Bushy tailed rats. a.k.a. squirrels. They do this to my Graham Thomas every year.

Yep, squirrels. The ditsy things bite off the buds on all kinds of things thinking it's food, chew on them and spit them out 'cause they don't like them. I hate squirrels! I found one of my Double Delights chewed up on the ground the other morning.

Well squirrels have to make a living too. LOL

Get a live game trap. Catch them and take them for a ride.
If I ate the nasty things, I would have a freezer full.
Got one yesterday and again this morning. I bet some of the neighbors are wondering whats going on with all the missing squirrels. It works for Rabbits also but different
bait. I bought mine at Gander Mountain.

John

You may not love this idea but when we had a squirrel problem in our old house, we put up a squirrel feeder in the back yard away from the garden & kept it stocked w/nuts. Squirrels are territorial, so the ones that were already there didn't let any new ones in. They were fed well enough to leave my garden alone.

I have bird feeders that double as squirrel feeders:) so they don't seem to bother my roses.

The trouble with feeding them is that when they are full
they start taking the food to the flower beds and burring
them. (Digging up your flower beds). Then, they go back
and dig them up. I just got another one just a few
minutes ago. (I guess I feed them too). For a few seconds. They also multiply.

John

Help! Something is eating the buds and sometimes the leaves of my roses, too. The rose that has the most damage is about 4.5 feet tall -- could a rabbit or squirrel reach that high? I haven't seen any squirrels in our relatively new neighborhood, but I know we have rabbits...argh!

Sounds like deer.

I love my little squirrelys. I feed them sunflower seeds and peanuts. I don't really have to worry about them eating my plants anyway, because they spend months up in the pine trees stripping the pinecones to eat the pinenuts, and then they move on to the black walnut trees and chow on the walnuts. They make a huge mess with all that tho. Plus I have mini walnut trees planted in all my pots and all around the yard. But that makes it kinda fun.

Now the deer are another problem. Goldiemom, I have to agree with Michael. I think you've got deer eating your roses! Shoot, that reminds me, it's time again to go spray the repellent....

"Well squirrels have to make a living too. LOL

Making a living does not mean that they should feast like Louis XIV or Henry the VIII.

Squirrels make a living around here stealing from the cardinals. This feeder has a 'squirrel protector' on it, which makes their acrobatics more interesting! Annie

{{gwi:291368}}

Help! For the first time EVER, this morning I woke up to every single last rose bloom, bud ready to open and newly formed bud GONE from every plant! It was as though someone just "snipped" them off.... No evidence or "chewed" flowers were on the ground...no leaves were eaten, and some stems are about 3 feet high. I suspect deer, but we've lived here for years and never had this problem. If anyone has any help or advice to offer, I'll all ears....they were so gorgeious and now they're GONE! (snif)

Two perfectly formed rosebuds, ready to open were there late yesterday afternoon. This am they are gone. They look like they have been snipped from the stem. Plant is about 3 ft high. Seems too tall for squirrels or rabbits. Any ideas as to what's doing this? Deer? I'm trying to not suspect the hostile neighbors (people) next door. kctypes4u,did you ever find out what was doing this? Sounds like we've had the same thing happen from your post on June 22: Help! For the first time EVER, this morning I woke up to every single last rose bloom, bud ready to open and newly formed bud GONE from every plant! It was as though someone just "snipped" them off.... No evidence or "chewed" flowers were on the ground...no leaves were eaten, and some stems are about 3 feet high. I suspect deer, but we've lived here for years and never had this problem. If anyone has any help or advice to offer, I'll all ears....they were so gorgeious and now they're GONE! (snif)

Love to Garden, if there are deer in your neighborhood, they are the likely culprit. I have about 130 rose bushes in my yard and before I started spraying them with repellent, the deer would eat every last bud during the night. I can clearly remember standing in my garden crying! I use liquid fence on my bushes now and rarely have a problem (they might get one or two buds before they decide they're too bitter), but there are many other sprays that work just as well. Best of luck to you!

What kind of repellent? I lost all the first rose buds off my Chrysler Imperial last night. :(

I use Deer Stopper on daylily buds, hosta foliage and roses.It needs to be applied every couple of weeks. After using the same repellant for a couple of years, you may need to switch brands (sometimes the deer become accustomed to it). Liquid Fence is another good brand.

Woodchucks well do this also. They well bend a stem down and munch on the flowers. Did not think it was he until I saw him do it.

