Is Gladiolus deer resistant?

Plant the corms in batches a fortnight apart for a long cutting season. They need lifting and storing north of zone 7, and thrips are the pest that ruins the flowers.

Do deer eat gladiolus?

Seldom. Rutgers rates the genus Seldom Severely Damaged, B, and Iowa State lists gladiolus among the bulbs in its second tier. NC State's entry says nothing about deer either way, so the tier rests on those two. The flower spike is the part at risk, and a row of glads grown for cutting loses spikes to deer the way a daylily loses buds: the plant is not harmed and the reason for growing it is gone.

Where it grows

NC State: hardy in zones 7a to 10b, 1 to 6 feet, full sun, flowering summer into fall; north of zone 7 the corms are lifted in fall and stored. The ASPCA lists gladiolus as toxic to dogs, cats and horses. NC State rates the severity Low, "salivation, vomiting, drooling, lethargy, diarrhea," with the "highest concentration in corms," and the callout below carries it.

Protecting gladiolus

The spikes rise over a few weeks and the 20 percent egg spray Colorado State rates High goes on as they do, once, and again at about thirty days for a succession planting. A cutting row inside a fenced vegetable garden is the arrangement that needs nothing.

If it is browsed

A spike taken is gone; the corm sends no second one that year. The plant is unharmed, the corm ripens on the foliage that is left, and the next batch planted a fortnight later is already coming.