Annual vegetables & flowers & deer repellant

Q: We will be traveling next year and so not gardening in Seeley Lake. A friend will water the perennials enough to keep them alive but what can we do about annual vegetables and flowers? We don't want the beds to become weed patches while we are away.

A: If you do nothing about the beds, weeds are guaranteed. They have adapted to take advantage of local gardening conditions, and they will thrive in the rich soil of your garden. If it were my garden, I would mulch the beds heavily, any time after this growing season ends, but preferably before winter.

If garden beds are covered with mulch, weed seeds blowing on the winter winds will not find a landing pad. (That applies to beds which are vacant only for the winter, too.) Besides that, seeds already on the soil surface will not be able to sprout under a mulch. Nearly all weed seeds need light to start growing; if they are kept in the dark, they wait there harmlessly.

That characteristic of weed seeds is one reason to avoid unnecessary tilling in any garden. As the soil is turned over, weed seeds are redistributed. Buried ones which are brought to the surface by the tiller blades will immediately begin to grow.

Any kind of mulch which keeps the underlying soil dark will stop weed seeds from sprouting. Black plastic will prevent sprouting, but it will also prevent rain and snow from reaching the ground. Because the plastic-covered soil will be hot and dry next summer, all the good microbes and small creatures in the soil will die from heat and will have to start new populations growing the next year.

I prefer an organic mulch, which will also feed the soil. A few inches of straw would do the job, although it is not inexpensive. If this year's plant growth is dense enough to cut down and spread as a blanket, that would also suffice.

My personal choice for a year-long mulch would be newspaper or corrugated cardboard, whichever is easiest to come by. One layer of cardboard will keep the soil in the dark. With newspaper, a layer of eight sheets is the minimum required. In both cases, some judicious weight here and there stops the sheets of mulch from blowing around. I used this system last year on my raspberry bed, where the plants had been infected by a virus. The only cure was to replace them and get all the infected suckers out of the garden. I cut the sick raspberries to the ground and covered the bed with newspaper. By last spring the paper was beginning to rot, and I planted vegetable seeds. By now the vegetables have grown and the mulch is well rotted. Weeds were nearly nonexistent in the bed.

Q: I tried spraying my rhubarb with deer repellants, and the deer didn't even notice the spray. They ate the leaves. Now what?

A: The only guaranteed way to keep deer from eating choice plants is a barrier. For rhubarb that might mean a piece of bird netting draped over the plant. Repellants work only for some deer, and only some of the time. Some of the more effective sprays cannot be used on food crops because they make the whole plant taste bitter.

However, I have been part of an experiment this summer with a new deer repellant called Deer Ban, and it has so far been successful. Not a spray, it is comes in the form of gel capsules placed on the ground ten feet apart. They deteriorate when wet and release the active ingredient, which smells like coyote urine. The idea is that deer will go to another area where there are no coyotes. The pellets do not wash off with rain.

I put Deer Ban in three areas frequented by deer. The plants have not been eaten, and I am not seeing deer where I would have expected them. These capsules might not work everywhere, nor do I know what will happen in winter. Deer Ban is available in Missoula and might be worth a try.

Hackett welcomes reader questions related to gardening, pest management, plants, soils and anything in between. Submit questions to mhackett@centric.net, call 406-961-4614 or mail questions to 1384 Meridian Road, Victor, MT 59875.