Grasshoppers, perhaps?

That's a possibility... they aren't currently as present in the neighborhood as they've been at other times. Though I did surprise a fairly large one on the pipevine yesterday. Thanks!

I hadn't seen any in our garden until just the past few days, and now they seem fairly abundant every time we go outside. Voracious little buggers, they are!

Japanese beetles are big fans of my Aronia, but they usually leave "skeletonized" leaves, and not just bare stems.

Pretty sure the current round of total leaf removal is being done at night or in the twilight hours by critters small enough to fit through the chicken wire grid. Appreciate the confirmations cut ants, grasshoppers, or other insect are likely suspects. I rarely resort to systemics, but will in this case to save the unestablished plant that has been kept largely without leaves since May.

Steverino, Interesting behavior of the cut ants sticking with one plant (as long as the leaves hold out) after they've marked a track to it. Would explain only one of three adjacent plants being attacked so badly. Will be watching for new damage on the others now that the first has been totally depleted.

Keep in mind cut ants won't necessarily do the logical thing and attack a nearby plant of the same species after they've polished off the first one. As often as not they will choose an entirely different plant on the opposite side of your yard for their next victim so keep an eye out.

Okay, the damage has now moved on to the mostly unscathed plant that's not encircled by chicken-wire; am guessing about a third of the leaves were lost over two nights.

Will try to catch something on camera overnight.

Slugs come out at nite & chew off fleshy growth, but not leaves on woody stems like that.

Well, early yesterday morning I did find this solo ant struggling through the mulch to haul off a relatively big chunk of Aronia leaf:

Was wondering why I didn't find more ants, then found this on the earlier night video that might explain it:This young opossum spent quite a bit of time rooting through the mulched bed for insects, slugs, and other stuff they are known to eat. Am guessing some of the other ants may not have survived this omnivore. The damp spots around the watered plants seemed to get extra attention - which also helps explain all the disturbed mulch I'd noticed around the plants and chicken-wire.

So, suspect it's been a multi-pronged mammal/insect attack. Still think this rabbit that has become way too comfortable in our yard (occasionally coming up to the low front window where s/he irritates the dogs) is also a contributor:

Unfortunately the camera motion detection doesn't currently work well in daylight due to all the "moving" shadows in the breezy weather we've been having (it records everything). So am not likely to catch the rabbit in the act on video during the hours it's most likely to be eating.

I can attest to rabbits loving Aronia and I need a chicken wire cage around mine.

tj

Happy to see you've found the culprit! Must be a young nest for damage to be so slow and minor which is good since with age they tunnel deep in the ground - A&M says up to 20 feet down- and at that point they're very difficult to erradicate often tunneling laterally underground to surface again away from the treated nest.