Official snowfall this winter in Benzie County is nearly eleven feet!
All that snow bent the branches of a white cedar by my house toward the ground until it became a thick white wall covering the whole shrub and extending to the ground.
After the snow melted, I noticed that bark was stripped from the branches as high as my shoulders. My first thought was deer. Only they would be tall enough to munch five feet off the ground. But then I remembered that the deer couldn’t have gotten to the branches through the snow wall or I would have noticed their activity before the thaw.
The tips of the branches were nipped off at a 45-degree angle and the bark was stripped in a way characteristic of rabbits.
But how did the rabbits reach so high?
Apparently, as they stripped the branches they could reach from the ground, they crawled up through the lattice to reach ever higher branches.
Overall, they created a chamber about three by five feet in area and about five feet high.
It was insulated above and on the sides by snow and on the ground by a 3-inch cushion of fallen branches. They only eat the inner living bark, not the entire branch.
Rabbits take cover under that cedar throughout the year, but over the winter, they accomplished an extreme makeover, changing a temporary refuge with excellent ventilation to a snug, multi-level chamber with a cushy floor and insulated walls and roof. Impressive work!
The cedar was overgrown for its location, so I don’t mind that they pruned it for me.