GARDENSCAPES
Oh Deer!!
Caretakers of the Island’s Outdoors
By Tessa Permar
A clean beige and white work truck pulls up to a property. Like choreography, two technicians pull hoses around the perimeter until they meet at the back. They spray 10 feet into the forest, streams of mist sailing into the tree canopy and down into the leaf litter. They make their way methodically around to the front, closing the perimeter. They spray the lawn, around the foundation, under decks and patios, trees, shrubs, and flower beds until the property is damp and lightly fragrant with wood and citrus. The windows of the house stay open. The technicians wear no masks or special protection except for wide hats to block the sun. After they leave, the deer, ticks and mosquitos all stop biting for a while.
“When we opened in 2014, I wanted to build something that felt in line with my values, something that could succeed without sacrificing health or integrity,” says Mario “Eddie” Spindola, founder of the Martha’s Vineyard Oh Deer branch. Oh Deer provides all natural mosquito, tick, and deer control services. The franchise has businesses across the Northeast as well as Virginia, Ohio, and St. Louis, and Spindola’s was the first.
Mario “Eddie” Spindola grew up on the Vineyard, spent a lot of time outdoors, and eventually worked as a landscaper. After meeting the Upham family who founded Oh Deer and designed the repellents without harmful chemicals, he remembers: “I saw that they could help protect and control landscapes without poisoning the environment,” Spindola recalls, “And I saw the need here for a safer, more conscious approach.” Today Spindola’s MV branch has 10 employees, 5 trucks, and around 500 customers across the Island, including Chappaquiddick. They spray year round, visiting homes every 2-3 weeks. For customers who want to protect precious fruit trees, young shrubs, and summer gardens, Oh Deer sprays a specially designed repellent that tastes terrible to deer but won’t harm them or the plants. The egg-based solution contains ingredients like garlic, white pepper, mint oil and organic soap. As Oh Deer shares on their website, once deer have found a spot with plentiful food, they will keep coming back unless deterred.
While a ruinous visit from deer can be frustrating and even heartbreaking for a time, ticks and mosquitos bring a serious and ongoing health threat. Both are prime carriers of vector-borne diseases like West-Nile Virus, Lyme Disease, Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever, Alpha-Gal, and many more. “The biggest change we’ve seen is the public health danger: the number of ticks and diseases have skyrocketed,” observes Spindola. To ward off ticks and mosquitos, Oh Deer sprays a mixture that includes cedarwood and lemongrass essential oils, castor oil, and organic soap. The treatments create a kind of olfactory moat that insects have a hard time crossing.
One key to Oh Deer’s effectiveness is their saturation method. Oh Deer will spray a small to average sized property with 50-100 gallons. “The essential oils are strong enough to kill the ticks and mosquitos, and when it dries, it’s a repellent,” Spindola explains. That means kids and pets can enjoy the outdoors without fear of infection or exposure to insecticides.
In addition to prevention through spray treatments, Spindola and the Oh Deer team are passionate about educating their community. Their multi-step approach is called T.I.C.K. which stands for Take Initiative Check Kids. As part of this initiative, “any island preschool or daycare can call us and request a service free of charge, including home-based daycares, playgrounds, etc.” The Oh Deer team provides education for kids and parents around tick-borne illness prevention, including steps to get rid of ticks on clothing and to remove a tick that has bitten. They offer printable family-oriented educational activities on their website like coloring, bookmarks, and bingo. The goal is to help kids get outdoors with the knowledge and protection to avoid infection and have fun. Another initiative, TICK9 (like K-9), involves partnering with veterinarians to offer on-location spray services and education.
In addition to these free services, Oh Deer’s sprays are priced to be financially accessible for Vineyard residents year-round. They offer different spray plans at reasonable prices for any property size.
“We’ve built something really solid on the island and I’m focused now on scaling up sustainably: expanding the impact without losing what makes us special,” Spindola says. He has been empowering his team to grow into leadership roles as they continue to serve the health and well-being of the island. “I have the team show up with the mindset that we’re caretakers for the space, the ecosystem, and the client’s peace of mind. We try to treat each property as if it were our property.”
For more information about all natural tick, mosquito or deer control: oh-deer.com/marthas-vineyard for FAQs or to get a quote, call: 508-627-2928, mv@oh-deer.com, to get your property under control and enjoy more time outside!
You can follow them on: facebook.com/ohdeer.mv & instagram.com/ohdeer_mv