The only plant I’ve ever heard is deer proof are daffodils.
I’ve heard they’re extremely toxic to deer.
So I planted a swath of daffodils and interplanted my tulips and hyacinths and never had a problem with deer eating them.
Yes daffodils. In late April my 12 foot densely filled daffodil bed with 6 varieties was doing well. I also found daffodil leaves in the middle of the lawn near the place were we removed a wrecked small shed 45 years ago when we bought the place for our kids. I placed barricades around them so the mowers would not mistake them for grass and this year they produced a variety of daffodil with many petals unlike the others I had there. I think we had some like that growing where we lived when I was a child 80 years ago, although these seemed larger and fuller. Perhaps they were an improvement on the ones from my childhood at that house which had been abandoned for 50 years before we moved into it.
This fall I will dig up these bulbs from the lawn, and remove some bulbs from the existing row against the fence. There is an unplanted area along that fence just crying for some pretty daffodils, and perhaps some tulips and hyacinths among them. Tulips and hyacinths plus lilies I planted last year had been nibbled by deer, so thanks for the suggestion.
Between the deer and the drought the small fig shrub that was just beginning to bear fruit last year seems dead, but I hope I am wrong. I had placed some scraps of tin roofing around it which deer did not like to walk on, but that probably prevented enough water from getting into the soil to counteract the drought.
When I started my garden here 30+ years ago, the internet was not built out yet, so I much have gone through $1,000 worth of plants and shrubs the first couple of years, only to find them eaten to a nub or torn up out of the ground. But the two types of daffodils were never touched!—even the ones near the woods. I feed them occasionally and they are still thriving and multiplying.
The only other reliably deer proof flower is the marigold, but they are only annuals. However, they produce abundant seed and even self-sow here and there. Oh, and don't let me forget my gorgeous bugleweed ground cover. It only blooms (to a height of maybe 5 inches) for about three weeks, but it spreads prolifically and soon you will have lots to share. The rest of the year it is a hardy groundcover (Baltimore area). Look here:
