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Default squirrels attacking maple trees

I have a couple of big silver maples, 40 years old and about three feet
in diameter.


I've noticed in the past few years that fox squirrels are trying to dig
a hole in each tree by clawing and biting. Each wound is in the trunk,
about chest high, where a small limb has been removed years ago and the
trunk is growing out around the stub. So there is already a kind of
recess in the trunk, and they are trying to turn it into a hole. I have
noticed that sometimes a lot of thin sap runs out of the wound and wets
the side of the trunk. Sometimes woodpeckers also do their work on the
same wound.


What is the best way to stop the damage and make the trees live longer?
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Default squirrels attacking maple trees

On 12/29/2011 2:54 PM, Matt wrote:
I have a couple of big silver maples, 40 years old and about three feet
in diameter.


I've noticed in the past few years that fox squirrels are trying to dig
a hole in each tree by clawing and biting. Each wound is in the trunk,
about chest high, where a small limb has been removed years ago and the
trunk is growing out around the stub. So there is already a kind of
recess in the trunk, and they are trying to turn it into a hole. I have
noticed that sometimes a lot of thin sap runs out of the wound and wets
the side of the trunk. Sometimes woodpeckers also do their work on the
same wound.


What is the best way to stop the damage and make the trees live longer?


Make the lives of the squirrels shorter!

Don

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On 12/29/2011 03:21 PM, IGot2P wrote:
On 12/29/2011 2:54 PM, Matt wrote:
I have a couple of big silver maples, 40 years old and about three feet
in diameter.


I've noticed in the past few years that fox squirrels are trying to dig
a hole in each tree by clawing and biting. Each wound is in the trunk,
about chest high, where a small limb has been removed years ago and the
trunk is growing out around the stub. So there is already a kind of
recess in the trunk, and they are trying to turn it into a hole. I have
noticed that sometimes a lot of thin sap runs out of the wound and wets
the side of the trunk. Sometimes woodpeckers also do their work on the
same wound.


What is the best way to stop the damage and make the trees live longer?


Make the lives of the squirrels shorter!

Don



I will probably take that as my Plan B.
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Default squirrels attacking maple trees

On 12/29/2011 2:54 PM, Matt wrote:
I have a couple of big silver maples, 40 years old and about three
feet in diameter.


I've noticed in the past few years that fox squirrels are trying to
dig a hole in each tree by clawing and biting. Each wound is in the
trunk, about chest high, where a small limb has been removed years ago
and the trunk is growing out around the stub. So there is already a
kind of recess in the trunk, and they are trying to turn it into a
hole. I have noticed that sometimes a lot of thin sap runs out of the
wound and wets the side of the trunk. Sometimes woodpeckers also do
their work on the same wound.


What is the best way to stop the damage and make the trees live longer?


They can't claw away healthy wood. They're removing rotting wood to
make a nest. It won't necessarily injure the tree - this is, after
all, how wild squirrels make their homes - but if a tree has several
such holes, you may want to have an arborist give you an evaluation of
the overall health of the tree.

Usually, once you get a hole in the trunk, you get decay starting in
it. It used to be advised to fill the hole with cement, but they've
found that doesn't stem the progress of the decay. Usually you can
keep the tree well-watered and healthy for several more years,
although if the decay eventually becomes substantial you'll have to
take it down. Like I said, ask an arborist for an opinion. Some cities
have arborists on staff; if your city does, you can probably get a
free consult.

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Default squirrels attacking maple trees

On 12/29/2011 03:47 PM, Hell Toupee wrote:
On 12/29/2011 2:54 PM, Matt wrote:
I have a couple of big silver maples, 40 years old and about three
feet in diameter.


I've noticed in the past few years that fox squirrels are trying to
dig a hole in each tree by clawing and biting. Each wound is in the
trunk, about chest high, where a small limb has been removed years ago
and the trunk is growing out around the stub. So there is already a
kind of recess in the trunk, and they are trying to turn it into a
hole. I have noticed that sometimes a lot of thin sap runs out of the
wound and wets the side of the trunk. Sometimes woodpeckers also do
their work on the same wound.


What is the best way to stop the damage and make the trees live longer?


They can't claw away healthy wood. They're removing rotting wood to make
a nest. It won't necessarily injure the tree - this is, after all, how
wild squirrels make their homes - but if a tree has several such holes,
you may want to have an arborist give you an evaluation of the overall
health of the tree.

