What's Skinning My Lemons?

I have a great big Meyer lemon tree growing right beside my deck. Tons of fruit, more than I can use.

For a little while I’ve noticed that every so often a half-eaten lemon would appear on the deck railing (well away from the lemon tree). Figured it was a hungry squirrel.

This weekend my g/f looked over and noticed that something has been gnawing the skin right off the lemons on the tree. The flesh of the lemons isn’t being touched, just the peel/rind getting taken. I haven’t done a full Lemon Damage Survey but the visible ones are all at the top of the tree.

Any idea what might be doing this? G/f posted this question on some plant-type discussion boards (she’s big into gardening) and some folks posited roof rats (I have scurrying sounds in the attic and found some droppings so I have a feeling that a call to the exterminator is in order anyhow).

We have a lovely orange tree just beside the deck and railing. We often (read every day in the warm weather) have squirrels showing complete disregard to the cleanliness of our yard. They’re pretty messy critters. They will gnaw off a chunk of peel and get the goodies inside with no difficulty. They leave the peels everywhere. I tried the “squirrel chaser” supposed repellant and it seems they just danced around it. [nelson]haw haw[/nelson]

It gets really nasty though when you get racoons involved. Good luck with your problem, meyer lemons are some tasty fruits!