John, I'm so sorry. This has happened many times to me. But thankfully never destruction at this scale.

Maybe you can save some if you re-pot and baby them, or maybe you can take cuttings of the one's too far gone.....

Wow - that must have been a whole family of raccoons! We have deer, which of course just graze a bit - they do not un-plant the roses. However, because of the deer I keep most of my smaller, newer roses in pots surrounded by cages. It might work for raccoons.

Jackie

Hi Jackie. I doubt anything short of a Houdini-proof lid-and-lock cage would keep out a 'coon. This is the same varmint who figured out how to get into a garbage can with a ten pound rock sitting on the lid and bungee cord tie-downs, lol. But I have to figure out SOMETHING to do before tonight, if it's just to bring them ALL into the garage for the night. Ugh.

Oops...I said I was finished whining, didn't I?

Oh...one more thing (I'm not whining, promise!): all the labels got
scattered. Some were obvious, but some of the teas are hopelessly
muddled. Have you ever tried to ID a wilted tea rose without even a bloom? lol. If they survive, I may need help identifying them.

So sorry John. I can't even imagine.

John, we also have issues with raccoons making messes, spilling trash, and uprooting plants to chew on them. My last 'victim' was a large pot of Amaryllis. I did find some small bulbs to repot. Bad, but nothing like your rose disaster, though. I have finally gotten a live animal trap. Raccoons love marshmallows and I usually catch them in a day or two. I know they say it's not good to relocate them, but otherwise they just keep coming back. You are right that fencing is not going to discourage them. In our last house, one wanted to get into our attic and he started at the bottom of the house and stripped off the siding all the way up to the second story trying to get inside. They are a major pest in my opinion, and don't discourage easily. Sorry for your loss...I'd put the roses in the garage tonight and buy a trap tomorrow. Bob in Indiana

"Pest" isn't the word, but I doubt Houzz would let me use more accurate language, lol.

I'm seriously thinking about the trap, Bob. My only problem there is I have a very curious kitty. She'd never forgive me if she spent the night in a trap, lol. She loves the outdoors, especially now that it's warm. But she has a litter box inside, so I may have to put up with her whining to get out all night.

I'm so sorry, that's just terrible! Hopefully with plenty of water your losses won't be too great. (PS... I would have cried to see all of my hard work undone like that, so I definitely don't think you're doing any "whining.")

Good luck, John....BTW, I purchased one live animal trap that came unassembled and I never could get it working right. I actually threw it away. It had very few instructions, and you'd think it would be easy to put together, but not so. I ended up buying the more expensive Have-a-Heart trap and love it. Hope you can find a good one and it works. Be sure it has good instructions!

Keep us posted. Bob

We catch raccoon, possums, and foxes with eggs and live traps. First put the trap out and don't set it. Leave a few eggs lying on or around it for a few days. Then on the third day open up the trap put one egg in front of it and 2 in the very back so they have to walk all the way in and set the trap.

I use the eggs because we have stray cats around. The cats leave the eggs alone. If I put in tuna or sardines etc. it will trap cats instead of what I want.

We have caught the craftiest foxes and raccoon this way. They love eggs but you have to let them eat a few first and get used to the trap being there.

I really like wildlife but we have had our chicken coops broke into (raccoons chewing through 3/4 inch plywood and foxes chasing turkeys and chickens clear up to the house which is an acre from the woods and digging into the chicken runs, so we had to resort to the traps. I usually don't trap unless I am having a particular problem.

Here, it's not raccoons. It's GOPHERS. The Western Pocket Gopher will eat the roots of any rose planted directly into the ground.

My double Ragged Robin had ALL of its roots eaten last winter, right down to a nub. It was 7 ft. tall, and they ate EVERY bit of root, so that the rose fell over. We soaked it for a couple of days, cut it back, and replanted it in a pot in the ground, and it's about 3.5 ft. now.

Roses are tougher than we give them credit for being. I hope some of yours surprise you.

I agree with Jerijen. I have had a St. Bernard puppy de- pot a rose on a very hot day and leave it chewed and almost rootless. Both the rose and puppy survived. I just soaked the rose in 1/4 strength Root-booster for 24 hours then repotted it after cutting it back.

You have my sympathies. This year, they dug up all my large decorative pots filled with annuals that I had spent the entire day before planting. They'd flung potting soil and annuals everywhere. I replanted but it took some time for the plants to recover from the mauling. I should have sprinkled hot pepper all over the pots, but I forgot. That usually keeps them out of plantings for a couple of days.

