What causes something stripped the bark off my young tree?
Bucks rubbing their antlers, which happens through the fall as they shed velvet and mark territory ahead of and during the rut. They choose trees they can straddle and that give — smooth-barked young stems — and aromatic species get selected out of proportion to their abundance. Deer return to the same rub lines and frequently the same individual tree year after year, which is why a landscape planting near a wood line loses the same specimens repeatedly. Precise peak weeks vary by year and location and are UNVERIFIED for any given central-Indiana season, though fall is the reliable window.
What you'd see
Bark shredded and hanging in vertical strips on a small-diameter trunk, typically somewhere between knee and chest height, on one or two sides. The wound looks scraped and fibrous rather than cut or chewed. Small side branches snapped off around the damage. Almost always a young smooth-barked tree from an inch to a few inches thick. Loose bark on the ground at the base. Rodent damage looks different — visible tooth grooves, usually right at ground level or below the old snow line.
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