December 25, 1982 – the day that my childhood naiveté was lost forever. I was standing in front of a tray of homemade chocolate covered cherries enjoying Christmas Day to the fullest extent possible. After I had eaten about 12 of them, my beloved Aunt Mary exclaimed to me, “When you are older, you won’t be able to eat all of those cherries!”
Much like me standing in front of that tray of cherries on Christmas day, rabbits are standing in front of your shrubs to enjoy the season to the fullest extent possible by eating the branches of those shrubs. Animals can cause extensive damage by eating the stems, bark, and foliage from plants.
Spring is when I observe quite a bit of damage. I encourage you to evaluate the shrubs and trees in your yard. With some careful investigation, you will be able to detect whether or not your plants have been damaged by animals. The first step would be to simply walk around your yard and look at each plant. You are looking for any signs of damage. Rabbit damage looks like someone recently pruned your plants, but did not rake up the part of the stem that was pruned off. The ends of the branches that are chewed on or bitten by rabbits are slanted. If you look closely, you may also be able to spot rabbit pellets.
Although I don’t see deer damage nearly as much as rabbit damage, it can be severe. The most common deer damage I see is on shade trees and evergreen shrubs. Deer will often rub up against shade trees. The damage may be about 3 1/2 – 4 1/2′ off the ground, and you would be able to see the green tissue that is normally underneath the bark of the tree. If the damage is deep enough, it will kill the trees. Damage of evergreen shrubs may simply look like someone used hedge clippers and clipped a depression into the shrubs. It would be at about the same height: 4’. Deer can also simply pull a shrub out by its roots to forage on it.
About 9 years ago, I visited with a customer in the spring. We had done extensive landscaping for her the previous summer. Her home was adjacent to a wetland area and many of her plants were damaged by animals during the winter. She was very concerned. She questioned why her plants in Huntley had been damaged during the winter, yet the plants that grew on a wooded lot at her Michigan home were not. I thought about that question a lot. As new subdivisions are developed, animals are displaced and the predator/prey ecosystem is disrupted.
In an established, maybe even wooded area, the rabbits are perhaps kept in check by predators such as coyotes, in a newly developed subdivision, there may be a disproportionately large amount of rabbits because their predators have been forced out. The rabbits are then free to graze and reproduce as they like until the predators come back. I don’t know if that is the correct answer, just an observation from having watched new communities such as Edgewater, Carillon, and Sun City mature.
If you notice animal damage to your plants, you may want to consider trying to protect your plants. Homemade and commercial animal repellent products are available. Human hair, Irish Spring soap, moth balls, and dryer cloths are all items that I have seen people use to repel animals. Commercial products such as Repels All, Blood Meal, and coyote urine can either be sprinkled around the base of the plants or sprayed on the leaves. Depending on where the plants are that you want to protect, you may also want to put up a physical barrier such as chicken wire, though be mindful of community regulations.
Thirty-two years later, I continue to graze on homemade chocolate covered cherries at Christmas. My grandmother, my two daughters, and I make hundreds of them each Thanksgiving and anxiously wait until they are ready to eat about a month later. My Aunt Mary is right; I don’t eat them like I used to, but I still treasure each one. If you would like to try to make these cherries yourself, the recipe is listed on our website: www.thegrowingscene.com.
• Kathleen Carr is the owner of The Growing Scene, Inc., a garden center and landscaping company. She can be reached by calling 815-923-7322 or tgsinc12@msn.com. Have a gardening question? Please contact her. She will address it in an upcoming column.