Usually, once you get a hole in the trunk, you get decay starting in it.
It used to be advised to fill the hole with cement, but they've found
that doesn't stem the progress of the decay. Usually you can keep the
tree well-watered and healthy for several more years, although if the
decay eventually becomes substantial you'll have to take it down. Like I
said, ask an arborist for an opinion. Some cities have arborists on
staff; if your city does, you can probably get a free consult.




Yes, I know they are trying to provide housing to their descendants and
kill off a tree that provides no food, while they are planting acorns
all around.

They are causing injury to the outer layer of wood (the new growth
ring). They are biting and digging through bark and into healthy wood.
They are not mainly removing rotting wood. The trees are mainly healthy.


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"Matt" wrote in message
...

I have a couple of big silver maples, 40 years old and about three feet
in diameter.


stuff snipped

What is the best way to stop the damage and make the trees live longer?


You can buy commercial repellents designed to deter squirrels. Gardening
stores often sell repellent sprays, which have a bitter taste that deters
squirrels from gnawing on trees. Repellents containing thiram or capsaicin
(same as the pepper spray used to repel OWS'ers g) work well to deter
squirrels. You can make your own with ground pepper or pepper oil. Some
people use shields - a 1 or 2 foot band of thin metal sheeting around the
trunk of the tree allegedly keeps squirrels from climbing above the metal
band. This remedy does not work when trees are close together or squirrels
have an aerial path to the tree trunk. Plus, it looks like hell.

Personally, I use three Hav-a-hart traps baited with pudding cups with
peanut butter smeared on the inside. I tie one of the cups just beyond the
trap treadle and the other I place at the entrance to the trap. The traps
have two doors so that it can be set to catch animals that are shy about
entering an enclosed space. I've found over the years that too many of them
were able to zoom out head first as soon as they heard the trap closing and
were able to escape before the trap closed.

Now, after they feast on the freebie at the entrance to the trap, all but
one or two of the oldest, wisest and fattest squirrels enter to get the
second cup. They walk all around it first, and even climb on top of it,
trying to avoid entering the trap. Some even leave for a while. But they
almost always come back for that second cup. Since they are nose first in
the trap, the doors swats them on the butt and they actually move further
inside and help the trap to shut.

I used to transport them in a small animal carrier to the big agricultural
park a few miles from here until one got loose in the van on the way to his
new home. Now they are relocated to squirrel heaven. I had one get into my
house when I was gone for a week. I came into the house, saw stuff strewn
around, drapes pulled down and finally, when

I went to take a leak, I saw the rim of the toilet bowl was covered with
dirt! "Who on earth," I thought, "would break into my house to stand on the
toilet with very dirty shoes?" After hours and hours of searching I found
Rocky wedged into a tiny space behind the over. I had borrowed my friend's
cat (and him) to help in the hunt. The cat was sitting in a carrier in the
living room when we heard the squirrel barking as we got near the stove. At
the time I didn't know the wide range of noises squirrels can make so I
didn't know at first WHAT was behind the oven.

I made a loopstick out of phone wire and some old oak picture framing and
yanked him out - the fattest squirrel I had ever seen - he made the oak bend
he was so heavy. Then with the squirrel fighting and chattering like a
whirling dervish, my friend opened the window and out went the squirrel and
loopstick. All the while we're doing this, the poor cat locked in the
carrier in the other room starts yowling away, apparently thinking whatever
is happening to the squirrel in the other room was going to happen to her
next. It was quiet a welcome home party.

--
Bobby G.


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On Thu, 29 Dec 2011 15:56:25 -0600, Matt
wrote:


They are causing injury to the outer layer of wood (the new growth
ring). They are biting and digging through bark and into healthy wood.
They are not mainly removing rotting wood. The trees are mainly healthy.


Wire cloth / mesh? Sized to order.

They need to chew because of the size of their teeth :\
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I have a couple of big silver maples, 40 years old and about three feet
in diameter.


stuff snipped

What is the best way to stop the damage and make the trees live longer?


I'm getting ready to fabricate traps out of 55 gal barrels, and some 4" PVC.
The three foot or so PVC has a tipping point slightly off center so it
resets itself. It is open on both ends, but placed so the squirrel goes in
one end. There's a trigger on the bait. When he reaches the bait and
trigger, he's well past the balance point. When he hits the bait trigger,
the tube is released, and it pivots. His weight causes him instantly to
plummet into 18" of water. The tube resets itself under its own weight and
balance point. The bait stays put, either being peanut butter slathered
inside the tube, or pecans wired on the trigger. It's a reusable trap and
resets itself. I built one last year, and it worked good. I intend to make
four this year so we can try to keep the squirrels under control and out of
our fruit trees.

