What's the Problem?

I recently got a phone call from a lady concerned that her trees had a disease.  She said that the disease left holes all over the trunk of her apple tree and now had started attacking her maple. 

I didn’t think this was going to be a disease issue because apples and maples aren’t close relatives.  Usually diseases are more specific than that. 

So, as I had suspected, her disease has feathers!  A woodpecker called the yellow bellied sapsucker pecks distinctive holes in almost straight lines on the trunks of trees.  Fortunately, trees usually can withstand the damage.  As you can see from the photo, once the sapsucker gets a tree on his mind, he stays focused on it for a while.  You can try to repel the birds by hanging a small, concave shaving mirror in the tree.  Also, they may be scared away by strips of aluminum foil 1"x12" hung from strings so that they twist in the wind.