Deer leave ragged ends on branches they browse. Good video showing this close up http://tinyurl.com/qc4hqqf (go to full screen for detail). Bunnies can only reach as high as they can stand on their hind legs, and are apt to leave a mess of torn leaves, stems & flowers strewn about. But they can jump to higher areas (porches, chairs) & nibble plants from above. Never noticed squirrels munching plants, but they get plenty of tidbits from bird feeder scatter. Our house sits in a clearing surrounded by woodlands, so somebody seems awake at any hour of the day or night scouting for supper. Aromatic plants like lavender & beebalm guard the borders near roses & floppy plants that obscure sure footing cover any bare ground around perennials, many of which are deer resistant, but nothing is deer proof. Have to fence the garden phlox when it buds, since deer have climbed the steps & gobbled down the blooms from the porch. Apparently, that's irresistible. They haven't bothered the hydrangeas, apart from sampling a leaf or two over the years, but in my son's garden miles away they browse his to stubs & bypass the Peace rose surrounded by lavender. Sedum Autumn Joy is a big draw for the fleshy leaves, so I leave the old stems poking out till getting around to caging them before the foliage outgrows their deterrence. Typically it's a curious young buck that comes exploring the flowers on his lonesome around here. Several small deer families graze on the back lawn & rest on the edge of the woods, but they seldom bother the plantings unless it's a hard season.

Haven't noticed any damage from other woodland neighbors, though the turtles will clean up fresh fallen rose petals & help themselves to a few viola blooms. In the years I find heliotrope to grow in the porch boxes, a hedgehog couple can often be glimpsed sitting quietly next to them, apparently enjoying the fragrance as much as we do, without disturbing a petal.

I didn't intend for this, but I've observed that the local squirrels seem to not like the feel of the coffee grounds I've been spreading in the garden beds. My little front yard garden used to have squirrels and various birds eating the leftovers I'd toss there from my Amazon parrot. While I keep seeing the birds feeding, the squirrels never touch ground there, as far as I've seen. Even tossing out some whole almonds failed to entice them to walk across the coffee grounds. Of course, your results may not be the same, but for those who have "squirrel issues" in their beds, it's worth a try. And even if you don't, collecting used coffee grounds from Starbucks or other neighborhood coffee joints helps decrease what goes into the landfill. And besides that, it's a really great, nutrient-rich, FREE soil amendment that will cause your earthworm population to explode.

:-)

~Christopher

It sounds like deer. You need to spray Liquid fence every week for 5 weeks, then you can cut down to every 2 weeks, then once a month. I just sprayed liquid fence tonight, rabbit ate some of my newly planted roses. Liquid fence is not cheap, $30 a bottle. It's easier for me just catch the rabbit. Just set up a live trap with lettuce! Can you hunt deer in your yard? Check out this thread, it might help you. http://forums2.gardenweb.com/discussions/3042886/deer-repellant-that-worked-100

A squirrel is eating all of my rose buds right before they are about to bloom they also dig up the flowers in my garden to bury the peanuts that my neighbor feeds them too. I got a have a heart trap and I brought two of them so far to a nice place about 5 miles away. I have at least one more to get because when I woke up yesterday morning I saw one digging up one of my plants. I ran out and saw that he had also ate another one of the buds off of my rose bush. This little guy might be too smart to go into the trap but I'm not giving up. If I had a human size trap I could take my neighbor (jerk) for a ride and solve the problem all together.

Why not get a bear suit and go and plunder the neighbours bird feeder early in the morning or whenever it is that bears trash bird feeders. That might encourage said neighbour to stop feeding the darned squirrels!

Linda

We can do with a whole lot less squirrels and zero deadly venomous snakes! We don't care if we never see a single rattlesnake, water moccasin, viper or huge constrictor like Burmese pythons! Only place they belong is safe behind strong glass in a zoo! Even non- venomous snakes are disgusting and never need to see them either.

I've been surprised to see my new (small) rose bush missing approximately one branch a day for the past few days, it's not just rose buds but whole branches sliced off with not very strong bite marks.. I noticed some weeds nearby with broad leaves have had their leaves snipped off and wondering what on earth could be doing this??? I'm now left with just a few short branches coming out the base.. Although I do have squirrels I've had them for years and never seen anything like this... The only culprit I can think of is field mice which I have seen around recently, does anyone know if they do this kind of damage or what else it could be??

Sounds like deer to me. Our voles eat roots and grass. Deer eat new growth, buds, and blooms, ripping and tearing and wasting what they eat. Voles kill perennials and roses by eating roots. Diane

Thanks but deer don't have access to my garden nor do rabbits as far as i know..

I haven't seen any voles but I guess they could be around..

Ground squirrels and bunnies left my roses alone for many years until climate change became an issue, and in a relatively short period of time they had eaten not only my roses but also companion plants, well really everything I had planted. The squirrels will eat buds, blooms, leaves and branches and are much more destructive than the bunnies, although in my case there were more squirrels than bunnies. They climbed over and under any barriers I put up, and out of 80+ roses I was finally left with one very thorny and spiny rose, Wild Edric. Five years later they are attacking it too.

Use powdered garlic to deter rabbits. They seem pretty easy to deter here, compared to other pests. I suppose that Finn, the cat helps a lot. He's heck on voles, so they haven't been a factor for quite a while. And yes, we have a major coyote population here, but if you are careful with your cat, they can be avoided. Most of the time, Finn is inside. Diane

Voles are yummy. Finn

Voles do cane damage here. They are awful. We have a visiting cat, but she is not full time.

Ive seen chipmonks eat rose buds, then I shot them.