Steve


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Default squirrels attacking maple trees

Matt wrote:

I have a couple of big silver maples, 40 years old and about three
feet in diameter.

I've noticed in the past few years that fox squirrels are trying to
dig a hole in each tree by clawing and biting. Each wound is in the
trunk, about chest high, where a small limb has been removed years
ago and the trunk is growing out around the stub. So there is
already a kind of recess in the trunk, and they are trying to turn
it into a hole. I have noticed that sometimes a lot of thin sap
runs out of the wound and wets the side of the trunk.


What you should have done when the limb was removed was to perform a
correct clean-cut of the limb at the trunk and then paint over the stub
with pruning paint. The black tarry paint will water-proof the wood
(and it is wood that you've just exposed - lumber if you will) and will
prevent this wood from rotting while the tree grows over it. If you
look at exposed wood that hasn't been painted, if the area is large
enough the tree can't grow over it fast enough before it rots and
prevents the bark from completing it's growth over it, leaving a
permanent cavity that will just continue to rot and eventually become
the reason why the tree must be cut down.

With that said, I also notice that squirrels will chew on the TOP side
of horizontal branches of maples (particularly sugar maples) and will
remove large areas of bark on the top side close to the trunk (THE SIDE
YOU CAN'T SEE FROM THE GROUND) and will eventually kill the branch.

The squirrels are doing this because there is probably too many of them
in your local area and not enough food supply, and they're going after
the bark because there's not much else for them to eat.

Again, applying a thick coating of black pruning paint seems to repel
them from continuing to damage the branch, and the coating will give the
branch a fighting chance to grow it's bark back. I've done this on a
few of my maple trees, and to a chestnut, and have also applied the
paint to the top side of other branches that show no (or minimal)
squirrel damage.

What is the best way to stop the damage and make the trees live
longer?


You've got to approach this like a carpenter, and imagine that just
under the bark surface what you have is wood - lumber. And just like
your deck will rot in a few years when it's exposed rain and dampness,
so too will the inside of a tree unless you take steps to waterproof it
and prevent cavities from forming. The bark must be allowed to grow
over these exposed areas, and the bark won't or can't grow back over top
of rotted-out wood and cavities.

And maybe buy a few 40-lb bags of black-oil or striped sunflower seeds
and throw some down every few days for the squirrels to eat - instead of
them eating the bark of your trees.
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On Thu, 29 Dec 2011 22:36:27 -0500, Home Guy wrote:

The squirrels are doing this because there is probably too many of them
in your local area and not enough food supply, and they're going after
the bark because there's not much else for them to eat.


Reverse course.

Plan C: simmered squirrel, brown gravy and fresh biscuits.


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"Steve B" wrote in message
...


I have a couple of big silver maples, 40 years old and about three feet
in diameter.


stuff snipped

What is the best way to stop the damage and make the trees live longer?


I'm getting ready to fabricate traps out of 55 gal barrels, and some 4"

PVC.

I knew there was going to be trouble dumping all that nuclear waste in
Nevada! Them's some might big squirrels you're looking to catch, pahdner.
(-: My wife absolutely hates even have the little 3' Hav-a-harts scattered
around the house. She would go into full-scale rebellion if I put 55 gal
drums around. But I do admire the one-step nature of your solution.

I used to put the whole trap in a heavyweight clear plastic bag and then
spray enough ether (starting fluid spray) to know them out for transport.
My wife hated that method since it tended to fill the house with ether
fumes. "The neighbors will think we're running a meth lab!" The auto store
clerk looked at me like I was a huffer when I'd pick up six cans of the
stuff when it went on sale.

Another reason to dispatch them quickly is that the older ones are usually
crawling with parasites of all sorts. A fair number of them are crippled,
too, missing eyes and ears or having some other malady (one had what looked
very much like a small caliber "through and through" wound. I sextuple bag
them to make sure the parasite don't jump ship and end up on my dog.

