BAD TASTE
Several weeks ago, I wrote about this year’s local wildlife explosion and my neighbors’ agitation over the small deer herd that has taken up residence on our block. The deer are still with us and were last seen chewing indiscriminately though some overgrown wisteria on the other side of my back fence. Now that Hurricane Irene has blown through, most everyone is busy picking up branches, drying out cellars or replacing food that went bad while the power was out. Comparatively speaking, it will be a relief to have only the deer to worry about when life resumes its normal rhythm.
But the day will come and the deer will loom large. Thinking about deer resistant plants now is a good way to take a break from thinking about the storm’s aftermath.
As all the experts warn, almost no plant is “deer proof.” Starving deer will eat just about anything and ruminants in different areas eat different plants. A shrub shunned by deer in Detroit may be like catnip to the antlered varmints in Knoxville. Deer, who aren’t burdened by the need to earn diplomas, degrees or certificates, do not have to exhibit logical behavior.
Still, there are some plants that are generally ignored by deer, especially if something more palatable is close at hand. If, like most suburbanites, you can’t fence your entire garden, the best strategy is to cordon off plants–like hostas and daylilies–that deer find delicious, and plant masses of specimens that make Mr. Antlers and his claque turn up their noses.
The following are a few good specimens for each season:
Fall: Asters, those mainstays of the fall garden, are sometimes listed as being relatively unattractive to deer. I wouldn’t bet the farm on it. The same goes for chrysanthemums. Spray both with repellant and plant lots of colchicum, a low-growing crocus-like plant that almost never finds favor with the four-legged eating machines. Colchicums come in shades of white, pink and purple and have either single or double blooms. The double varieties look a bit like water lilies. Order and plant now for blooms in late September or October. The rather coarse-looking leaves appear in the summer, many months after the blooms, but if you plant cleverly amid ground cover like the deer-resistant ajuga, the effect of those leaves will be minimized. When they turn brown, you can cut them off.
Winter: Deer have to work harder in winter to find anything to eat. They will happily munch yews, which should, by all rights, be poisonous to them. They are less likely to eat andromeda or Pieris japonica, and that fact is a great boon to gardeners. With evergreen leaves and fragrant, bell-shaped blooms in early spring, pieris should be in every garden–regardless of the deer threat level. Underplant with one of the many available varieties of hellebore, which covers the ground, provides long-lasting flowers starting at the end of winter and is untroubled by deer. Many garden centers and online nurseries carry Helleborus orientalis hybrids, with single or double flowers in shades ranging from white to pale green to deepest purple. I am especially fond of Helleborus niger or Christmas rose, which sends out white blossoms, sometimes as early as mid February in my part of the world. The flowers eventually fade to a lovely pink, while remaining impervious to deer or rodent attacks.
Spring: Two genera will get you through spring without deer depredation–narcissus and allium, otherwise known as daffodils and ornamental onions. There are a great many varieties of daffodils available, from tiny miniatures like ‘Jack Snipe’ to stately trumpet and large-cupped varieties like ‘Mount Hood.’ If you pick wisely from the array of early, mid and late season varieties, you can have eight weeks of lovely, deer-resistant color. Ornamental onions or allium make a nice contrast with daffodils and the large, round-headed ones, like purple-flowered ‘Globemaster’ and ‘Gladiator,’ provide architectural interest at the backs of beds and borders. If you want something a little smaller, try Allium ostrowskianum, which stands only six to eight inches tall, and features rose-pink flowerheads.
Summer: There are many beautiful summer-flowering plants that are rarely or seldom damaged by deer. Unfortunately, my favorites, roses, are not among them. I spray them assiduously with foul-smelling deer repellant and hope that the lumbering varmints don’t think of it as some kind of aphrodisiac. When not spraying, I plant agastache, also sometimes know as anise hyssop or hummingbird mint. Agastache is deer-resistant, drought hardy and attractive to butterflies, hummingbirds and other pollinators. The plants have been the darlings of horticultural cognoscenti for the past ten years, and as the result, there are many varieties and colors available. Two years ago I planted Agastache ‘Salmon and Pink’ in my garden. It smells lemony, blooms on and off throughout the summer and improves the appearance of a whole section of the front border. I look at it and forget the vacant stare of Mr. Antlers and the two young males who form his current posse.
Even under ideal conditions, we live in a fragile ecosystem. Choosing the right plants helps make the backyard ecosystem just a little more resilient.