HOw To SOMETHING IS EATING THE BARK ON THE FRUIT TREES

I was riding around not he zen machine and passed by the pear trees and noticed this.  I about fell off!  (not so 'zen', ha).

Something has stripped and/or eaten the bark of of two fruit trees.  They just so happen to both be the pear trees.  All other trees, knock on wood, were ok, so something was appealing about these two in particular. 

I thought maybe deer, though we've never seen any at the farm yet.  And any deer would have eaten off the leaves on the upper part and they look fine.  Rabbits?  Raccoons?  Something else?  It almost looks like something from ground level was standing up?

I decided I needed a temporary fix to cover the bark a bit and maybe deter whatever it is.  So I remembered reading that many animals don't like strong herb smells.  I had a basil plant in a pot that had gone to seed and I was going to pull it up anyway.  So I did, got out the clippers and some garden twine.

I cut up the long thin branches of the basil and tied them onto the trunk of each pear tree.  I left the leaves on and tied pieces all up and down the lower length of the tree.  I'm sure if someone stumbled across my temporary remedy, they might assume it was some sort of Blair Witch Project type offering.  Hey, maybe that would scare them off, ha.

Does anyone have any suggestions?  Will I lose the trees with the bark stripped? Most of what I read said they should bounce back, especially with Fall/Winter here and it goes dormant.  Still, I'm worried, of all the trees I planted, these were the most trouble free so far and were doing well, dang it.