My pet bunnies complete chew the bark around several apple trees. If
I make cuttings now and stick them in the ground, is there much chance
they'll root? They just started leafing. Would I be much better off
just buying dwarf varieties at the nursery?

"James" wrote in message
oups.com...
My pet bunnies complete chew the bark around several apple trees. If
I make cuttings now and stick them in the ground, is there much chance
they'll root? They just started leafing. Would I be much better off
just buying dwarf varieties at the nursery?

Probably. If you take cuttings, you'll be taking them from above the graft,
which means they won't be on a dwarfing rootstock.

Can you protect the trees with some chicken wire etc, to protect the bark,
or is it all gone?

Steve

On Mar 29, 3:54 pm, "shazzbat"
wrote:
"James" wrote in message

oups.com... My pet bunnies complete chew the bark around several apple trees. If
I make cuttings now and stick them in the ground, is there much chance
they'll root? They just started leafing. Would I be much better off
just buying dwarf varieties at the nursery?

Probably. If you take cuttings, you'll be taking them from above the graft,
which means they won't be on a dwarfing rootstock.

Can you protect the trees with some chicken wire etc, to protect the bark,
or is it all gone?

Steve
Bark completely round the trunk gone from ground to 2' up. These were
not dwarfs.

I would get new trees, plant them inside at least 3 ft high weld wire fence
with no more than 2 inches of space between the openings. Then I would cut
it into 3 to 5 ft long pieces and circle them into cages and set them out
around your new trees.

I would plan on leaving them here for 3 or more years. I didnt know at what
age they are no longer fair game for rabbits, but I've heard that deer also
love to munch on them.

Good luck. Dwayne

"James" wrote in message
oups.com...
My pet bunnies complete chew the bark around several apple trees. If
I make cuttings now and stick them in the ground, is there much chance
they'll root? They just started leafing. Would I be much better off
just buying dwarf varieties at the nursery?

On Mar 29, 5:11 pm, "Dwayne" wrote:
I would get new trees, plant them inside at least 3 ft high weld wire fence
with no more than 2 inches of space between the openings. Then I would cut
it into 3 to 5 ft long pieces and circle them into cages and set them out
around your new trees.

I would plan on leaving them here for 3 or more years. I didnt know at what
age they are no longer fair game for rabbits, but I've heard that deer also
love to munch on them.

Good luck. Dwayne

"James" wrote in message

oups.com...



My pet bunnies complete chew the bark around several apple trees. If
I make cuttings now and stick them in the ground, is there much chance
they'll root? They just started leafing. Would I be much better off
just buying dwarf varieties at the nursery?- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

The trees are about 25 years old but first winter here for the buns.

There is a special grafting technique called something like a 'bridge graft'
which you
can try. You cut a strip of bark from a non-critical place of the tree which
includes
the cambium layer. You then do a graft attachment to points above and below the

place the tree was girdled (this term describes the damage done). You can
probably
google for more details on this technique. I have seen examples where this has
worked, but you may need some help from an accomplished grafter.

If your original tree was on standard rootstock, all you have lost is a few
years until
these cuttings develop into comparable size trees to your current damaged ones.
I
personally prefer dwarf trees for maintenance, quickness to bear fruit, etc.
You could also buy some dwarfing rootstock and take a piece of scion (outer
branch of
new growth) from your existing tree and graft it onto this rootstock.

If grafting is not an option and you have the money to buy new trees or want
quicker
results in fruit bearing years, I would go with buying dwarf versions of
whatever you
have lost.

I lost a young tree in similar circumstances one year. Protect yourself by
putting fine
wire encircling meshes around the trunks of your trees. Make them high enough
so
that the critters can't climb up a snow drift to get over them. You can also
buy something called tree guards, which are coiled plastic tubing that can be
wrapped
around the trunks. Those however, should be removed after the winter since they

make nice homes for insects. These guards also keep the harsh winter sun from
burning the trunks of your trees.

Also, if the rabbits did not chew past the outer bark and into the cambium
layer, you may be able to just wrap the area and hope the remaining cambium
layer
will continue to pass nutrients to the tree, and also the bark may grow back,
depending on how badly it was chewed.

Sherwin D.

James wrote:

My pet bunnies complete chew the bark around several apple trees. If
I make cuttings now and stick them in the ground, is there much chance
they'll root? They just started leafing. Would I be much better off
just buying dwarf varieties at the nursery?

On Mar 29, 9:40 pm, "James" wrote:
On Mar 29, 5:11 pm, "Dwayne" wrote:





I would get new trees, plant them inside at least 3 ft high weld wire fence
with no more than 2 inches of space between the openings. Then I would cut
it into 3 to 5 ft long pieces and circle them into cages and set them out
around your new trees.

I would plan on leaving them here for 3 or more years. I didnt know at what
age they are no longer fair game for rabbits, but I've heard that deer also
love to munch on them.

Good luck. Dwayne

"James" wrote in message

roups.com...

My pet bunnies complete chew the bark around several apple trees. If
I make cuttings now and stick them in the ground, is there much chance
they'll root? They just started leafing. Would I be much better off
just buying dwarf varieties at the nursery?- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

The trees are about 25 years old but first winter here for the buns.- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Hard to believe that rabbits would damage trees that old. Usually
they damage small trees in the winter when snow is on the ground and
they munch bark above snow line.
Buck deer OTOH can demolish a tree maybe up to 8 inches in diameter by
rubbing their antlers on it. This normally happens in late summer to
early winter. For rabbits, wrapping the tree trunk with plastic or
paper will protect bark but for deer you need fencing.
Frank

On Mar 30, 6:23 am, "Frank" wrote:
On Mar 29, 9:40 pm, "James" wrote:





On Mar 29, 5:11 pm, "Dwayne" wrote:

I would get new trees, plant them inside at least 3 ft high weld wire fence
with no more than 2 inches of space between the openings. Then I would cut
it into 3 to 5 ft long pieces and circle them into cages and set them out
around your new trees.

