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I may have created a monster! No, I'm kidding... But I encouraged my parents to attend the garden tour this weekend and now Mom wants me to do a design a garden for her. She has some garden--we are not starting from scratch. She's gardened for years, knows the basics, doesn't mind a little maintenance, etc.
The main challenge to designing a garden plan for her is the deer. She lives out in the country--in a little suburban-like subdivision of one street with about 20 to 25 houses. The houses all back up to undeveloped woods. One neighbor feeds the deer (as if there were not already too many deer in the area!) so a herd of deer move through her yard daily. Before this neighbor moved in and the deer got so bad, she used to have a rose garden with about 18 rosebushes beside the front drive. Only 2 or 3 tiny bushes remain now and she never gets to see them bloom 'cause the darling deer (sarcasm intentional) eat the buds right before they open! They regularly mow down her hostas...
We need to develop a plan that relies heavily on plants the deer only eat when they can't get anything else. Mom has some full sun areas, some full shade areas, and some in between. So there's a place in her yard for almost any kind of plant. Mom's yard is zone 6a.
I have no experience with planning a deer resistant garden. Any help y'all can give me about what to plant that the deer won't automatically munch on, will be very appreciated. I know about the deer repellent spray stuff--can't think of the name right now...Plantskydd or something like that...but I'd like to plant stuff that the deer won't really want to eat so we won't have to rely heavily on sprays, electric fencing, etc. Mom loves things that bloom--the more heavily it flowers, the better!
TIA for any help/advice!
Kim
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