My horses are eating the bark on the trees

[Ponygirl]

How do I stop the horses from eating the bark on the trees???? they are feed well and have plenty of hay....never miss a meal.....I know they must be bored....or must like the taste of those trees....they don't chew on the fence boards...and they are not eating the bark from all the trees....just a couple.....

Is there a paint or a coating that can be applied to the trees to deter them from doing this????

Any suggestions will certainly be appreciated.....

 

[Hosscrazy]

I ended up wrapping my trees with chicken wire - it's definitely done the trick for me!

 

[JO~*]

What kind of trees are they? Not cherry I hope.

I put up wire around my apple trees.

 

[justaboutgeese]

We wrapped the trees with wire to prevent chewing. I think they do it just because they can.

 

[Naira3284]

we had only one tree they chewed on, I just took a bar of soap and ran the soap up and down the bark till it was covered in it. than we watched the horses come up to it, take a bite and start spiting and making gross faces

havent chewed on it since

 

[Bess Kelly]

Be sure to spray to areas without bark with a tree pruning spray or you may end up with a dead tree!

Then wrap in several layers of wire or fence around it. Also watch that they don't then eat the leaves and lower branches. I suppose some do it for boredom relief, some because they crib anything, some may "like" the taste, etc. You might want to check to tree type to be sure the leaves and such aren't harmful to them.

 

[Bluerocket]

chicken wire is good --- don't wrap it tooooo tightly around the tree however as you can "girdle it" (have the bark grow over the wire and eventually kill the tree).

 

[Deanna]

Mary ours do it this time of year as well and still are doing it...I think it is somthing with the tree and like you said it is only our holly and oak trees they have not killed the trees over the past years so I really dont worry about it and like yours ours are fed well minieral block hay and tons of grass mine I dont think are bored the ones I see doing it there are only 2 horses on 4 acres....sorry I dont have any ideas if you want to stop them from doing it there are some pretty good ideas here to try

 

[Marty]

One day several years ago, a neighbor and I were talking and he pointed out to me that Sonny was eating a tree in his front field. Sure enough, upon inspection, he had been going to town on it. Common sense told me that was just plain weird and he was lacking something. Turned out I was not giving him adequate hay at all. And the hay I was feeding him wasn't the best I could do for him either. AFter that I began to buy a lot better quality hay and was sure to feed him enough after that. No more eating the tree.

 

[HGFarm]

We usually make a little fence to surround the trunk where they cannot reach in to chew. Or loosly wrapping with wire, as suggested above would probably do it. Just allow for tree growth..

 

[Ponygirl]

Deanna...I think the trees are possibly red oak that they are stripping the bark on....most of the trees are sweet gum and they do not touch those trees at all....

Marty....my horses have more than enough hay, plus it is the best quality in the Houston area....every year, my hay supplier gets 1st place in the state in competition....so I know they are not lacking there....

Every body else....hubby has already sprayed the pruning stuff on the trees today....I like the idea of the chicken wire as I think it is inexpensive and probably easy to manuever around the trees....I appreciate all your suggestions....

Thanks!!!!!