Do Deer eat Tomatoes? Yes! As we love tomatoes, so do deer. Who can resist juicy, pulpy, and delicious tomatoes? We love tomatoes in our garden that are growing healthy and red-colored with full of juice. Deers also love them. Deers roam around your garden boundaries in search of food. Mostly this is seen when the area is quite woody and not many fruit trees or vegetables are in the vicinity of deer.
Deers like to eat leaves, fruits, vegetables, and bushes, so there are chances that the nearby plants and foliage also can get damaged. Deer love to eat tomatoes. Tomato is one of the fruits they like to eat. When hungry, deer can jump long distances and can eat the tomatoes off the vine.
Deers also munch on peppers, cucumbers, beet, beans, strawberries, squash, etc. But do deers eat tomatoes or tomato plants? Are tomatoes toxic for deer? How do you keep them away from the tomato plants? All the information is given in detail below. So, keep reading!
Do Deer eat Tomatoes?
A question always comes in front of us: I have grown tomatoes, will deer eat tomatoes? Here is the straight answer, yesdeer definitely eat tomatoes. Tomato is one of the fruits they like to eat. When hungry, deer can jump long distances and can eat the tomatoes off the vine.
They look at the red color-popping tomatoes and don’t lose a chance to munch on them. Deer can eat any type of leaves, and when they can eat tomatoes then definitely they never leave the parts of tomato plants.
They eat them and if in large numbers deer can drastically affect your vegetable garden or fruit garden. Deer are super hungry in a day and eat 6 to 8 percent of their body weight in a single day.
How to find that Deer have eaten your tomatoes?
The tomatoes that are not at the extremetop and have been eaten messily, then deer can be to blame.
The damage caused by deer is similar to that of rabbits.
Deers will just not eat fruit but also every part of the tomato plant.
They can eat drastically and sometimes can completely vanish from the plant overnight.
“You can’t have the fruits without the roots.”
– By Stephen Covey
How to keep deer away from the garden?
1. Sprays
There are many deerrepellents sprays out there in the gardening stores that people often buy to keep deer away from fruits and vegetables. Deers always stay alert for predators and smell amazingly well, as a defensive system. These sprays smell weird to the deer and they detect something wrong and quickly run away. The smell is usually similar to rotten meat or eggs.
Other than this, you can also use some stuff already present in your home, like used eggs, and smelly shoes, and put them in the sack and tie them near the tomato plants. Dissolving some hot sauce with four gallons of water and spraying it all over tomato plants also helps.
2. Fencing
To protect the tomatoes from deer that can jump heights, fencing can be beneficial only if it has enough height like 8-9 feet made of wires or heavy gauges. You can separately put the fence to every plant but that would be tiring and costly.
An electric fence is often used by people for the night protection of tomato plants and the garden as a whole. The fence should give a mild shock to the deer so they get aware of the danger and harm they might get from jumping the fence or going near it.
3. Deer-proof tomato cages
Deer-proof tomato plant cages are another effective way to get rid of deer eating your plants. You simply need to place the plant cage around the plant having stakes that will and tiny air holes that will not let dees eat tomato plants.
The horizontal cage placed in a row on the tomato plant works well too. The same example is a ‘deer netting fence’ that will also be a barrier between your tomato plants and deer.
4. Wiring
Have an extra-long wire? Use it! You can lay down the wire or fencing wire on the ground or within the boundaries of the garden. Individually placing the wire on the ground around the plants will also be helpful in keeping deer away from the plants.
Hooves when touching the wire, deer sense that something is not good and hate touching wire like that, by this way they will stay away from the tomato plants. This method is beneficial but has a low chance of success.
5. Soaps
The soaps having a strong smell are used to repel deer off the garden. The soap will be inserted in the socks(nylon)and can be tied near the plant and let do its work.
6. Ultrasonic devices
Buying an ultrasonic deer-repellent device is another good investment for keeping your tomato plants safe. You can get them in the market, a good quality device is what you need.
They keep the deer away by releasing some high-frequency sound that will make the deer cautious and they might turn back and get irritated with the sound. Humans can not hear ultrasonic sounds but some animals only.
7. Companion plants
Another way is to plant some other plants that have a strong smell to the tomato plants. Deers don’t like strong smells of chives, pepper, garlic, sage, rosemary, purple fountain grass, and boxwood.
You can plant any of these near the mainplant in your garden, so that deer don’t come near your tomatoes.
8. Motion-activated sprinklers
The motion-activated sprinklers are devices that are automated and are meant to spray cold water as they detect any motion in close proximity.
They run on batteries or sometimes are solar-charged. Some devices are fed with an alarm to alert the owner about the attack of deer or other animals.
Wrapping up the context
The deers love plants and are herbivores, we love them. But, we love our garden too and tomatoes are our favorites. To keep the deer away from eating your plants and wiping them out you need to be aware of the various devices that you can get in the market and use them. Other than that many protective fences can be used, and protective wires and cages can be used to create barriers between your plants and deer. We hope you like this information and find this helpful!
FAQs
1. Will deer eat the tops of tomato plants?
The answer to this is an absolute yes! Deers like to munch on any leaves they get and also many plant parts. They are hungry most of the time and feed on fruits too when they are in their vicinity. Tomatoes are juicy fruits and deers will also feed on top fruits or leaves if they like and can jump a height of fewer than 8 feet.
2. What veggies do deer not eat?
Obviously, the root vegetables that are not easily accessible to the deer are hard to eat. These vegetables need digging. Other than this, cucumbers and squashes are also not liked by the deers. Veggies that have a strong fragrance like garlic, and onion, are also avoided by the deer.
3. Will deer eat unripe tomatoes?
Deer eat both ripe and unripe tomatoes, leaves, and plant parts as well. They eat in large amounts, cause big damage to the plant, and sometimes completely wipe off the plant and leave just the bottom parts of the plant.
4. What smell do deer hate the most?
Deers have strong smelling power and the smells they usually don’t like and prefer to stay away from are strong smells like garlic, rosemary, onions, thyme, oregano, marigolds, rotten eggs, lavender, mint, and thyme.
5. Do deer eat tomatoes off the vine?
Yes, deer will eat tomatoes off the vine. If you have a garden with tomatoes, be sure to keep an eye on it to make sure that the deer don’t get to them first. Deer will start eating tomatoes early in the season, and they can quickly consume a large number of them.
Howdy, I am Becky, I love dedicating my time to Gardening Hood to help you learn about experiences that I faced by Winning or Losing strategies applied in my Gardening Experience. I am usually trying new strategies to increase the success of new plants in the Garden, I try my best to publish those on Gardening Hood as soon as possible.
