Willow deer damage

Here is some common osier willow, osier viminalis, that I think has been damaged by a deer. Need to set up the wildlife camera in case they strike again!

Common osier willow deer damage

These were shoots I had pruned from our next door neighbour in our old house. She had asked me to trim the shrub as it was blocking out quite a bit of light. I eventually got bored with cutting each individual stem and cut the entire thing to the ground with a chainsaw. Within a year, the new shoots were up to 3m long and 3cm thick - remarkable stuff and good for weaving/structural work. I've stuck a load of 25cm cuttings into the ground and most of them have taken, the tallest being about 60cm high. The gloves in the picture are Tegera 17 cut resistant gloves, available from Cromwells, they're the best all round gloves I've found so far.

Osier viminalis

We also planted some in an organised plantation in spirals and they seem to be doing very well indeed. As from today, 4 plants (out of 64) had grown taller than the 60cm spirals. We've also planted some yellow willow but it's not doing so well as yet.

Osier viminalis

It's so easy to propagate that I'm not worried about the damage - I'd only stuck the damaged shoots into the ground as had got tired of planting the individual sticks but didn't have enough to build anything meaningful with