Now, I have converted a cattle prod to just stun them with stun being a
euphemism for electrocute. Very quick and mostly painless from what I can
tell. I used to spend considerable time and effort to relocate them to the
park, but after the one got loose in the van and climbed up onto my head
(Gott what sharp, nastly claws) and another bit my thumb during the transfer
process, it was no more Mr. Nice Guy. As I am sure you've noticed, they
look just like kissing cousins of rats when they're soaking wet and that
cute fluffy tail slicks down to a narrow diameter.

I'm sure those brought on Bambi are horrified, but that one damn squirrel
that spent a week in my house did thousands of dollars of damage to all the
Andersen windows in the house trying to chew his way out. The molding and
woodwork on the basement casement-style windows got particularly savaged.
My feeling is once you come onto my turf, you've earned whatever happens.
Squirrel or burglar. I still find ossified squirrel turds on upper shelves,
on top of the free-standing bookcases, etc. In the spring and fall, I can
catch up to 7 a day and sometimes they're just waiting around for me to
reset the trap. Aside from the damage, the little suckers are always
activating the front door motion sensor. When it chimes three time in an
hour, out go the traps.

The three foot or so PVC has a tipping point slightly off center so it
resets itself. It is open on both ends, but placed so the squirrel goes

in
one end. There's a trigger on the bait. When he reaches the bait and
trigger, he's well past the balance point. When he hits the bait

trigger,
the tube is released, and it pivots. His weight causes him instantly to
plummet into 18" of water.


Clever! Put it over a fire and you've got yourself Chunky Squirrel Soup. I
surprised they don't figure out a way to get out. I guess it's hard to jump
up from the water. I've seen them to some pretty impressive vertical leaps.
I also watch them just hanging off the "squirrel guard" on my neighbor's
bird feeder like little Flying Wallendas.

The tube resets itself under its own weight and
balance point. The bait stays put, either being peanut butter slathered
inside the tube, or pecans wired on the trigger. It's a reusable trap and
resets itself. I built one last year, and it worked good. I intend to

make
four this year so we can try to keep the squirrels under control and out

of
our fruit trees.


I have a wonderful elderly neighbor who has four or five bird feeders around
her house. Ever since they went up, the squirrel population skyrocketed as
well. I'm practicing ZSPG - zero squirrel population growth.

--
Bobby G.


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"Home Guy" wrote in message ...

stuff snipped

And maybe buy a few 40-lb bags of black-oil or striped sunflower seeds
and throw some down every few days for the squirrels to eat - instead of
them eating the bark of your trees.


I probably wouldn't do that since my neighbor's multiple and well-stocked
bird feeders are what caused the explosion in the local squirrel population.
With a good supply of food, they'll make a good supply of squirrel pups.
Rodent populations tend to expand very rapidly in the presence of a copious
food source.

Maybe if you laced the feed with birth control hormones . . .

--
Bobby G.


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Default squirrels attacking maple trees

Matt wrote:

Yes, I know they are trying to provide housing to their descendants
and kill off a tree that provides no food, while they are planting
acorns all around.

They are causing injury to the outer layer of wood (the new growth
ring). They are biting and digging through bark and into healthy
wood. They are not mainly removing rotting wood. The trees are
mainly healthy.


So build a squirrel house or two and mount it up in the tree. They will
probably take to it right away and solve your problem for you.

Jon


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"Matt" wrote in message
...

I have a couple of big silver maples, 40 years old and about three feet in
diameter. . . .
What is the best way to stop the damage and make the trees live longer?


If your trees have grown to 3 ft. diameter in 40 years, they seem
so exceptioally vigorous you need do nothing to make them live longer.

--
Don Phillipson
Carlsbad Springs
(Ottawa, Canada)


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And maybe buy a few 40-lb bags of black-oil or striped sunflower seeds
and throw some down every few days for the squirrels to eat - instead of
them eating the bark of your trees.


Yeah, at $30 a bag, that's going to happen.

Steve




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On Dec 29, 2:54*pm, Matt wrote:
I have a couple of big silver maples, 40 years old and about three feet
in diameter.


snip


What is the best way to stop the damage and make the trees live longer?


Silver maples are one of our commonest fast growing weed trees. Any
city with a large population of these trees has rather high damage
problem after every high wind weather event.
Considering the size and probable condition of your trees , it would
be prudent to plan the removal and replacement as soon as you can.
Contact a tree service soon and if winter work suits them have the
work done now. It will probably be cheaper, since dry wood and bare
branches make it easier.
Come spring, have a better variety put in place and enjoy. Sturdy
Norway maples are good in many places, but your location might have
even better species.
This advice is based on BTDT, as they say. My losses over the years
from white maple disasters, mostly insured, have been several thousand
dollars. Tends to give you an attitude.

