Jerome

And then there are gimps like me paying thousands for tree guards hmmmmmmmm

On another note, earlier today when cutting wood I noticed this heart pattern. It first for about 8 inches through the wood.

Also these brown wrap-around tree guards are great, very strong plastic. I bought light clear plastic ones last year and they are too flimsy as the sheep will just take them off when scratching

Sheep, hares and the occasional Deer can have a go at the trees. The main issue is that sheep like to scratch, and will lean into the tree with all their weight and loosen the trees,this can also knock off tree guards. I prune off any branch that grows under 5 foot and I have tried various other methods such as painting the trees with paint and watered down manure to keep the sheep away. In general they don't pass much heed but every now and then some bastard will decide to strip trees and eat any bark they can get. I also have about 350 apple/pear trees that I bought over the last two years and the sheep always try to get these trees. One ram lamb got into them yesterday and stripped a load of trees that I keep in a protected area. That lamb is going to the factory tomorrow. I have wrapped the trees in black plastic which can save the tree, so hopefully. This is one of the smaller trees with two of the wrap around tree guards which is what I would like on all trees.

Thank you for the reply. Well 10-12 years ago my father planted an enormous amount of acorns that we collected from a few forests and from this initial planting we have approx 6 thousand trees. We also have another few thousand random trees growing, pretty much any time my dad would find a nice tree growing he would take note of location and collect seed. So we have large amounts of crab apples/plums/cherries/hazel/damsenetc. We also have an established area with older oak. Anyhow it's these trees I am planting. The key to planting these bigger trees is to prune the very hard, pretty much just leaving a 10 foot pole. It looks terrible when you do it but after a few months they develop a lovely crown and this brutal pruning increases survival rates. I have even planted cherry trees that were over 20 years this way with100% survival rate. I only have a few pics, I have some videos but they are shaky as I was just using my phone

Hiya everyone. I found this thread while googling 'recycled tree guards' wondering is it possible for a private individual to get used tree guards. I have been planting trees for the last 10 years, mainly oak trees, on farm land which is grazed by sheep, and it's costing a fortune in tree guards. In this thread I see that in some places they are littering the ground and unwanted. I try to plant out approx 300-400 oak trees each year and ideally each tree would need two spiral tree guards to keep the safe from the sheep. The trees are currently in a nursery area and are all over 10 years old. I have to did them up with a digger. I am based in Ireland, I'm hoping there might be a similar amount of unwanted tree guards here but to be honest this county is arseways. Is there any environmentally driven scheme in which people can obtain used spiral tree guards? Perhaps covering the postage cost?