Fruitless fruit trees

[rfmccloskey]

I have a dozen fruit trees (peach, pear & apple). The trees always are loaded with fruit by mid-July. However, by mid-August, just prior to picking, the trees are stripped bear at night--presumably by animals. A neighbor has experienced similar problem, which he attributes to ground hogs. Is there anyway to keep these varmints away?

P.S. I also have a several peach tree cankers. I plan to cut them away. However, is there anything I can put on the trees that will prevent the cankers from growing/forming in the first place?

Thanks.....

 

[John Paul Sanborn]

Cutting wont help and may hurt the tree more.

Many annimals eat fruit, fences and traps seem to be the best way to go. If near the house, lights with motin detectors may help with the neighborhood kids.

 

[John Paul McMillin]

there is not much you can do for the cankars on the peach , you can try to prune out the cankars if they are out on the tips of the limbs. About the fruit disappearing , are you sure it is an amimal or do you have apple scab and the trees are just aborting the fruit . If it a disease then you can set up a spray program. If it is critters than I have had had success with keeping squirrells from eating all my english walnuts by making a funnell out of galvanized sheet metal and putting it on the trunk of the tree . I have had great yeilds where before i had none.As long as there is no other tree around for the critters to jump from