Effective rabbit repellent paint?

General Fruit Growing
#1

Over half my trees either died or sustained serious bark damage due to rodent activity over the last winter. It was the biggest loss I’ve ever had as a home orchard grower. Most trees looked unsalvageable so I felt devastated. Since then many trees recovered, at least partially so I could send cuttings to friends or preserve the varieties by grafting.

For this upcoming winter, I’ve been protecting most of my trees with various Amazon products but they only go up about 8 -12" off the ground. With snow, I worry that they wont be high enough.

To have additional protection, I have been painting my trees with iv organics paint. I got several cans of the green paint on sale at half price so it was not expensive to protect many of my trees.

I have 2 questions for this group - Do you believe that the IV organics paint can protect my trees from ravenous rabbits over winter? We have a ridiculously high rabbit population here. I haven’t seen so many rabbits around ever before.

Some of my trees were still green and I couldn’t paint them. Since I now ran out of paint, Is it worth painting them next time around with surround/skim milk mixture as in this link:

Will surround painted on thick stay on the tree? Will it protect the trees from rabbits?

#2

I have pretty aggressive rabbits too - spiral tree guards work well and you shoudl find some that go at least 2-3 feet tall - I did lose some lower scaffold branches (maybe a disadvantage to the low branching that I am targeting). This year my nursery is selling a mesh that I am trying on a few of my trees.

#3

You don’t need to paint your new dog.

#4

Aluminum window screen comes in 3’ widths. Cut off enough to wrap the trunk and then staple the open edge shut with a regular paper stapler. No rodent damage.

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#5

Highly recommend checking out this thread as well Living with the cottontail and growing fruit