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Deer can hop over a normal 6' fence pretty easily. With that said, they don't like to jump when they can't see where they'll be landing which is why I wrapped my entire garden fence in black scrim. Privacy from the neighbors is nice but more importantly, the deer keep out. A closely spaced double
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fence works also but building two fence lines can get pretty expensive; scrim is cheap.
As for moles or gophers, if you can encourage a family of owls to move in they'll make short work of that problem. Google 'how to build owl nesting box'.
Weirdly enough we have owls in abundance in my neighborhood. I think they're great horned owls which might not be seeking other prey. The inability to fence the garden corner in our HOA townhouse project is the real problem.
Great horned owls will eat pretty much anything that doesn't eat then first. As you said, maybe there's an abundance of prey and your gophers are to much work where easier food abounds. As for the deer, if you can't fence properly predator urine (coyote, wolf, etc, etc) scares then away. It works.
Squirrels will completely destroy gardens, too. They decimated my containers of tomatoes last year. Thieving bastards would take two or three big bites out of each tomato. Then they chewed the stem in half down at the base of the plant after they’d ruined all the tomatoes.
Comments
Deer can hop over a normal 6' fence pretty easily. With that said, they don't like to jump when they can't see where they'll be landing which is why I wrapped my entire garden fence in black scrim. Privacy from the neighbors is nice but more importantly, the deer keep out. A closely spaced double
fence works also but building two fence lines can get pretty expensive; scrim is cheap.
As for moles or gophers, if you can encourage a family of owls to move in they'll make short work of that problem. Google 'how to build owl nesting box'.