# Rodents girdled the peach tree.  Do you think it'll make it?



## EatenByLimestone (Apr 3, 2011)

Last fall I planted a few peach trees.  I was out cleaning up the back yard and noticed the tree.  I'll leave it up just in case it decides to live, but am not going to hold my breath.  What do you folks think?


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## begreen (Apr 3, 2011)

That doesn't look good. I would guess those varmits killed the tree.


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## Adabiviak (Apr 4, 2011)

How much of the cambium is intact? If it's girdled all the way around, it's toast.


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## Dieselbreath (Apr 4, 2011)

I experience that all the time with my seedlings. Say goodbye and replant. This time wrap the bottom with tin foil. This has been an especially bad year here in NW Oregon.


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## Adabiviak (Apr 5, 2011)

Tin foil! Good idea - we have some aspens we just planted which had the bark tore up pretty bad by deer (not fully girdled though), and that neck of the yard doesn't lend itself to an easy fence.


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## Bill (Apr 5, 2011)

I use sum-pump hose, slice off 12" and split it and slip over the trunk of all small trees. Some times the trees will make it, but usually not.


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## homebrewz (Apr 5, 2011)

Maybe.. wait and see. Had this happen to a couple of mature crab apples last winter. My forester friend said there was probably enough energy in the trees to leaf out, so you might not know until after the spring. Its been a year.. our trees seem OK. If yours makes it, you'll need to wrap it for next winter.


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## Wood Duck (Apr 5, 2011)

It looks to me like the tree is completely girdled, and therefore a goner. If there is even a small strip of bark the tree can recover, but I don't see much hope for your tree.


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## zzr7ky (Apr 5, 2011)

It's toast.  Good excuse for a nice air rifle though ; )


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## billb3 (Apr 5, 2011)

even if there's a sliver of bark left on the unseen side that'll take [del]years[/del] decades  to recover.

start over


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## fishingpol (Apr 6, 2011)

We have a lot of rodent damage like that around here from this past winter.  After the snow melted, there were little channels on the grass all over the place.  Hawks better get busy around here.


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## jdemaris (Apr 6, 2011)

EatenByLimestone said:
			
		

> Last fall I planted a few peach trees.  I was out cleaning up the back yard and noticed the tree.



I don't live very far from your area and that happens every year here - to many young trees.  I've never had the top of any of them survive, but the root-stocks usually do. 

So, the problem is usually what the actual root-stock is.  Fruit trees are often grafted, especially those sold  in cold areas like this (25 F below). 
If your root-stock is not the same as the "above ground" tree, you're apt to have a tree grow back pretty fast this summer- but it won't be the peach tree you started out with.

I've got Reliance peaches here - grafted from some sort of Manchurian root-stock.

I've tried covering with metal woven fench, cloth tree-wrap, etc.  Nothing worked and often wrapping made things worse.

My fix has been to plant 10X what I really want, and if a couple make it past the first two years, they usually do OK.

Besides the mice and rabbits chewing the bark off newly planted deciduous trees, we also have a lot of trouble with deer stripping all the needles off of Balsam Fir and White Cedar plantings.


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## btuser (Apr 7, 2011)

Nature is the enemy.


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## Adios Pantalones (Apr 7, 2011)

I have cut bare trees that grew buds, or whose buds popped after being cut.  Signs that there's life in it are little indication of it surviving- I think "he's dead, Jim"


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## RNLA (Apr 7, 2011)

Dead Jim, dead. :-S


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## ramonbow (Apr 8, 2011)

Looks like your only chance is to graft "bridges" from the root area to the intact bark. I've only tried this once and it failed miserably. If that was a tree you wanted to get rid of it would surely live, but being a fruit tree it looks like its a goner. Like others have said it may re-sprout from the roots. This is fine if the tree was not grafted onto a rootstock. Over a couple of years select the best sprout and cut out the rest. If it has been grafted you will likely have a tree with sub-par peaches if it bears fruit at all. All our fruit trees get either tree tubes or 1/4 x 1/4" hardware cloth around them from the ground to at least a foot above average snow level.


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