Last year GFE maintenance attached a few broomstick-type poles to the top of the fence as extensions, strung twine through holes drilled in the poles, and tied on strips of yellow caution-tape. The high winds whipped the string and caution-tape to shreds.
After the Garden group meeting on March 10th, Kent was asked his opinion about the fence. However, Ray W did not want to use [more durable] wire, because we did not want to injure the deer. He had plenty of string that was at least stronger than twine.
Nothing was done for over a month.
So we went to the woodshop and found scraps of lumber to make additional 2-foot extensions from every post of the chain-link fence, not just every 3 of 4 posts. We attached eye-screws to the extensions at 1- and 2-feet above the chain-link fence. We strung Ray's string through the eye screws and wrapped the string around each extension several times to minimize friction.
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| GFE Garden with a "deer-fence" extension |
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| Lower end of the garden with compost bins |
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| The fierce winds did whip the CDs, wrapping them around and around the fence string, which was okay |
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| Eventually we had most of the CDs in place |
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| At the upper end of the garden, Ray has many garden plots filled with tomato plants |
As expected, the fence string has broken a couple times, and a few CDs have cracked and "slipped away." We doubled the string fence and shortened the CD strings, and can only say that it has lasted longer than the first deer fence attempt.
Addendum: Ray insists that deer are still getting into the garden, leaving impressions in newly tilled soil. But there are no distinct deer hoof prints, which one would expect if they were jumping into the garden. One GFE resident has an animal-cam, and has verified that there is a chipmunk living in the garden. The impressions could be chipmunk or even bird scratchings.
