heathens away from the hungry totem so you can dismantle it? The trick I used on the other totem (butterflies) isnt working and I am out of food.

Use lightning (If you have enough energy.) to scare the aggressive heathens away (And the Red masked heathens too!) so your builders can come in and dismantle it.

Note: Don't use bees, the builders will run away as soon as they hit the swarm.

What I did to get the heathen guard away from the hungery totem was I grabed my kid & kept dropping her in front of him till I had lead him to the bottom of the screen, then I pulled her away so she didn't lead him back & I dropped all my adults on the totem, then I repeated the leading him away process each time he got about halfway back to the totem till it was dismantled.

In my first game I zapped the totem with bees and even lightning, but I found that "kiting" worked better, and it didn't use up any god powers. The important thing is to drop your villagers on the near side of the totem to demolish it. If you drop them on the other side they'll see the scary red-masks and run away immediately. As well as kids, a nursing mother is useful as the decoy (if you have one, of course).

What do you mean near side? I have tried so many times and I can only get it to 25% Thanks!

the side of the totem not facing the noni bush.

If you drop a peep on the side facing the bush they will see the red-mask guards and immediately run away. You should be careful to drop the peeps so that they land on the side facing you, so that the totem is between them and the red-masks and blocks their view.

remove the guards from the firewood, not just from the bush? It seemed to do that with my first two villages but on the third they just stayed and are preventing my builders from getting access to the wood.

when you build your statue up, the guards will soon become uncomfortable and abandon the wood pile.

as I did not have other powers at I kept dropping a villager on the heathens as a decoy this let my builder getting on with his job to dismantle the hungry totem this worked as the heathens were too busy chasing the intruder off

keeping them on the side of the totem away from the red heathens. I don't have enough power for the lightning, but I'm out of food. I can lead the orange ones away, but am stuck on how to get around the red.

summon bees on them. Or lightning (because I'm evil like that)

When this happens, sneak your villagers in there (trying to make sure they don't see the Red Masks) and get them to start dismantling the totem. Put all of your adults on it.

I believe they will take cover when it's raining so that's also an opportunity to dismantle the totem.

As others have said, lightening also works, just make sure your villagers are not too close or they will get zapped too.