In the spring of 2022, I faced incredible adversity.
Warm sunny days melted the snow, and, as it turned out, the mice had gnawed the apple trees. Moreover, both mature trees and young ones were damaged. There was no question of cutting them down, although some apple trees suffered quite significantly. I am still a young gardener, so I was not only puzzled by the question “what to do,” but also began to look for answers to it. And I can safely say, I found it.
Uninvited guests in the apple orchard
Some visitors may never be seen in person, but traces of their presence are immediately evident. As a rule, this happens in the spring: the snow melts, tree trunks are exposed, on which four-legged visitors have left their creepy “autographs”.
Mice
Voles are regular visitors to the orchard during the winter season. Only in spring their presence is revealed by the mutilated bark of trees, primarily apple trees. The largest representative of voles among them is the water vole, its body length varies from 12 to 20 cm. Representatives of other species are smaller, on average from 8 to 12 cm. Mice are very prolific, if no measures are taken, any vegetation in the garden, whether the garden may be in danger of destruction. Voles give birth to offspring several times a year. There are from 4–5 to 14 mice in a litter, and in some years the number of rodents reaches 2 thousand individuals per 1 hectare. Animals create a system of passages underground and on its surface. The entrances to ground nests are perfectly camouflaged; it is completely impossible to see them.
Damage to apple trees from mice is terrible because it is often discovered late. Bare areas of the trunk become vulnerable to winter frosts, especially if they alternate with thaws. If the garden is located near the house, you can periodically check whether the bark is intact, trample the snow in the tree trunks, blocking the movement of rodents. But it is not always possible to get to a dacha outside the city at the right moment, and it is impossible to guess this very moment. Rodents grind the pliable bark of young and middle-aged apple trees from the root collar and up the trunk. In winter, they make tunnels under the snow, raking it with their front paws and head. The higher the snowdrifts, the higher the damage will be, right down to the skeletal branches. The sharp mouse incisors also attack the roots of apple trees located closer to the surface of the earth, buried seedlings and cuttings.
We determine the extent of damage and risks
To find the optimal strategy for restoring damaged fruit trees and other seedlings damaged by rodents, it is worth determining the degree of damage caused to the plant. Rodents can:
- partially gnaw off the bark on the trunk;
- gnaw the bark on the trunk around the circumference (in a ring);
- eat skeletal and small twigs;
- damage the roots (most often damage appears only in the spring, when trees fall over and are easily pulled out);
- gnaw through the root collar tissue.
All types of damage, even small ones, put trees at risk of frostbite, infection, disrupt sap flow and cause drying out, not to mention a decrease in stability and yield.
The chances and timing of saving the plant are influenced by two factors:
- condition of the cambium (is the cambium damaged and has the drying process begun?);
- affected area.
Only trees that have not had at least part of their bark gnawed off (at least 20% of the bark and roots should remain) should be saved. The smaller the area of damage, the higher the likelihood that the seedling will survive and recover over the years. Serious risk of plant death - more than 50% of bark or roots damaged or any ring lesion.
To choose the optimal strategy for restoring seedlings damaged by rodents, it is worth determining the degree of damage caused to the plant
Photo gallery: species of voles that gnaw apple trees
The entrance to a water vole's burrow is almost impossible to notice.
The field vole is difficult to distinguish due to its dark fur
The bank vole lives non-stop 24 hours a day
During the day, the common vole eats food equal to 50–70% of its body weight
Forest guests
The white hare is small, in summer it feeds on grass and herbaceous plants, but in winter it raids gardens, eating apple trees, buds on old trees, and young shoots on seedlings. An apple tree is a delicacy for him, but if he gets hungry, he will gnaw off all the trees in sight. The brown hare eats the same things as the hare; stays in open places: fields, forest edges, loves to look into the garden. It is difficult to keep track of the animals, because their activity occurs in the dark, and on a moonlit night, hares can feed until the morning. Although the hare no longer belongs to the order of rodents, it gnaws the bark of many trees thanks to its powerful front teeth - incisors. And if mice work like a jeweler, more or less evenly removing a layer of bark, then hare gnaws are rough, deep and long.
A hare's teeth are powerful and grow throughout its life.
Effective protection against hares is a net or any other material wrapped around the trunk to a height of at least 1.5 m. Why so high? The body length of the hare is 45–47 cm, the hare is 55–67 cm. Add here the length of the hind legs, which is almost equal to the length of the body (and the hare can stand “on tiptoes,” significantly increasing in height). The higher the snowdrift, the greater the damage to the bark.
Standing on its hind legs, the hare significantly increases in height and damages trees to a height of more than 1 meter
By the way, I prepared the apple trees in the fall by wrapping the bases of the trunks with nylon tights, but this year there was more snow than ever, and the hares gnawed the trunks above the wrapped one.
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For me, there is no creature worse than mice and hares than an ordinary domestic goat - the most malicious garden pest from early spring to late autumn. These insidious creatures with amazing insight find the slightest loopholes to get to the coveted plants. From my sad experience, I remember a November day when four neighbor’s goats, left unattended by the owner, entered my front garden through a slightly open gate (but that’s a different story). In just a few minutes they managed to taste rose bushes with huge thorns, lilacs and my favorite Golden Delicious. Everything was eaten, gnawed and broken off with barbaric cruelty, and my emotional experiences at that moment were beyond description. Subsequently, only a strong high fence and a bolted gate protected my plantings from the encroachments of horned beasts.
Goats seem to be able to climb any tree.
conclusions
So, in order to save an apple tree damaged by mice, it is necessary to properly treat the damaged areas depending on the degree of damage - its depth and area. In some cases, when damage has affected the deep layers of the trunk, radical measures are resorted to in the form of cutting the trunk to reverse growth.
Problems with rodents can be avoided by taking preventive measures in a timely manner. The trunk can be protected mechanically using coarse material, chain-link mesh or plastic bottles, or treated with solutions containing substances that taste or smell unpleasant. The garden is cleared out in the fall to create unfavorable conditions for unwanted winter guests.
It is worth remembering that measures to protect the garden must be taken together, since each method has both its advantages and disadvantages. Tree treatment measures should be taken as early as possible to minimize damage from rodents.
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