Damn Deer

[Elvis]

When we moved from the Texas Hill Country, we were so happy to have flowers in our flowerbeds and colorful things around our home. But, damit, the deer followed us. Just got home from vacation to find all of our new flowerbeds wiped out. Depressing and expensive.

Have a Rachio3 controller. I'm looking for suggestions for using motion detectors or camera motion detectors to fire off specific zones to scare them off.

1. Will the Rachio driver allow me to programmatically "quick run" a zone?

2. Any reliable outdoor motion sensors compatible with C4?

3. How about using Ring motion with the Ring driver? I hate to have to have cameras everywhere I have flowers though. Adds up.

Thanks for any ideas.

[eggzlot]

4 hours ago, Elvis said:

When we moved from the Texas Hill Country, we were so happy to have flowers in our flowerbeds and colorful things around our home. But, damit, the deer followed us. Just got home from vacation to find all of our new flowerbeds wiped out. Depressing and expensive.

Have a Rachio3 controller. I'm looking for suggestions for using motion detectors or camera motion detectors to fire off specific zones to scare them off.

1. Will the Rachio driver allow me to programmatically "quick run" a zone?

2. Any reliable outdoor motion sensors compatible with C4?

3. How about using Ring motion with the Ring driver? I hate to have to have cameras everywhere I have flowers though. Adds up.

Thanks for any ideas.

A fence 6’ or taller

I went far down this wormhole and had a half baked design but never did it. 
 

Then we got a fence this spring. 

[Elvis]

Oh yeah, fencing works but not if it obstructs our view. So that’s out. 

[Cyknight]

Can't comment on if sprinklers will drive them off, though a roaring cougar might.

For outdoor motions, the Axxes Industries ones work a charm, have had two outside now for motion lighting .... gosh more than 5 years for sure.

[Cyknight]

1 minute ago, Elvis said:

Oh yeah, fencing works but not if it obstructs our view. So that’s out. 

Glass fencing.

[eggzlot]

7 hours ago, Elvis said:

Oh yeah, fencing works but not if it obstructs our view. So that’s out. 

We did aluminum fencing so we can mostly see through it.  Doing plantings all around the inside too so we see more plants and less fence.  

[prabeau]

While on the subject any ideas (tried many ) to get rid of geese other than a 12 gauge . I spend 2 hours picking up crap at cottage before the grand kids show up.

Thanks

 

[eggzlot]

You can google motion sensor water sprinkler.  They have stand alone devices.  They hook up to a spigot.  My issue is we use our yard with our dog, so how would the sensor know if its a deer, or me and my dog.  So then I was looking at things that can you attach at the spigot level to turn a spigot on / off.  That would require when we go outside to remember to hit a button to turn off the spigot, when we go back inside to the spigot on, etc.  

Wrestled with logic but didn’t figure out a way for it to work for me unless I just did it based on alarm - when alarm is set to armed/stay - turn water spigot on..when disarmed turn water spigot off.  But then if I wanted to use a hose to water the outdoor plants I’d have to do a manual over ride.

Just walking you through my process and why I figured it was just not going to work.  If you have a specific area the deer congregate and you aren’t in that area often - look for a motion sensor water sprinkler.

[Elvis]

We had a motion sprinkler at our old place in the Hill Country but all it takes is one night forgetting to turn it on, which happened, and they wiped us out. It was really bad there. They ate plastic flowers.

Here they aren't as aggressive and are a lot more skittish. I have two of the Axxes motion sensors so I'm going to try those with sound first before I delve into the sprinkler system.

[Elvis]

3 hours ago, prabeau said:

While on the subject any ideas (tried many ) to get rid of geese other than a 12 gauge . I spend 2 hours picking up crap at cottage before the grand kids show up.

Thanks

If nobody nearby feeds them, they might move on -- so I've heard. We have cranes. Between the deer, raccoons, fox, and cranes the dog's piles are the least of our worries. He usually has sense enough to leave his own yard. Cleanup before kids visit... well it's just another chore of living on the lake.

[eggzlot]

24 minutes ago, Elvis said:

We had a motion sprinkler at our old place in the Hill Country but all it takes is one night forgetting to turn it on, which happened, and they wiped us out. It was really bad there. They ate plastic flowers.

Here they aren't as aggressive and are a lot more skittish. I have two of the Axxes motion sensors so I'm going to try those with sound first before I delve into the sprinkler system.

that is why I looked to combine the water sprinkler with something like: https://www.lowes.com/pd/Rain-Bird-Pro-Grade-Hose-End-Digital-1-Station-Irrigation-Timer/3643892?cm_mmc=shp-_-c-_-prd-_-plb-_-google-_-lia-_-207-_-irrigation-_-3643892-_-0&placeholder=null&ds_rl=1286981&gclid=Cj0KCQjw3f6HBhDHARIsAD_i3D9ZJBXSBKCKL34SqUdnjcg-la9Q53kWbJ9W7V5CDFKUWrS8Xy1KoQUaAnZfEALw_wcB&gclsrc=aw.ds

 

Very low fi solution and given the size of our property and all the areas that were being attacked by deer it was not going to work.