Joe
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"Don Phillipson" wrote in message
...
"Matt" wrote in message
...

I have a couple of big silver maples, 40 years old and about three feet in
diameter. . . .
What is the best way to stop the damage and make the trees live longer?


If your trees have grown to 3 ft. diameter in 40 years, they seem
so exceptioally vigorous you need do nothing to make them live longer.

--
Don Phillipson
Carlsbad Springs
(Ottawa, Canada)


I like two 220v, (440 where available) bare copper 3/0 wires running up the
trees, one inch apart. Slathered, of course with peanut butter, or sprayed
with peanut oil.

This minimizes the damage from squirrels.

Steve


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On 12/30/2011 02:37 AM, Jon Danniken wrote:
Matt wrote:
Yes, I know they are trying to provide housing to their descendants
and kill off a tree that provides no food, while they are planting
acorns all around.

They are causing injury to the outer layer of wood (the new growth
ring). They are biting and digging through bark and into healthy
wood. They are not mainly removing rotting wood. The trees are
mainly healthy.


So build a squirrel house or two and mount it up in the tree. They will
probably take to it right away and solve your problem for you.

Jon



Thankfully squirrels limit the sizes of their families so their
offspring always have places to live. I expect they would move in to
the house and be grateful and satisfied so that they and their
descendants would never try to live anywhere else.
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On 12/29/2011 05:36 PM, Robert Green wrote:
"Matt" wrote in message
...

I have a couple of big silver maples, 40 years old and about three feet
in diameter.


stuff snipped

What is the best way to stop the damage and make the trees live longer?

I had one get into my
house when I was gone for a week. I came into the house, saw stuff strewn
around, drapes pulled down and finally, when


--
Bobby G.



Were you feeding the squirrels by any chance? Doesn't sound like it,
but ...

I knew a guy who had a 12-foot shack/cabin in the country, and he used
to feed the red squirrels. He went away for a week or more and returned
to find that the squirrels had gotten into the shack and turn things
upside down looking for food. Red squirrels are little and probably
didn't have much trouble squeezing through some little crevice into the
shack.
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On 12/29/2011 09:36 PM, Home Guy wrote:
Matt wrote:

I have a couple of big silver maples, 40 years old and about three
feet in diameter.

I've noticed in the past few years that fox squirrels are trying to
dig a hole in each tree by clawing and biting. Each wound is in the
trunk, about chest high, where a small limb has been removed years
ago and the trunk is growing out around the stub. So there is
already a kind of recess in the trunk, and they are trying to turn
it into a hole. I have noticed that sometimes a lot of thin sap
runs out of the wound and wets the side of the trunk.


What you should have done when the limb was removed was to perform a
correct clean-cut of the limb at the trunk and then paint over the stub
with pruning paint. The black tarry paint will water-proof the wood
(and it is wood that you've just exposed - lumber if you will) and will
prevent this wood from rotting while the tree grows over it. If you
look at exposed wood that hasn't been painted, if the area is large
enough the tree can't grow over it fast enough before it rots and
prevents the bark from completing it's growth over it, leaving a
permanent cavity that will just continue to rot and eventually become
the reason why the tree must be cut down.

With that said, I also notice that squirrels will chew on the TOP side
of horizontal branches of maples (particularly sugar maples) and will
remove large areas of bark on the top side close to the trunk (THE SIDE
YOU CAN'T SEE FROM THE GROUND) and will eventually kill the branch.

The squirrels are doing this because there is probably too many of them
in your local area and not enough food supply, and they're going after
the bark because there's not much else for them to eat.

Again, applying a thick coating of black pruning paint seems to repel
them from continuing to damage the branch, and the coating will give the
branch a fighting chance to grow it's bark back. I've done this on a
few of my maple trees, and to a chestnut, and have also applied the
paint to the top side of other branches that show no (or minimal)
squirrel damage.

What is the best way to stop the damage and make the trees live
longer?


You've got to approach this like a carpenter, and imagine that just
under the bark surface what you have is wood - lumber. And just like
your deck will rot in a few years when it's exposed rain and dampness,
so too will the inside of a tree unless you take steps to waterproof it
and prevent cavities from forming. The bark must be allowed to grow
over these exposed areas, and the bark won't or can't grow back over top
of rotted-out wood and cavities.



