Yes, COVID was a Political Scam

[TDDA]

In regions with deers you will find marks on trees and can judge by the age and size when it happened, fresh ones tell you more

What do you see?

How much wrong am I?

I don't know.

I was scouting the area and getting my tree stand ready for the climb. Those marks weren't there the week prior. What's in the photo is what a buck (male deer) does during the rut. I found this tree (and a couple of skinnier ones) like this walking back in.  No deer for me that day though.

It was a pretty healthy tree from what I could see.  I ought'a go back out there and see if it died after all that bark got tore off.  Pretty long way to go just to look at a tree though, so I probably won't.  If I had to guess those marks were only made the day before I came back and found 'em.  Would have walked right past it in the dark to get to where I stowed my stand.

It could have been a deer though but the fungi is helping a lot for the destruction. I've never seen it that worse in the forest here and we do have deer. I try to pull up some fruit and nut trees and ran into deer trouble already. We call them bock here, the male deer. They rub their antlers, on younger trees too. Damages the bark and then it starts to hear and tree overcomes it with slower growth an tree-life long marks or dies when it's too much. 

Have you noticed the fungi on the tree? That is one of the first external signs of infection and ultimate death. Next time you are there you could check out the abnormal leaf laying there and compare it to another one far away that is healthy.