[prabeau]

9 hours ago, Elvis said:

If nobody nearby feeds them, they might move on -- so I've heard. We have cranes. Between the deer, raccoons, fox, and cranes the dog's piles are the least of our worries. He usually has sense enough to leave his own yard. Cleanup before kids visit... well it's just another chore of living on the lake.

We are on a lake also. They feed on whatever lawn we have. The sprinkler system sounded good till I read that eventually they just don't care. Coyote decoy is my next experiment.Where are the real ones when you need them !

[eggzlot]

1 hour ago, prabeau said:

We are on a lake also. They feed on whatever lawn we have. The sprinkler system sounded good till I read that eventually they just don't care. Coyote decoy is my next experiment.Where are the real ones when you need them !

You can try coyote urine.  It helped before we got a fence. 

[Cyknight]

On 7/26/2021 at 9:19 PM, Cyknight said:

Glass fencing.

Seriously. Treated for high reflection (near mirror) on the outside (so they don't run into it).

Keeps the Coyotes out too.

[Elvis]

2 hours ago, Cyknight said:

Seriously. Treated for high reflection (near mirror) on the outside (so they don't run into it).

Keeps the Coyotes out too.

I wish that would work but the shape, size, and location -- a fence just isn't feasible. They jumped over our 5' fence in Kerrville no problem, so I'm not real sure it would work anyway.

[OceanDad]

I'd suggest using the smart event triggers from a Hikvision etc. security camera instead of basic motion.  You have far more flexibility and fine tuning with things like intrusion detection, line crossing detection etc.  Set minimum and maximum target size, maybe even some AI features.  Should minimize false alarms.

[Elvis]

1 hour ago, OceanDad said:

I'd suggest using the smart event triggers from a Hikvision etc. security camera instead of basic motion.  You have far more flexibility and fine tuning with things like intrusion detection, line crossing detection etc.  Set minimum and maximum target size, maybe even some AI features.  Should minimize false alarms.

Might have to as they are out in broad daylight now. I was just going to set them to go off at night with any motion because we'd only seen them on the cameras at night. If they're going to eat everything in the daytime, going to have to figure something else out.

Thinking about bringing home an electric fence charger from the ranch and running the wire just over the top of her flowers. Maybe a couple of pops on the snout will run them off.

[OceanDad]

I hear you.  My wife has set me the challenge of protecting her precious passion fruit vines from the rats and the raccoons that seem to love the taste.  I'm not having much luck so far...

[Cyknight]

21 hours ago, Elvis said:

I wish that would work but the shape, size, and location -- a fence just isn't feasible. They jumped over our 5' fence in Kerrville no problem, so I'm not real sure it would work anyway.

Proper Deer fence is 7'. Obviously a glass fence can get VERY expensive, but you never said the budget

[eggzlot]

26 minutes ago, Cyknight said:

Proper Deer fence is 7'. Obviously a glass fence can get VERY expensive, but you never said the budget

we did 6' because that is as big as our town will permit for a "permanent" decorative fence.  But the fence companies sell a fine mesh you can put above to give you another 1' or 2' and because that is "removable" you can get by and pass our town ordinance.  We are seeing how our 6' fence does before investing in the extra netting to put above.  We have a very big deer issue here in Northern NJ.

[Cyknight]

17 hours ago, eggzlot said:

we did 6' because that is as big as our town will permit for a "permanent" decorative fence.  But the fence companies sell a fine mesh you can put above to give you another 1' or 2' and because that is "removable" you can get by and pass our town ordinance.  We are seeing how our 6' fence does before investing in the extra netting to put above.  We have a very big deer issue here in Northern NJ.

Sure, yes, local rules of course apply. That said, wonder if you could have a top separate panel of glass that you could technically slide in/out and consider it removable? Just thinking out loud.

 

[eggzlot]

22 minutes ago, Cyknight said:

Sure, yes, local rules of course apply. That said, wonder if you could have a top separate panel of glass that you could technically slide in/out and consider it removable? Just thinking out loud.

 

im sure we could.  we've "seen" the fine black mesh and its barely visible from the street, only as you approach the fence.  but so far, knock on wood, after 3 months of the fence up, not 1 deer sighting in our backyard.  our front yard is another matter (And again very strict town ordinances about fences for your backyard but not the entire perimeter of the house).

[Jeff W]

One of the Control4 instructors ran into the same issue.  He tried multiple things to chase the deer away.  What worked in the end, was a motion trigger that would play back a custom .mp3 sound file of dogs barking on his outdoor speakers.  

Not quite as aggressive as the roaring cougar, but it got the job done.  He said it worked like a charm.  

[Elvis]

She re-arranged her patio furniture to be more of a barrier and I set the sprinkler zone to come on at various times for just 1 minute during the evening. Don't really know if this worked as they've been busy eating at our neighbors for a while now.

[Cyknight]

35 minutes ago, Elvis said:

as they've been busy eating at our neighbors for a while now.

Best solution: make your backyard less attractive to eat for deer than your neighbours on either side