Vole damage to trees (and prevention)

[Angus Whitehead]

Hello,
Does anyone have advice on how to prevent vole damage to the bark of my trees? Over the last couple of weeks Probably 400 or so have been girdled (ring barked), some quite deeply.
Would copper grease harm the trees? I'm thinking of painting some on the trunk of each one to prevent them from nibbling.Having looked into grease bands and Vitax fruit tree grease, it seems a reasonable idea, especially if I mix a bit of garlic in (if the smell is such a turn off for them). I've read various advise about using castor oil, essential oils (eg lemon) mixed with diatomaceous earth, as well as garlic.
There seems to be disagreement over the use of Vaseline (blocking some pores of the bark), and the cost of dozens (hundreds?) of tubs of the Vitax tree grease would be vast. Seeing as copper can be sprayed on trees, I wonder if copper grease would be ok (if "standard" farmyard grease is no good for trees, which I've also not fully established yet).
I know weed control etc is key to reducing rodent habitat, but they dig into the roots and (I suspect) live there too.
Secondly should I paint over the damaged areas, or hope that they will naturally heal?
I will also look into the cost of plastic tree wraps / guards, but these will no doubt be costly (especially to do 5000 trees!).
Any help would be most welcome!!

[Chris Schmidt]

Are you sure they are voles? Just checking, as dealing with voles is a little different than dealing with field mice which can also girdle trees (I had that problem last year on about 100 of my 3300 M9 trees).

The BC Agriculture people told me if I had moles/voles, the only treatment is to install traps in their tunnels.

As it turns out I had mice living under the weed cloth, i simply pulled up the weed cloth and no more girdling occurred. And it was a lot easier to deal with than a potential vole problem.

Plus I also wrapped the base of the trees in heavy plastic to protect the tree bases. From the root ball to about 10" above ground. This not only protects from the field mice, but also from the weed-wacker, and occasional rabbit. 

So far so good...

Chris Schmidt

Tod Creek Craft Cider

273 Prospect Lake Rd, Victoria

Visit our tasting room: Wed to Sat, 10am - 4pm

250-882-1061

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[Steve Hall]

hello, we had the same problem with voles some years ago albeit on a much smaller scale ,half length (bandsawn in half) plastic spirals seemed the only thing that worked

good luck

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[John C. Campbell III]

nothing worked for me till a family of foxes appeared and ate them

jccampb

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[pennsy x]

Painting over will keep them from drying out. But what you really want to do is bridge graft those areas.

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[woodcarver]

I made a tube of hardware cloth, buried a couple of inches and going up about 18 inches about the soil line--with a diameter large enough for about 8-10 years of trunk growth. I ended up going back and folding down the tops of the hardware cloth so that the sharp edges would never hit the trunk. Seems to be pretty effective, but its a real pain when the hardware cloth works lose. I've replaced some cloth with spiral wraps. I take the wraps off in spring as soon as it looks like voles have plenty of other things to eat. I don't like the wraps to be in place during warmer weather. So far I've lost one tree out of 540 in two winters to voles. We'll see.

The hardware cloth definitely is costly and labor intensive.

I've read that a very quick pass with a flail mower in the summer will knock back the population.

[Handmade Cider]

Distraction? If you have been pruning then leave a load of prunings around on the ground, hopefully they will go for the bark on the pruned wood instead.

D

Denis France   www.handmadecider.co.uk   07590 264804  Company. No. 07241330

White Label – Champion Farmhouse Cider, Bath & West Show 2015.

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[Michael Holzer]

Voles can be a major pest in orchards, especially when you have trees on dwarf rootstocks, such as M9. Vole usually feet on the trees roots, not on the bark to my knowledge, and thereby can even kill them. If your trees have been girdled, it might be caused be rabbits.

There are few possibilies to protect your trees against voles:

1. plant trees with a wire mesh basket. The mess size should be below 13mm. 

    https://www.wuehlmauskorb.de/index.php/anwendung

2. catch voles swith traps, different models are available. Takes some experience to catch them and to distinguish     

    between vole and mole tunnels. (Can provide more info If you like)

3. use bait which is designed for orchard protection, uses either zincphosphide or bromadiolon. 

    for example: http://www.epmhandel.de/Gardentop-15g-pasta-5kg-Eimer

Hope that helps!

[Appleman]

I care for a 450 trees in my orchards here in Northwestern, Vermont. The fix is quite easy and I have had only 2 tree losses in over 15 years of growing and attributed to my own neglect not to inspect for openings in the protective barrier in the fall.  What I use is aluminum screening, 26" high around the base of the tree/s. I cut a generous sheet of screening and apply it by folding it in half, and bring the ends together on one side of the tree. With a standard office stapler, I affix staples from top to bottom moving horizontally across (kind of like tying lines on a paper). This forms a tight barrier providing excellent protection from bores and voles. As the tree trunk grows, the internal staples open and allows the screening to stay tight around the tree. It is far superior to plastic spirals or fabrics.       

[woodcarver]

Wow this is a very intriguing idea! I assume that the Staples keep the wrap a tight enough so that it hugs the ground? Is that right? And this provides good protection from borers as well? Does it make weeding around the trunk difficult?

[sand...@franklinvt.net]

The Aluminum screening gives full protection from bores and voles. Again, as the trunk grows the inner staples open up but the screening stays tight so no voles or bores can damage the tree. Before I started using this method I would find bore and vole damage on a yearly basis. This system really works and I encourage you to try it. (Warning: Use aluminum screening only as voles will chew through nylon screening.)