here’s how you can do that:

• Start by installing fence posts around your pumpkin garden.
• Take a lot of tin cans and punch some holes in them.
• Tie the tin cans in stacks to separate fishing lines.
• Connect each fence post with a fishing line, end to end.
• Ensure the fishing line is about 3 feet high, near chest high for a deer.

Fishing lines are thin, making them impossible to see in the dark.

So a deer coming close to your fen will trip the fishing line, causing stairs with the tin cans. This sudden clinging and crashing of the cans will send the deer running!

5. Use Deer-Repellent Sprays & Smells

Deer have a strong sense of smell, which is why in the old days’ hunters never bathed with soap or put on any scent when going deer hunting.

You can use this to your advantage; if deer detect a human scent or something strong and repulsive, they will avoid coming close.

You can place old dirty rags sprayed with awful deer-repelling smells like peppermint, garlic, or scented soap.

Also, if you have a dog, you can stink up the rags with dog urine to scare away the deer, as they’ll think it stinks like a predator!

How To Verify Deer Activity in Your Pumpkin Patch

Animals love eating fresh fruits and vegetables right from the garden.

Whether they’re pests like rats and mice, or big animals like deer, they won’t let the chance of eating your pumpkins go to waste.

Here are 3 ways to tell if deer are invading your pumpkin garden:

1. Hoof Prints

If it’s a deer, it’ll leave some heavy hoof prints on your ground.

The best way to identify deer prints is that they resemble an upside-down heart shape.

The toe impressions at the top are pointy and close to each other, with a split in the middle.

2. Entire Plants Have Been Eaten

Deer are big animals with even bigger appetites. So, if they enter your pumpkin patch, they’ll eat their fill by consuming the leaves, skin, and the entirety of the pumpkin unless they are disturbed, of course!

Because deer weigh heavy, they can stomp anything to reach whatever they’re going after.

So, you may see flattened plants along the path to your pumpkins.

3. Deer Poop

If you spot a pile of scat-shaped small dark pallets, you have deer activity in your area.

Unlike other animals, deer poop in large amounts in a single location rather than all over the place.

So look around; if you spot piles of dark pallet poop in other areas, you may be dealing with more than one deer.

Summary

Deer can be a sight when spotted in the wild, but not so much when they’re close to your pumpkin patch. You don’t want them anywhere near there as they’ll destroy the entire produce.

Here are 5 ways to keep deer away from pumpkins:

1. Place tall fencing around your pumpkin patch.
2. Motion-activated sprinklers.
3. Scare them away with mysterious lights.
4. DIY loud metallic sound traps.
5. Use deer-repellent sprays and smells.

These simple measures can prevent the deer from entering your garden, allowing you to enjoy watching your pumpkins grow into giant orange fruits!