The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Community => Coffee Lounge => Topic started by: doganjo on December 26, 2017, 06:48:14 pm
-
My son seems to think it was small deer, and that it was freshly done last night. My front paddock only has 4 feet fencing round it. The bark has been eaten completely up to a height of about a foot and a half. So I don't expect the trees will survive. The trees are all about 8 years old. The pear tree and plum tree haven't been touched, but we didn't have time to put any protection round them so whatever animal it was may come back and do the sme to them. They didn't touch the willow either.
If I plant more apple trees (I do have one in a big pot ready to plant out in the spring) I will put protectors on them.
Any deas on what it might have been?
-
Any chance of a pic?
-
Unless you have sheep getting into your garden I would be inclined to agree with your son :(
-
Not sheep. lol
-
That sounds very annoying... I’d be very grumpy if I was you. By 8 yrs old you expect the trees to stand up for themsekves a bit. Here sheep and deer do that sort of damage.
-
Muntjac?
-
I would have thought Muntjac deer, unless any geese can gain access. Geese love tree bark for some reason.
-
If it is from the bottom up - hares? do you have snow?
-
What a shame. could they
regenerate from what's underground?
-
Maybe too late now but I'm sure I read that if you wrap it (clingfilm?) that wluld give it a chance. Whether enough to be productive again would be debatable, but 18" does sound a bit too much.
I wonder if it's worth stricking some cuttings off them? Wrong time of year for grafting?
Try spraying remaining plants with well diluted manure-water, keeps my goats from eating willow.
-
Have you got snow cover? We have found that rabbits and hares will stand on top of the snow and destroy trees, chewing an amazing amount of bark, up to higher than you would expect. They can't get to the grass because of the snow. Both can get over that height of fence. I think apple bark is particularly popular with grazers. Or muntjak as suggested if you have them.
-
Thanks for all the suggestions and ideas folks.
We have no snow, just a couple of nights of hard frost.
I do have rabbits but they aren't large and I've only ever seen a few at a time nibbling the grass.
I've never seen hares around here - we're just across the railway line from the village of Clackmannan, and there is a farm across the quite fast bypass.
There are probably deer in the small woodlands behind the farm.
Two of the trees have been well stripped of bark all round from the ground up - to about 18 to 20 inches. To be honest one had been pulled out of the ground a little by the wind and the apples were on the ground till I harvested.
Thee trees had no names as I got all of them from Morrisons supermarket when I moved down here in spring 2008, so not worth taking cuttings from.
I haven't been out today, but as of yesterday neither the pear (which is too near the top line of shrubs to do well anyway, so will probably be removed) and the plum (which fruited for the first time a couple of years ago but didn't have any this year) have been touched. I'd be disappointed if the plum was attacked as it's fruit were delicious.
I was just curiou,s as it almost seemed so deliberate, and limited to the apples. My son gave me a Jonagold last year and it is presently in a large pot. I was going to put it out in the front paddock but I'll make sure it has a tree wrap round it first.
-
If there's a bit at the bottom that's not ruined (even an inch or two) you could saw off the rest of the tree and graft on whichever varieties you want, even multiply up your new Jonagold and have several of them? Have a look on YouTube - I've never grafted anything but am planning to have a go and am planting lots of apple trees everywhere with the hope of one day grafting onto them. You may get suckers from the ground anyway
and could choose one of these to turn into a proper tree, I'd expect it to shoot up since it's coming from an established root system.
-
I like that idea SH, ive done a little bit of grafting, practise on willow, i think it would be a form of budding to go on to a thicker rootstock. Shame to waste the rootstock.
-
That's an idea, Steph Hen - never tried grafting, but I'll look on YouTube. One tree is pulled well out of the ground (high winds earlier in the year) but another is OK, although it consists mainly of suckers already as the central stem got broken down when they were newly planted a few years ago. I think they may be OK
-
Could I graft one of the untouched branches onto the root stock? One of them seems to be OK.
But one of the apple trees and my plum tree have been eaten all round the base, below the stock - I don't suppos there's anything I can do with them >:( :( :'(
-
Oh not your plum that you liked? Has there been another visit?
It's wrong time of year really for grafting, but you have nothing to lose by trying?
The tree you have snickering, could you get one of the suckers with roots on, graft on to it and pot up in a greenhouse or porch?
When we did grafting it was in spring, grafting onto bare rooted rootstocks, then they are planted out, Ive seen a video where the rootstocks were planted and person just went down the rows sticking scions in and taping up, amazing speed.
-
Yes, my lovely juicy 'pick off the tree' plums will be no more. :'( I used to like cute little roe deer. >:( >:( >:( But no more!
Not sure what I'll do with the apple trees. Too cold and snowy to do anything yesterday or today.
-
If they've ring-barked a tree it'll probably become diseased and fail within a couple of years. My Badger Face managed to push up the bottom of the sheep wire around our 10 year old trees (despite being in a field of 15cm ancient meadow grasses - no-one's told them they're not goats) and I've just planted new trees in a sheep-free area to replace them.