I would plan on leaving them here for 3 or more years. I didnt know at what
age they are no longer fair game for rabbits, but I've heard that deer also
love to munch on them.

Good luck. Dwayne

"James" wrote in message

roups.com...

My pet bunnies complete chew the bark around several apple trees. If
I make cuttings now and stick them in the ground, is there much chance
they'll root? They just started leafing. Would I be much better off
just buying dwarf varieties at the nursery?- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

The trees are about 25 years old but first winter here for the buns.- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Hard to believe that rabbits would damage trees that old. Usually
they damage small trees in the winter when snow is on the ground and
they munch bark above snow line.
Buck deer OTOH can demolish a tree maybe up to 8 inches in diameter by
rubbing their antlers on it. This normally happens in late summer to
early winter. For rabbits, wrapping the tree trunk with plastic or
paper will protect bark but for deer you need fencing.
Frank- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Apple bark remains thin and delicious to rabbits. Rabbits also love
dogwood twigs but the trunk is too rough for them.

On Thu, 29 Mar 2007 13:49:09 -0700, James wrote:

My pet bunnies complete chew the bark around several apple trees. If
I make cuttings now and stick them in the ground, is there much chance
they'll root? They just started leafing. Would I be much better off
just buying dwarf varieties at the nursery?

You could post it to alt.binaries.pictures.gardens and put a link here?

Or send it to me and I will post it for you.


If you do send it to me, put a subject with the word 'worm' in it, and let
me know here so I will check my email. I don't check my email often, and
have thousands of unread spams.

stonerfish

jellybean stonerfish wrote:

On Thu, 29 Mar 2007 13:49:09 -0700, James wrote:

My pet bunnies complete chew the bark around several apple trees. If
I make cuttings now and stick them in the ground, is there much chance
they'll root? They just started leafing. Would I be much better off
just buying dwarf varieties at the nursery?

You could post it to alt.binaries.pictures.gardens and put a link here?


Jellybean,

Sticking these branches of apple wood will not in start a new tree. If it
would,
you would not get a dwarf tree anymore. The only choice is to hope the tree
stays alive long enough to get some dormant (no leaves opening yet) branches
and graft them onto a dwarfing rootstock. If grafting is not an option, then
you
will have to buy new trees. For goodness sakes, put some wire mesh aroung the
trunks of all your fruit trees to prevent this occuring in the future.

Sherwin D.

On May 8, 2:49 am, sherwindu wrote:
jellybean stonerfish wrote:
On Thu, 29 Mar 2007 13:49:09 -0700, James wrote:

My pet bunnies complete chew the bark around several apple trees. If
I make cuttings now and stick them in the ground, is there much chance
they'll root? They just started leafing. Would I be much better off
just buying dwarf varieties at the nursery?

You could post it to alt.binaries.pictures.gardens and put a link here?

Jellybean,

Sticking these branches of apple wood will not in start a new tree. If it
would,
you would not get a dwarf tree anymore. The only choice is to hope the tree
stays alive long enough to get some dormant (no leaves opening yet) branches
and graft them onto a dwarfing rootstock. If grafting is not an option, then
you
will have to buy new trees. For goodness sakes, put some wire mesh aroung the
trunks of all your fruit trees to prevent this occuring in the future.

Sherwin D.

As it turned out the apple trees didn't die after all. The leaves
didn't wilt so I assume they're fine now. Some of the Euonomus did
die.

On Tue, 08 May 2007 01:49:39 -0500, sherwindu wrote:

jellybean stonerfish wrote:

On Thu, 29 Mar 2007 13:49:09 -0700, James wrote:

My pet bunnies complete chew the bark around several apple trees. If
I make cuttings now and stick them in the ground, is there much chance
they'll root? They just started leafing. Would I be much better off
just buying dwarf varieties at the nursery?

You could post it to alt.binaries.pictures.gardens and put a link here?


Jellybean,

Sticking these branches of apple wood will not in start a new tree. If it
would,
you would not get a dwarf tree anymore. The only choice is to hope the tree
stays alive long enough to get some dormant (no leaves opening yet) branches
and graft them onto a dwarfing rootstock. If grafting is not an option, then
you
will have to buy new trees. For goodness sakes, put some wire mesh aroung the
trunks of all your fruit trees to prevent this occuring in the future.

Sherwin D.

I'm sorry. My response was supposed to be to the guy about his worm
pictures. I don't know what happened. I think I will blame in on the
software.

stonerfish

On Tue, 08 May 2007 00:45:21 +0000, jellybean stonerfish wrote:

You could post it to alt.binaries.pictures.gardens and put a link here?

Or send it to me and I will post it for you.


If you do send it to me, put a subject with the word 'worm' in it, and let
me know here so I will check my email. I don't check my email often, and
have thousands of unread spams.

stonerfish

Please don't leave us. I picked some little carrots the other day. There
were two or three sets of twins that grew spiraled around one another. It
was very trippy. But not near as trippy as your videos....womp womp

sf

ok my software is bugged. My responses are going to the wrong posts.
Bye, I am off to alt test...

sf