Thanks for the insights. So it makes sense that they are tearing up the
bark and trunk around the stub of the limb, stopping it from growing
around the stub. I'll look into the pruning paint idea if you think it
will still do some good.


And maybe buy a few 40-lb bags of black-oil or striped sunflower seeds
and throw some down every few days for the squirrels to eat - instead of
them eating the bark of your trees.



Whoops, I was with you until that last paragraph. It sounds like a way
to produce more tree-destroying squirrels.


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On 12/29/2011 11:09 PM, Robert Green wrote:
"Home Guy" wrote in message ...

stuff snipped

And maybe buy a few 40-lb bags of black-oil or striped sunflower seeds
and throw some down every few days for the squirrels to eat - instead of
them eating the bark of your trees.


I probably wouldn't do that since my neighbor's multiple and well-stocked
bird feeders are what caused the explosion in the local squirrel population.
With a good supply of food, they'll make a good supply of squirrel pups.
Rodent populations tend to expand very rapidly in the presence of a copious
food source.

Maybe if you laced the feed with birth control hormones . . .

--
Bobby G.



I have a bird feeder on a stand, with a baffle that keeps the squirrels
from climbing up. This summer, the branches of the victim tree in
question started hanging down close the feeder so the squirrels could
drop down from the tree onto the feeder and get the sunflower seeds.
They were very brazen, and if I went out and shooed them away, they were
back about as fast as they could climb the tree and drop down again.
They actually tore the feeder apart trying to get at a few seeds that
had fallen into the cracks between the little boards of the (wooden) feeder.
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Default squirrels attacking maple trees

Joe wrote:

Silver maples are one of our commonest fast growing weed trees.
Any city with a large population of these trees has rather high
damage problem after every high wind weather event.


Considering the size and probable condition of your trees, it
would be prudent to plan the removal and replacement as soon as
you can.


That is complete bull**** advice.

The truth is that people don't live long enough, and certainly not in
the same home, to see a "more desirable" replacement tree grow into
maturity.

I have two silver maples (each about 2 ft diameter) one in the front
yard and one in the back. I have seen what high winds (and even extreme
snow events in October - BEFORE they drop their leaves) can do to them
over the past 10 years - and the truth is not very much.

Until we can buy mature trees at Home Despot and "install" them as
easily as we can buy and install a hot tub or a deck or some other
relatively expensive piece of out-door infrastructure, I suggest you
treat any existing mature trees on your property as the only ones you'll
ever have in your lifetime.
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On 12/30/2011 12:17 AM, wrote:
On Thu, 29 Dec 2011 14:54:21 -0600, Matt
wrote:

I have a couple of big silver maples, 40 years old and about three feet
in diameter.


I've noticed in the past few years that fox squirrels are trying to dig
a hole in each tree by clawing and biting. Each wound is in the trunk,
about chest high, where a small limb has been removed years ago and the
trunk is growing out around the stub. So there is already a kind of
recess in the trunk, and they are trying to turn it into a hole. I have
noticed that sometimes a lot of thin sap runs out of the wound and wets
the side of the trunk. Sometimes woodpeckers also do their work on the
same wound.


What is the best way to stop the damage and make the trees live longer?


Spread some roofing tar on the bare wood. Not the stuff called
roofing cement (thick stuff), but the thin tar. Just paint it on with
a cheap brush. Two coats is better than one.

They also sell a similar product made for trees, and costs a lot more.
I've used tar when branches were cut and rotting was starting. I
cleaned out the rot and coated with the tar. End of rotting!



Thanks. That's about the same as my first guess at a solution, but I
didn't know whether it would work.


I called some tree-trimming guys for advice too.


One guy said right away I should put a piece of sheet metal over the
wound and hold it down with screws. He said squirrels would tear up screen.


The second guy said the squirrels were probably digging out rot and that
I might easily have a carpenter ant infestation too. He didn't look at
it though. He said I should look for carpenter ants when it is above
seventy degrees at night, so I will check it in the summer. He didn't
mention sheet metal until I did, but he agreed that that might work.


Sounds like I should use either tar or pruning paint to stop rot and
also cover the wound with sheet metal to stop the squirrels.
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On 12/30/2011 10:04 AM, Don Phillipson wrote:
"Matt" wrote in message
...

