North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[jim <jmc1@epix.net>]

Plastic spiral wraps, aluminum foils, and any other sort of light-excluding
wrap will lead to really serious burrknots on apple rootstocks that have
a genetic propensity to that problem--Malling 26 and MM.111 would be the
worst, but you can get in trouble with all the English clones.  The
spiral wraps can perform an additional disservice -- with a few years of
benign neglect, a wrap can actually girdle the tree.

Hardware cloth, screenwire, or any other open material will usually keep voles out, but if there is snow up to the top of the cylinder, sometimes voles will take that route over the top.

We can handle the voles and rabbits -- but our most troublesome rodents are these whitetail deer!!

//Jim
www.cumminsnursery.com

del stubbs wrote:

I've been a pondering tree gaurds, and a deep subject she is what with
plastic spiral wraps and aluminum foils and all.....But I keep returning to
window screen.....
        it breathes,
        it can be painted white on the south (I understand that having the shade
somewhat removed from the tree -rather than just painted bark- is better
protection)
        the holes are smaller than any field mice I know,
        should last many years even underground a few inches
        can be cheap

        on the last note I called the local hardware store and found that I could
buy a 100 foot roll of 2' window screen for $62 U.S.  If I cut it into 1'
strips that's 62 cents each, can you beat it?
        yep!, scrounger that I am I asked the clerk what happens to all the
discarded screen...it took a while to convince him that someone could
actually want it!  bins of it he said,  come and get it, espcially come
spring.
        the quoted price was for aluminum, the common fiberglass was cheaper, but i
didn't ask
        I just now tried rolling up a 1' by 2' sheet on a piece of an old garden
handle and it made a nice tight roll......origionally i thought to just wrap
it around tree (about 3 to 4" tube and staple edges tpogether)   but this
1"-three-times-around  tube would naturally expand with the tree. It could
be secured with a quick wrap of twine if needed
        Any better ideas?
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