Garden

Slideshow: Creating a deer-resistant container garden

In photos: GardenWise magazine editor creates a deer-resistant container garden with her father.

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Credit: Carol Pope

Carol Pope

A retired tilesetter, my dad has been eyeing his galvanized-steel Target washtubonce one of the tools of his tradeas a possible planter for the past couple years. The holdup has been that he has been unsure of what flowers to plant in his front yard where the deer continually feast. This year, for Fathers Day, I thought it would be fun for us to tackle this project together.



Credit: Carol Pope

Carol Pope

First, I did some shopping at the local nursery, which found me doing the usual “scratch and sniff” with the leaves of all the plant candidates. Were the leaves stinky enough to repel the deer? In the case of Nepeta ‘Walker’s Low’ (catnip), the answer was a resounding yes, so I decided on two good-sized plants. Looking just leafy now, they will provide an abundant cascade of violet-coloured blooms through much of the summer.
To coordinate the planter with two other container marigold gardens in my parents’ front yard, I bought one pot of marigolds, plus two Alyssum saxatile ‘Compactum’—while I haven’t tested these against the deer myself, their fuzzy silver leaves have me betting they are deer-resistant.
For a strong centrepiece, I went for Salvia nemorosa ‘East Friesland’, which isn’t as strong smelling as I might wish but has the deer in my own yard consistently turning their noses up at it. Other options I considered for the centre plant were a big Shasta daisy or a perennial grass, but I liked the distinctive purple blooms on the Salvia nemorosa for this front yard that is beautiful but predominately green.
Testing these choices together later in my dad’s tub, they seemed to work well.



Credit: Carol Pope

Carol Pope

The next step was to provide adequate drainage to the tub. A power drill using the largest bit available did the trick.



Credit: Carol Pope

Carol Pope

The placement of the tub was the toughest challenge. We considered the front yard carefully and finally opted to position it on the lawn behind two other planters to create a triangle shapealways a good design strategy.



Credit: Carol Pope

Carol Pope

As we wanted the planter to sit up just a little bit and be level, we measured the bottom of the tub and headed out for some landscaping bricks to create a platform.



Credit: Carol Pope

Carol Pope

It took some playing with sizes but we came up with the perfect configuration just slightly larger that the bottom of the tub.



Credit: Carol Pope

Carol Pope

Back at the house, we laid the bricks out on some plastic to help keep the grass from growing between the cracks.



Credit: Carol Pope

Carol Pope

And it’s a perfect fit!



Credit: Carol Pope

Carol Pope

Time to add some soil and start planting.



Credit: Carol Pope

Carol Pope

The roots of the rootbound salvia are teased out.



Credit: Carol Pope

Carol Pope

Our marigolds pull easily into three bunches to add splashes of yellow around the purple flower spikes of the salvia.



Credit: Carol Pope

Carol Pope

Everything is fitting in just about right.



Credit: Carol Pope

Carol Pope

All the plants are gently pressed in with soil added around them and patted down nice and firm to 10 cm (2 in.) below the rim of the tub.



Credit: Carol Pope

Carol Pope

We use the mist setting on the sprayer to gently clean off the leaves and water the plants in.



Credit: Carol Pope

Carol Pope

It makes a striking container garden for the front entrance it just needs to grow in a little more and in the case of the catmint and alyssum start flowering.



Credit: Carol Pope

Carol Pope

This was a really fun way to spend Fathers Day with my dad!


In photos: GardenWise magazine editor Carol Pope creates a deer-resistant container garden with her father.