What animal eats dead bark off of a tree?

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There is shredded wood at the base of the tree but nowhere near the amount that is gone.
 
There is shredded wood at the base of the tree but nowhere near the amount that is gone.

Bambi and his mother ate tree bark in that movie...


Is the bark piled on the ground under the tree or is it gone?

I'm thinking Pileated woodpecker after grubs if the bark is scattered under the tree.

Look close where the bark isn't missing and you can see holes where he probed for grubs.

Wouldn't the woodpeckers have flown south for the winder, or do they stick around?
 
I wonder if those marks are made by beetles and then the dead bark fell off on its own?
Here's a few pics of bear tearing bark off, there was no damage on the wood underneath, not that I remember. The blurry close up picture shows the bears teeth marks in the bark:
björn vs tall.JPG björn vs tall2.JPG Björntänder vs tall.JPG
 
Nothing eats bark off of a dead tree. Plenty of creatures eat bark off of live trees. I wonder if what you are seeing is the work of a larger woodpecker.
Just a little pecker.
It's not the 'woodpecker' its a woodpecker
A cousin of the woodpecker and part of the excavator family this little guy is known as the sapsucker.
That tree was hammered by Beetles. All the holes in the existing bark appear to be exit holes. The sapsucker hears the Beetles under the barb and strips it. It dosen't take them long. I have worked amongst them for years in the mountain Pine Beetle attacks. They have cost me a lot of money as they peck through the ribbons of the pay trees and the ribons get blown away and snowed on. When the numbers don't match I have to mob back once it's all figured out. After been a host tree the bark starts to separate. It's usually the larvae that move around the tree as they grow and server the cambium layer. I don't know much about oak Beetles & patterns other than the Beetles are large. One looks like what is known to me as the spruce Beetle with long antennas.
 
taz-tornado.jpg
 
I could take a picture oof a tree down by the creek on my property that looks exactly the same. It started higher and worked it's way down. At first my best guess was a bear but it did not look like claw marks, so then I though maybe large whitetail bucks, but it seemed almost too high for that. I now believe it is a wood pecker or something like a porcupine. If you figure it out. please update. If I catch the culprit here, I will update with a picture if I can.
 
Is the bark piled on the ground under the tree or is it gone?

I'm thinking Pileated woodpecker after grubs if the bark is scattered under the tree.

Look close where the bark isn't missing and you can see holes where he probed for grubs.

I think you are spot on with the woodpecker. I have a few species around here and some of them are great at tearing large sections of the bark off like this.
 
You could put up a trail camera and find out exactly what it is? I've never seen anything like that.
 
I think you are spot on with the woodpecker. I have a few species around here and some of them are great at tearing large sections of the bark off like this.

The three-toed woodpecker makes horizontal marks like that but not that many, and not from a dead tree since it dricks the sap that comes out of the "rings" it makes.

Maybe it is a woodpecker but one that is out of his mind? I'm sure animals can go postal too...
 
The three-toed woodpecker makes horizontal marks like that but not that many, and not from a dead tree since it dricks the sap that comes out of the "rings" it makes.

Maybe it is a woodpecker but one that is out of his mind? I'm sure animals can go postal too...
Even more OCD than the rest...lol
 
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