-
A friend suggested wrapping cling film round the base of affected trees to save them - has anyone heard of that?
-
A friend suggested wrapping cling film round the base of affected trees to save them - has anyone heard of that?
I suggested it, but I think 18" may be too much, and I think it has to be done straight away. (Actually I think it was Beechgrove garden on TV that mentioned it, but I'd heard of using something to bridge the gap previously).
Added
Fact sheet 2, April 6th, 2017
-
A friend suggested wrapping cling film round the base of affected trees to save them - has anyone heard of that?
I suggested it, but I think 18" may be too much, and I think it has to be done straight away. (Actually I think it was Beechgrove garden on TV that mentioned it, but I'd heard of using something to bridge the gap previously).
Added
Fact sheet 2, April 6th, 2017
Sorry didn't remember your post PHB. My plum tree has been eaten about 4 inches all round, but it doesn't look recent so they've obviously been snacking before and I hadn't noticed. So I guess I will be fruitless next year. :'( :'( :'(
Oh, and edited to thank you for the fact sheet link. I've never bothered to look at them before but they are full of
great information and accompanied by photos. I'll be reading this tonight instead of my historical romance on my kindle! :excited:
-
Quote ... "So I guess I will be fruitless next year."
Almost certainly I would say, but don't be surprised if you get blossom despite the damage. If you do, don't get excited - the tree/s will use up stored resources and eventually die. It is possible to bridge the gap with a bark graft (not sure it will work over 18" on your apples), but you will need to ask yourself whether the trees/varieties are worth the bother!
Grafting (leaving aside bridge bark grafting): my understanding is that bud grafts are best done when sap is flowing and that scion grafts are best done when dormant (happy to hear any contrary views) - if you want to try save anything doganjo, no harm in trying to graft a cutting from the variety growth/wood onto, say, a sucker from the root-stock of your damaged trees. (Best to do several grafts on more than one sucker and cut out anything that doesn't work idc.)
-
Quote ... "So I guess I will be fruitless next year."
Almost certainly I would say, but don't be surprised if you get blossom despite the damage. If you do, don't get excited - the tree/s will use up stored resources and eventually die. It is possible to bridge the gap with a bark graft (not sure it will work over 18" on your apples), but you will need to ask yourself whether the trees/varieties are worth the bother!
Grafting (leaving aside bridge bark grafting): my understanding is that bud grafts are best done when sap is flowing and that scion grafts are best done when dormant (happy to hear any contrary views) - if you want to try save anything doganjo, no harm in trying to graft a cutting from the variety growth/wood onto, say, a sucker from the root-stock of your damaged trees. (Best to do several grafts on more than one sucker and cut out anything that doesn't work idc.)
Yup, thinking the same, thank you; the plum tres would be worthsaving - but the bark seems to have been stripped a good while ago. The apples were just cheapies from morrisons when I moved down here. I'll have them taken down and plant good ones and protect them. I now know the reason we have deer in the garden - across the lane a large field is being prepared for house building and they have heras panels completely surrounding it. Deer were often seen there before, so they have had to find other food sources. I won't miss the apples, they weren't that great, but there were a lot of them. If i can find mature trees not too expensive that mighht produce a crop soon I'll replant.
Thank you everyone for your help and advice.
-
I wonder if it's worth wetting the plum stem and wrapping it? No harm in trying? You can send off for rootstocks.
Have they chewed above or below the rootstock? If there is any stem above the rootstock but below where they chewed it may sprout itself?
-
The plum tree has been chewed right down to ground level up to about 4 inches. I haven't been out there for a couple of days but by the looks of it I think it was a good few days before we spotted the apple trees.
I'll try wrappig it tomoorow if it's reasonably dry. Thank you
-
Here's a link re bridge grafting:
http://www.ladybug.uconn.edu/FactSheets/trees--bridge-grafting-and-inarching-.php (http://www.ladybug.uconn.edu/FactSheets/trees--bridge-grafting-and-inarching-.php)
It doesn't mention plums, but anything is worth a try. Re plums; from my experience, plum rootstock will sucker easily and since trees are damaged, I suspect a good sized root system will throw good number of rootstock suckers this year. Even if you try the bridge grafting, take some extra cuttings of the variety and stick them in some compost - a bit of rooting compound won't go amiss obviously - if they root, you will have retained material to graft onto any new suckers idc as an alternative means of recovering the situation.
Apples: the rootstock will also throw suckers idc and you could do the same, but maybe glean some cuttings from friends etc of a variety you like and create new trees on your well established rootstock. Alternatively, if you want early cropping from new apple trees, go for ones grafted onto one of the dwarfing rootstocks (either M9 or M27 - I can never remember which is the most dwarfing) as they tend to crop much sooner than trees on other rootstock and crop quite abundantly and, of course, will not require a ladder or other aids to harvest the crop - downside is that they really need permanent staking, but no big deal.