Tree Damage

About a month ago, our neighbors to the northwest decided to sell off all their hardwood timber.  We listened in disgust to the hum of chainsaws and the Thud! as each mature tree crashed to the ground.  The wooded section that remains is only partly ours, and mostly our next-door neighbors.  Gone is the beautiful buffer zone that provided a screen between us and them and was a thriving woodland habitat for numerous squirrels, birds, deer and fox.
I actually made myself nauseated just fretting about it.  It was extra painful, I think, because we had lost so many of our trees since moving in for various reasons: construction stress, an ice storm toppled two and badly damaged four others that had to be removed.  We lost an elm that had been girdled by something.   I do not even want to tell you how much we paid to save another 90-ft tree that still ended up having to come down!  So here we are trying with all our might to save our trees, and they were cutting theirs down.
It surprised me that over the next week, I actually forgot what the landscape used to look like.  I took action by planting a new white pine in the back and two river birches near the creek.  I consoled myself with the thought that perhaps the removal of the canopy would allow some of the saplings increased sunlight and hopefully faster growth.  There are two younger maples and a tulip poplar on that side that are between 20 to 35 feet tall, just not very wide.  Maybe those will fill in.

Then yesterday, as I was cleaning up some of the leaf litter by the creek, I noticed this:

I was distraught to see ants crawling in and out of these holes that are oozing sap.  Then I looked over at the other maple about ten feet away.  More holes!  Lots of rows of holes!  I came inside to Google “ant damage” and grab my camera.
What I learned from reading is that insect damage on a tree does not appear in a distinct pattern.  Insects create random holes, usually entering one side of the tree and coming out somewhere on the opposite side.  These holes are definitely in a pattern.  So what caused them?   They are the work of the Yellow-Bellied Sapsucker, a small woodpecker belonging to the Picidae family.

I read on, trying to determine if there is anything I can do to stop these trees from being killed.  According to my reading, the YBS drills these holes in the spring to create wells of sap which it then laps up with its tongue.  Ants, bees and other insects are drawn to the sweet fluid and the woodpecker dines on those as well.   Other bird species, especially hummingbirds, benefit from these holes of sap because there are few nectaring flowers on which to feed during that time.  The insects are beneficial food source for them as well.
Hmmm, you all know much I love birds.  I have never seen this YBS!   But, I need to put that mission on the back burner for now, because at the moment I am concerned more about the trees.  I continued reading.
Yellow-bellied sapsuckers have favorite individual trees.  That is to say, several species of trees are chosen by the entire population of YB sapsuckers.  But one little woodpecker will often return to the same tree for as long as the tree lives.  Well, I thought, perhaps that means that these wounds in the tree are not fatal.

 

Old Scars

I began to look closer at the tree trunks.  Sure enough, you can see rows of raised dimpled bark where the tree eventually healed over the oozing holes.  There are several holes on both the maples, and one row so far on the tulip poplar.  If the YBS drills all the way around the tree, or the tree fails to heal over, then a portion of the tree above that spot will die because the sap will not be able to flow above that point.  We shall see what happens. 
Now, on to capturing the culprit with my camera…