I planted a native bur oak in my yard in Missoula 15 years ago. It is now 20 feet high. A beautiful elegant tree.
Right after that bad cold spell we had, I suddenly noticed that the upper half of the tree appeared orange.
Imagine my horror when I looked more closely and realized that all the bark was peeled off the upper half of the tree (trunk & branches).
I contacted the city forester, and he confirmed my fear that squirrels likely chewed all the bark off.
And probably deep enough to kill the entire upper half of the tree.
I had never heard of this happening to a tree, especially after it was this size.
I asked if there was anything I could have done to protect the tree, and the forester said, probably not.
Squirrels can get around just about any physical barrier, by jumping from nearby trees.
and if I tried to protect the tree now, I'd have to remove all the lower branches to keep squirrels from jumping up on them
to get around the barrier and then the tree would have nothing to live on.
So I wanted to ask if anyone knows of some sort of repellant that could be put on a tree to keep squirrels off the tree?
I hate to keep squirrels off an oak, but if they are stupid enough to kill a key food tree for themselves,
I think I'm doing them a favor to keep them off the tree. Then they could pick up acorns off the ground.