I have a couple of big silver maples, 40 years old and about three feet in
diameter. . . .
What is the best way to stop the damage and make the trees live longer?


If your trees have grown to 3 ft. diameter in 40 years, they seem
so exceptioally vigorous you need do nothing to make them live longer.



Maybe it is out of character for a Canadian, but you may not be familiar
with silver maples. They grow very fast. Not so exceptional for them.
And the neighborhood is as old as the trees, so there were no other
trees to shade them out. The ground is pretty wet here too.
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"Matt" wrote in message
...
On 12/29/2011 05:36 PM, Robert Green wrote:
"Matt" wrote in message


stuff snipped

RG I had one get into my
RG house when I was gone for a week. I came into the house, saw stuff
strewn
RG around, drapes pulled down and finally, when

Were you feeding the squirrels by any chance? Doesn't sound like it,
but ...

I knew a guy who had a 12-foot shack/cabin in the country, and he used
to feed the red squirrels. He went away for a week or more and returned
to find that the squirrels had gotten into the shack and turn things
upside down looking for food. Red squirrels are little and probably
didn't have much trouble squeezing through some little crevice into the
shack.


Nope. But my very close by next door neighbor does. It turned out that the
chimney didn't have a wire mesh cage on it and the old damper on the old
furnace had a swivel vane (almost exactly like Steve's pivot pipe,
ironically) that may have served as the access point. The source of that
incursion was never definitively found but there were no more incursions
after I had a fairly sturdy wire-cage chimney cap installed. That lasted
until the huge red maple out front got killed in one of the 100 year snow
storms we now have about every 10 years. They had pulled away a section of
siding, chewed through wood and insulation and got into the attic. Hearing
them skitter about at night was more than my wife could stand. The war was
on.

While my current method of dealing with them sounds fiendish, the neighbor's
five fully stocked and not effectively squirrel proofed birdfeeders are the
main problem. Rodents expand their families as the food supply expands.
There's a great episode of the Late Croc Hunter at a granary where there are
so many mice when they opened a bin chute, they ran out in a stream like
living water. And straight down his wife's blouse. Once my wife saw that,
the squirrel war heated up.

At first, I trapped them with peanut butter laced with Halcion, a sleeping
pill with an LD50 so high, a human has to eat over a thousand of them to
die. That was a tip I got from some squirrel research that wanted to catch
and band them. It was cheaper than buying traps at $30 a pop. But dealing
with doped up squirrels wasn't really a useful method for a homeowner so I
went to Ebay and got 3 double-ended squirrel traps. In the beginning I was
happy to take a drive to the park (near a great sub shop - hoagies not
boats) to relocate them. Then, the Incident occurred.

At that time, I still knew little about squirrels and some of their
remarkable capabilities. They can chew through plastic coated wire in very
short order. Burlap impedes them not at all. The guinea pig cage inside
TWO burlap bags I used to transport them was no barrier to a big adult male
with huge incisors. Driving 35mph with a very big, very crazed, escaped
squirrel in the van marked the beginning of my war on squirrels.

I'm basically a live and let live sort of guy until someone or something
invades my turf, climbs onto my head and whizzes on me with noxious squirrel
spurt. That's when things went from "Bambi" to "The Predator" in a few
short seconds. Yes, I know that's just instinct their instinct, but I have
my instincts, too. The feeling I had that night that I might soon die in a
car crash because I was trying to save a squirrel's life changed the
equation forever. Now I feel perfectly justified in quietly removing
squirrels from the gene pool that hang out around homes and not trees.

I learned something about them that day as he climbed up my back and onto my
head: squirrels seem to prefer to make their escape by instantly going for
altitude. The damage that was done in the house was primarily to the upper
shelves and a check of the spoor revealed he spent most of his time at the
windows or on a "elevated highway" he had mapped out. It wasn't until they
got into the attic that I learned a great deal about how they move around
inside a house.

When someone suggested that relocation might interfere with studies they
might be doing at the Agricultural research center, the whole concept got
redefined. My one-house Squirrel Relocation Service became the Squirrel
Population Control Service. There was some humor in it. The squirrel had
grabbed things like bags of cookies and knocked them to the floor, always
chewing into the bag where he saw a picture of the contents. I remember
looking at a bag of Chips Ahoy on the kitchen floor and seeing a hole where
the cookie picture had been. Then I realized that I was not burglarized,
but squirrelized.

--
Bobby G.




