How to Make Homemade Deer Repellent For Hostas

Deer are nice animals and appear to go around without causing too much trouble. However, when you have your prized Hostas, and you wake to find a herd of deer has ravaged them, it can be heartbreaking.

Rather than take extreme measures to keep deer off your land, you may wish to take the natural yet effective methods of keeping deer or even rabbits away from your plants.

Luckily, the homemade deer repellent for plants here is highly effective and can be made with ingredients you probably have around your home.

By the end of this guide, you will have more than a few great ways to keep deer and rabbits away from your Hostas and your ground. Each of these methods works effectively, and you will put an end to your problem with any of these deer repellents for good. (Learn the Best Time To Divide Hostas)

What smells do deer hate?

When you first start to look for homemade deer deterrents, you quickly learn the smells they hate. To humans, these smells are often very aromatic. You also find two separate groups of scents.

One interferes with deer’s sensitive sense of smell, and with this, they associate them with danger. Smelly bars of soap being the main smell they associate here. Soap sends out predator scents and signals.

Any sprayed products you use need frequent reapplication. This is true over bad weather and rain. If you have humid weather, it can, in some instances, help enhance the scent.

Deer love to feed on the ground and even to a height of six feet, so these are the areas to cover. Hostas fit right into the level.

Alert scents are the second group. Human hair can be one, yet it doesn’t keep them away for too long. There are plants that deer don’t like, such as perennial herbs such as yarrow, tansy, and artemisia.

Add a few herbs like chives, oregano, thyme, mint, dill, and tarragon. You can plant these around your garden or in well-placed containers.

Will Coffee Grounds Keep Deer Away from Hostas?

You can use coffee grounds you have stored in a plastic bag for a week. You can then spread these around your yard and Hostas, yet the amount of time in the bag, the mixture can go moldy, and this can apply to your plants. (Find out What is Eating my Hostas)

What can you put on Hostas to keep deer away?

Here are a handful of effective natural deer deterrent recipes you can find using easy-to-find ingredients.

Effective and Long-Lasting Peppermint Spray

When you use the smell of peppermint with the other ingredients, you can make a ready-to-use homemade deer deterrent you need.

It is among the best garden deer repellents to use, along with your other attempts at keeping these animals from your yard.

Ingredients

1. 6 drops of peppermint essential oil
2. 4 drops of rosemary oil
3. 8 oz of white vinegar

Add each of the ingredients into a large spray bottle and shake. First, spray the mixture around your hostas’ ground and the garden plants you want to give protection.

When using this, avoid spraying on leaves and vegetables as vinegar can kill these plants. The scent may be pleasing to humans, yet it is best to keep deer away.

Hot Chili Pepper Spray

Make sure to wear gloves when making

Ingredients

1. 1/4 cup of water
2. 2 tablespoons of vegetable oil
3. 3 tablespoons of milk or yogurt (can use dish soap as an alternative)
4. 4 habanero peppers
5. Blend the peppers and strain through a coffee filter or fine cloth into a jar with a lid. Add the oil and milk.
6. Add to a spray bottle, then fill with water to a 10 to 1 mix.
7. Spray on your garden plants or around your fence and re-apply regularly after rain.

Deer Spray with Liquid Soap

You may find this one isn’t as effective as others, yet it is cost-effective for using repeatedly.

1. 1 gallon of warm water
2. 3 large eggs (include the shells)
3. 2 cups of water
4. 2 cups of fresh green onion leaves
5. 1 bar of melted soap (use Irish Spring or Dial)
6. 2 tbsps. of hot chili or pepper powder
7. 1 large clove of garlic

You will find this recipe is labor-intensive to many. However, the chili scent and soap make a great deer repellent to add to your homemade deer-deterrent.

1. Melt the soap in warm water
2. Add all ingredients to a blender besides the water mixture.
3. Blend until liquefied and then add to the gallon jug.
4. Fill with sufficient warm soap mix to fill the container.
5. Replace the cap and shake.

Add to a spray bottle as needed and spray your plants around your Hostas. It helps when you get eggshells on the leaves helps, yet this may clog your spray nozzle. Re-apply every two weeks.

What is the best natural deer repellent?

Ingredients

• Garden sprayer
• 1 gallon of warm water
• 3 x Eggs
• Milk or yogurt (3 tablespoons)
• 3 cloves of crushed garlic
• 3 tablespoons of cayenne pepper

Here are the steps to make the best natural deer repellent

Blend ingredients

Add the egg, milk/ yogurt, garlic, and cayenne pepper with a couple of cups of water to your blender.

Mix thoroughly.

Strain the mixture into a gallon jug; lastly, add the remaining water

Let your mixture ferment

You can use the spray tight away, yet leaving it for over 24 hours makes the homemade deer repellent far more effective. It stinks from this point, and you can see why it could keep deer away so easily.

Add to your garden sprayer.

Spraying your solution.

Spray your Hosta plants after the dew or rainfall has dried. Spray all the plants, including leaves, stems, and any other bits.

You will find this spray mixture won’t harm your plants when used. It just smells bad as the eggs and milk rot.

The milk helps the deterrent sticky from the protein casein, and when this dries, the odor becomes undetectable to use yet unpleasant to animals. The cayenne pepper gives nasty burns up the nose should any deer try smelling your Hostas.

Read more: Best Garden Shovels