I think the branches were alive. I don't know that I'd call them twigs. Some of them are up to 8 feet long. There are approximately 20 stripped branches now that I look. Also, the tree is more like 35 - 40 feet tall. I think it's 20 years old. I agree that it shouldn't hurt the tree too much, but I'm jsut wondering what I should do. Do I need to prune off all those branches? What a pain. I would definitely require a ladder or some tree climbing. Would you guys try to reduce the chances that the animal will do this to another 20 branches next time? If so how? Thanks.

The craziest thing happened for me. I had an African violet in my office. When I came into the office on Monday, the entire plant was gone!!! I was dumbounded and thought someone had played a mean prank. But today, the custodian and I did some investigating and found rat droppings around the office and have decided my poor plant was eaten by a rat that is someplace in office. Gross! That thing contaminated my office. I was sick thinking it all day. I did a search online tonight and found this discussion. I had never heard of an African violet being devoured by a rat.

It's also available as an audiobook if you're REALLY taking it easy this summer.

Without a pic, it's difficult to tell, but I still could be a familiar animal that is simply suffering from the mange, and has lost the hair on its normally-furry tail. A recent poster put up a pic of a "mysterious" animal, which was a Red Fox with advanced Demodectic mange, something that dog breeders are all-too familiar with. Without the familiar fur, an animal like a Grey Fox can look quite strange, especially from a distance. That's not to say it can't be some exotic escapee/releasee, but of all the animals in that size range I can think of(and that's a lot), the only ones with bare tails are still types of 'possums or rats, and neither would have even a vaguely cat-like face. Sharon McKenzie