We have a 35 year camelia donation which has had every one if its small branches, which were completely in bloom, stripped. What creature

Question

is responsible? Initially, it looked as if a human had severely pruned it, but some branches were on the roof, possibly in the chimney, which was blocked. The beautiful bush has always flowered — this is the first time. The bush now is a 8-foot high bare stem; the removed flower branches just strew around the base. This happened quickly — the last 3 or 4 flowering branches gone whilst out for a few hours in the day yesterday.  Birds here: mostly buzzards — crow type, occasional magpie. Animals: squirrels, possibly rats, no deer, but foxes, badgers. But this is high, next to cottage wall (300 years old) and no other plants touched . A mystery!

Answer 1

Sorry to hear of the damage. Water and fertilize and hope for refoliation with the onset of the spring growing season.

That’s quite a variety of wildlife that you have mentioned. I would suspect the large birds in numbers to do that much in a short time, but I haven’t seen that happen except with parrots and cockatoos in a feeding frenzy.