Are these natural? I believe it's a pin oak ~10 yrs old. They look fresh but the neat line threw me a bit. I also have a troublesome neighbor who I would t put it past to try to kill my tree (it's right on the property line) and I don't see any holes higher than I could reach myself.
by crino_raccan
8 Comments
That’s your pecker hole
Looks like a woodpecker searching and coming up with nothing. We have a lot of those here. When they find something, they do a neat rectangle, if they find a lot, your tree is decimated.
That’s a pecker, baby!
You could look at the woodpecker as a kind of a neighbor
Likely Yellow-bellied sapsucker damage
not an aborist but have asked this before for my own trees with similar concern. Result == Sap Suckers. No significant damage or concern from these birds/holes.
Very old woodpecker damage, many years
As others have correctly pointed out, these holes are from one of the four species of sapsucker that live in North America. Unlike other woodpeckers, sapsuckers aren’t going after insects inside the tree. They drill these holes and drink the sap that collects in them and they eat the bugs that are also attracted to the sap. My understanding is that this does not mean that the tree is unhealthy and it doesn’t significantly harm the tree.