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On 12/29/2011 09:36 PM, Home Guy wrote:
With that said, I also notice that squirrels will chew on the TOP side
of horizontal branches of maples (particularly sugar maples) and will
remove large areas of bark on the top side close to the trunk (THE SIDE
YOU CAN'T SEE FROM THE GROUND) and will eventually kill the branch.



insidious
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"Matt" wrote

Thankfully squirrels limit the sizes of their families so their offspring
always have places to live. I expect they would move in to the house and
be grateful and satisfied so that they and their descendants would never
try to live anywhere else.


I think them singing "KumbaYah" all night might be a little bothersome.

Steve


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"Matt" wrote


Whoops, I was with you until that last paragraph. It sounds like a way to
produce more tree-destroying squirrels.


Squirrels LOVE BOSF. (Black oiled sunflower seeds), and you will have them
migrating from the next township if you start feeding that. Plus, the seeds
are around $30 or so for a 40# bag these days. Don't know exactly how much,
cause I quit buying them after they went past $20.

Steve


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"Matt" wrote in message
...
On 12/29/2011 11:09 PM, Robert Green wrote:
"Home Guy" wrote in message
...

stuff snipped

And maybe buy a few 40-lb bags of black-oil or striped sunflower seeds
and throw some down every few days for the squirrels to eat - instead of
them eating the bark of your trees.


I probably wouldn't do that since my neighbor's multiple and well-stocked
bird feeders are what caused the explosion in the local squirrel
population.
With a good supply of food, they'll make a good supply of squirrel pups.
Rodent populations tend to expand very rapidly in the presence of a
copious
food source.

Maybe if you laced the feed with birth control hormones . . .

--
Bobby G.



I have a bird feeder on a stand, with a baffle that keeps the squirrels
from climbing up. This summer, the branches of the victim tree in
question started hanging down close the feeder so the squirrels could drop
down from the tree onto the feeder and get the sunflower seeds. They were
very brazen, and if I went out and shooed them away, they were back about
as fast as they could climb the tree and drop down again. They actually
tore the feeder apart trying to get at a few seeds that had fallen into
the cracks between the little boards of the (wooden) feeder.


I have seen lots of deterrents to squirrels. The best I saw was one that is
battery powered. When the squirrel climbs down the line, or jumps over to
the feeder, the cover drops down under the squirrels weight, and no seeds
can come out. Then a battery powered motor starts the whole thing spinning.
After about three revolutions, the squirrel is dizzy, and lets go. A guy
with time and tools could probably build one. Don't know how much they cost
new. Google spinning squirrel. About $50, I'd say. Allows the light birds
to feed.

Steve


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On 12/31/2011 12:10 PM, Steve B wrote:
"Matt" wrote in message
...
On 12/29/2011 11:09 PM, Robert Green wrote:
"Home Guy" wrote in message
...

stuff snipped

And maybe buy a few 40-lb bags of black-oil or striped sunflower seeds
and throw some down every few days for the squirrels to eat - instead of
them eating the bark of your trees.
I probably wouldn't do that since my neighbor's multiple and well-stocked
bird feeders are what caused the explosion in the local squirrel
population.
With a good supply of food, they'll make a good supply of squirrel pups.
Rodent populations tend to expand very rapidly in the presence of a
copious
food source.

Maybe if you laced the feed with birth control hormones . . .

--
Bobby G.


I have a bird feeder on a stand, with a baffle that keeps the squirrels
from climbing up. This summer, the branches of the victim tree in
question started hanging down close the feeder so the squirrels could drop
down from the tree onto the feeder and get the sunflower seeds. They were
very brazen, and if I went out and shooed them away, they were back about
as fast as they could climb the tree and drop down again. They actually
tore the feeder apart trying to get at a few seeds that had fallen into
the cracks between the little boards of the (wooden) feeder.


I have seen lots of deterrents to squirrels. The best I saw was one that is
battery powered. When the squirrel climbs down the line, or jumps over to
the feeder, the cover drops down under the squirrels weight, and no seeds
can come out. Then a battery powered motor starts the whole thing spinning.
After about three revolutions, the squirrel is dizzy, and lets go. A guy
with time and tools could probably build one. Don't know how much they cost
new. Google spinning squirrel. About $50, I'd say. Allows the light birds
to feed.

Steve



I forgot to mention that I got on a ladder and cut the overhanging
branches, which solves the problem until they grow back down in a few years.
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