There have been some strange occurrences this fall to some plants around the area. A customer came in last weekend and told me he thought he had a beaver eating his dappled willow tree. Eighty percent of the bark was stripped from the trunk about four inches off the ground to five feet up the side of his dappled willow tree. Since beavers can’t reach five feet in the air I knew it wasn’t a beaver. Beavers also wouldn’t leave any remnants behind as they would cut the willow down and take it back to their den for a winter food source. No this problem was a buck. 

Any trees with a trunk around two inches or less fall prey to bucks in the late summer through fall as they rub their antlers up and down the trunks, first to shed their velvet but later just to relieve itching. I had a small peach tree that I planted in September that was completely snapped off at about a foot high because a buck decided that it was conveniently placed there for him. When I planted the tree, it had already lost its leaves for the fall, so I didn’t put a fence around it figuring it would not be a target until spring. I was wrong.  

Another critter creating a problem for me that I have never had to deal with before is a porcupine. Last month while at work one day, the eastern side of a large maple in my backyard had the bark stripped down from about a foot off the ground to about twenty feet up the trunk. At first I had no idea what could do this. But with some expert advice from a DEC officer and further investigation we determined that it was a porcupine that had stripped the bark simply to grind down its teeth. Porcupine teeth, like beavers, grow constantly and need to be filed down from time to time. Since they can’t get an appointment at the dentist, they chew wood to trim their teeth and my maple did the trick. Now the bark on my maple is very thick and the porcupine didn’t chew down to the core so my tree will be fine, just funny looking for a while. Protecting your trees can be tricky although a fence would have saved my peach tree from the buck. 

As for my maple, I am using a hot pepper animal repellent to ensure that the porcupine doesn’t come back to that tree. I have two acres of woods in back of my house that he or she can have for future dental issues, but the tree next to my patio is off limits from now on. Ground cayenne pepper, which is the active ingredient in the hot pepper spray, also works well to repel all sorts of critters. Use in birdseed to keep squirrels and deer from eating all your seed. Birds don’t get the burning sensation from the pepper, it just tastes like a bell pepper to them. Cayenne and black pepper can also be used around areas where dogs and cats have been peeing. My mom was having that problem down in Florida, where all the neighborhood dogs out on a walk would stop by to take a wee on her mailbox post. 

This is kind of like facebook for dogs, checking out who was there before them and then leaving a reply. But this would constantly leave stains on her mailbox post, and she is not as spry anymore to clean off the stains. A friend told her about using black pepper to cover the scent and keep the dogs from peeing there. One application and the problem was solved, plus she gets some entertainment watching the dogs come to the pole, take a whiff and start sneezing. Pepper works well under porches too if you have problems with cats spraying. Apply pepper generously so that animals will stay out of the area entirely as they will not want to get any on their paws. We carry sprays that you can use on a foundation, but if you just need something to put on the ground, pepper will work just fine.