Wow- that's really rough. I hope Jeri is right, and they will recover, but that's quite a set-back, even if they all pull through. Which I hope they do.

Virginia

What a mess---I understand how upsetting it can be---each area has it's problems to deal with .right now I'm dealing with RRD but I remember waiting a long time for the first bud on one of my roses and "Bambi" came by and nipped that bud off---YUK---only rose lovers can understand your frustration------

Florence

Thanks all. Misery loves company! lol.
Jeri- yeah, I'm hoping the roses (especially the teas!) are tougher than they look. Right now they are pitiful little babies.

In addition to the raccoons, I also have voles. They aren't nearly as big as gophers, but they do love rose roots. And hosta roots, and lily bulbs, and peonies....Grrrrrrrrrrrr.

I should have gone to town and bought some critter repellant. I didn't even think of it until floridarose's hot pepper comment.

John

Watch for some of the catch and release pest management companies who work the posh neighbors driving into your area and making deposits. Take pix and call Fisheries and Wildlife.

One neighbor of mine who has corn fields shot 32 raccoons and trapped and additional 65. All of a sudden. Even they don't reproduce full sized coons that fast.

Ann, if I catch anyone releasing raccoons on MY farm, they'll be catching more than raccoons as they leave :) :) :)

John

If it was Maman Cochet, Cl, I'll happily send you mine come dormant/bareroot season. I've cut her back because she was out of control, but she keeps growing too rampantly for any good spot I have! She won't have to be too big to ship, either; I can cut her back to 2 feet and she'll just be back to 15' in no time :) I know this from experience, lol.

Meredith, thanks so much for the offer. Mine isn't the climber, but I sure would find a spot for yours if you still wanted to send it, lol. I'd be glad to spot you the postage, or trade for another climber. If you'd like to trade, I'll send you a list of what I have, and I can root cuttings this summer.

John

Ooh, sounds like fun! My rose budget is non-existent this year, so that would be awesome :) I'll try to have your Cl Maman have narrow canes that can be wound around to ship! Then the canes will have some age on them and not be so delicate and new (and they'd be long, so that's fun!).

Meredith, I sent you a private message with a partial list of climbers I have.

John

Oh what a bummer, John, I would be beside myself. That's really awful. We've spotted at least one raccoon but I think the lack of water keeps them away for the most part as it does the deer. Living in a bone dry place does have its advantages. Strangely enough even the gophers left about three years ago and a few days ago was the first time since then that I've spotted a gopher mound.

I can't even imagine releasing raccoons into another neighborhood, that is truly wicked. I don't know what the answer is, and I didn't even realize until I read this the damage they can cause. Gardening is not for the weak of heart, that's for sure.

Ingrid, you are so right. If we weren't made of stern stuff we'd have given up long ago. Either that, or we're all masochists, lol.

Raccoons are NOT the cute little masked bandits of the cartoons. They are ravenous, malicious, destructive THIEVES, who are much too smart for MY good.

On a brighter note, some of the roses look like they might survive if I can balance keeping them shaded enough to keep them from wilting until roots re-grow, without inducing so much blackspot from being in the shade that they defoliate and die anyway, lol.

John

Hope you potted them back. Roses are fairly tenacious so they may come back. The raccoons do the same thing here. Anything I plant must have a tomato cage until they are rooted in or their dug out. It helps to place some rocks on the pot until the plant roots more. Of course rock heats up the soil if it's really hot out. To bad they don't sell that netting material that Santa Rosa Gardens sends their perennials in. That would work well to keep them out of pots.

Can you bring roses in garage at dark till morning. The raccoons often repeat the same behavior for a couple of nights.

Patty, I did bring them in (all 18 of them, grrrrr) for three nights. I also spread repellant around and in the pots when I finally left them out. So guess what? The varmint went and dug up my newly planted cannas :P

John

Is there any bone meal in the planting hole? They have been digging them out here all spring if I forget to cage it. I planted a bunch of Lemon zest in with the daylilies forgot tomato cages. Yep every little band size rose was out of the ground. If no bone meal they assume there are a few extra worms that made their way into the planting hole. When the babies start coming out all heck brakes out. I'm just happy I saved all those tomato cages there not cheap any more. I feel for you in more ways then one. A walk and replant is the first thing I do in the morning.