A Bark Eating Animal/Rodent

[SwampDonkey]

Porky will strip the bark off most any tree, even bitter pin cherry. Bleck. :D

[SwampDonkey]

The critter, believe it or not, was a field mouse or vole.

Voles will damage raspberry, blackberry and mulberry. That seems like a lot of chewing there for a little vole. They are generally base of the stem type feeders though, not up in the limbs. Musta been coming back a lot of times.  ;D

[Jeff]

That certainly in not vole. He may have been seen up there after the fact for a nibble, but the original culprit was certainly a porcupine.

[RPF2509]

Porkys have been very scarce in CA for some time.  I'd guess ground squirrel or tree squirrel.  Look at the size of the teeth marks.  Mice are about as wide as a pencil line, squirrels about as wide as a crayon line. That's a lot of damage for a mouse but a squirrel could do that in a few days.

[Ljohnsaw]

+1 on scarce Porkies.  I've been "in the country" in northern California (not far from the OP) for nearly 30 years and have never seen nor heard of any encounters.  We've had a number of dogs that tangled with skunks, mice, gophers and voles but never porkies.

EDIT:  Sorry, Jeff.  Left the "nearly 30 years" out.

[Jeff]

Well, I'd bet there was at least one 5 years ago.

[Barebuttminer]

Well I guess I have some explaining to do.  First off the tree is a mulberry tree located at my winter residence in Elverta CA., a small farming community about 15 miles north of down town Sacramento. I live here in the winter time because my unincorporated Nevada City property is inaccessible in the winter time.
There was 3 to 4 square inches of bark was being removed from the tree nightly over a period of approximately 8 to 12 weeks. If this was porky then he was most certainly a light eater.
The teeth marks left in the bark are less than a 16th of an inch wide much too small to be a porcupine tooth.
I have spoken with Trapper John from Sacramento County wild life management and he assured me that there are no porcupines in this area.
My primary reason for believing that it was a mouse eating the bark is because after I seen Fuzzy jumping out of the tree with a mouse in his mouth there was no more damage done to the tree. Of course Fuzzy wasn't about to let me close enough to inspect his catch to find out what type of mouse it was. He was probably afraid that I might take it away from him. I'm assuming that it was ether a field mouse or a vole.
Yes I to find it hard to believe that a mouse can do this much damage to a tree.
Anyway that particular branch of this tree has long since died and is now being used as a trellis for a Honey Suckle bush.

[SwampDonkey]

That does spell out the situation much better now. ;)

[michigander53]

This is a pic of a squirrel I caught stripping a tree in January of last year![imgleft]http://[imgleft]

[michigander53]

I too thought it was a porcupine, but had never seen one in our area! I only seen this behavior last winter![imgleft]http:///imgleft]

[SwampDonkey]

I've seen red squirrels debark small patches in spring time on hard maple and come back to it to lick the sap. Right now I have a porcupine though, that is mostly targeting hard maple and stripping the main stems. He is also in the larch and also a fir here and there. He completely girdled a 20" yellow birch. He's got to go I'm afraid. I have been trying to locate his den with him in it. ;D

[Roxie]

Michigander53, I've never seen anything like that, and wouldn't have believed it without the photo.   

[thecfarm]

Nothing to gauge it's size,but looks big next to a Maine gray squirrel. I think a grey one in no longer than a foot.And saying that,the ones around here are always on the back side of a tree.

[coxy]

the chips on the ground are way to big for a squirrel I would put money on a pork pine

[Jeff]

This is reminding me of a topic from long ago called "Making Paper" < LINK  where on first observation, one would think the sap suckers flying in and out had pecked up a tree very bad, but until you actually new the truth, that it was wasps harvesting bark and the sapsucker visits incidental.   I'm betting the squirrel was the secondary visitor, just like the sapsuckers in the aforementioned topic. There are definitely porkies in the Frankenmuth area.  If you have woods in Michigan, it is possible of not likely you have porcupines.

I still clearly remember the day Mr. Tom and I discovered this going on and I got in there to document it. The section of tree is now in my little cabin in the back yard.

http://youtu.be/UdYjjJL9iIw

[coxy]

jeff did you ever find the nest

[Jeff]

Not as I recall.

[Bogue Chitto]

Dead gum that feller is hungry, or that is a mighty sweet tree.   Might want to put a trail cam. on that and post it. 

[michigander53]

https://youtu.be/ByueqFn6oZ8    I found this on You Tube about a squirrel stripping a tree!