I had sprayed plants with protective odour but maby rainy winter have washed away the smell.

there may be some hope fore some of eaten grafts, but even then it is always fallback in developement of plant.

Hare had not even eaten all the tops but just left them lying there on the ground as if he was just testing his teeth.

Golden colourforms of picea abies had been most wanted delicatesses this winter

Fortunately i managed to remove one big hare with boxtrap and havent been seeing any tracks on the snow lately.

This raises a question if i should fence my whole lot like prisonyard. Protecting individual plants with wirenetting is difficult when number of plants increase year By year.

Here in Germany smell is not enough. I must take a fence round each young plant. When the plants are old enough, then you can take the fence away.Without a fence, there's too much risk for rare plants.

Wolfgang

In our area winter can last from November to March, a full 5 months. I sleep much better at nights knowing my plants are protected from nibbling rabbits and deer. I feel it's mandatory that every plant gets caged in chicken wire. Also serves as a marker so nothing gets stepped on in deep snow. Yes as the collection grows so does my collection of chicken wire and fence post, and the time needed to cover in the fall and uncover in the spring. But at lest I know when its -10 for a two week period I've done all I could have done to protect my conifers.
The other part is having a good rabbit control program during the whole year. I'm in the country , so see a rabbit, shot a rabbit. And in the winter my box trap is always set.

Barn cats take care of rabbits around here.

Deer are an issue, though, especially with this hard winter. They're even eating pungens right now.

good riddance.. vermin are vermin ... congrats .. stinking rats with big ears ...

i dont know what species or type i have.. but smelly fruit works to attract them ... both apple cores.. and cantaloupe rinds .... i may as well eat the good parts ... the fruit i mean.... never had rabbit ...lol

ken

Three years ago we had deep snow for the month of February. I had my back yard fenced in with chain link. The ground was uneven at the bottom of the fence line and rabbits could squeeze there way under. Since there was nothing to eat they came in under the fence and destroyed 12 of my dwarf conifers and several Ginkgos. I purchased rolls of fine mesh galvanized wire two ft. high and began to wrap my fence. I cut the bottom to fit the ground contour so it fit snug against it. Took about a week kneeling on the frozen snow tying it to the chain link. with fine galvanized tie wire. That completely shut them out of my garden forever. I see plenty of tracks on the other side of the fence where they
,rabbits, try to defeat it. A lot of work but worth it.

For a lot of you this is not possible but my garden is small which permitted me a way to solve my rabbit issues.

You can barely see the wire mesh in this photo starting at the bottom of the fence line up to two ft.

{{gwi:640956}}

Dave

If its any consolation something ate my conifers too. I don't know if it was deer or rabbit. One was a blue star juniper the other is some type of chamaecyparis pisifera I inherited. They were both small plants so a little bite still adds up to damage. Plants just came out from under the snow, so I am guessing the damage happened within the past few days. I sprayed repellent yesterday. Hope that will keep them away. I wish they would stick to the grass. The deer again ate through the deer netting draped over our holly bushes. Yes, the deer eat the prickly holly in winter, and they ate so much of the azalea I wonder how much flowers we will get this year.