brush forest or open woods

[Legionair]

Question to the more experienced hunters.....

I have woods behind my house that I hunt bordering an isolated field (75-80 acres surrounded by hardwood forests).

These woods of mine are an old christmas tree field with sporadic hardwood trees in the middle and thick hardwoods on the ends. The center of this pine forest is typical of unkempt pines - tightly packed (3-6 feet between trunks) tall straight white? pine. The bottom 10-20 feet is dead branch clutter making it somewhat difficult to walk through (for humans at least). There is very little ground cover like grass or clover as there is little sunlight breaking through the canopy. This strip of woods is approxamately 250-350 yards long, by 100- 300 yards thick. And sloped up hill towards the open field in varying degrees between 25 and 45 degrees.


O.K. my question is -- should I go in there with a chainsaw and thin out the pines to let in light, or just remove the dead low limbs to open up the forest floor, or just leave everything alone. I'm hoping to make this more inviting to the deer.

Thanks for the opinions...

Legion

 

[guncobbler]

I've been thinking about this kind of problem for a while too. I'm looking at a little less than 100 acres of mostly big woods and will manage it for deer and timber. Going to open up the woods canopy by logging in an hourglass pattern. Figure 5 acres for each end of the hourglass. This will encourage low growth that gives the deer a couple of good thickets to hide out in. In between the two thickets I'm planning a longer thin section of low cover connecting the two. This hopefully will give the deer just enough screen to prefer using that path to the other end of the hour glass. This is where the tree stand comes in Plan to plant some conifer such as pines, cedar or hemlock in the logged sections and keep them trimmed down to make them short and bushy to give good winter wind protection. That's my plan, GC

 

[oomcurt]

I guess it depends on where you are/hunt. I know this...white tail deer are browsers and as far as I know they really don't like eating pine needles. That said, you might consider making a sort of alley if you will that the deer might use as a runway. Open the pine are up to encourage more light I don't think will mean anything to the deer. Neither do I think it will promote scrub growth of hardwoods as well as it might if you thinned out areas next to the hardwoods. I've hunted deer in WI for over twenty years or more and I never ever saw a deer in a pine plantation. Now, that doesn't mean they won't make thier bed in one..but using pines for food.... if given a choice they will take scrub and brush any day of the week over pine. I did once..and only once shoot a deer that had pine remnants in his gut..man..every bite of that venison tasted like I was eating a pine tree.

 

[roundball]

Question to the more experienced hunters.....

I have woods behind my house that I hunt bordering an isolated field (75-80 acres surrounded by hardwood forests).

These woods of mine are an old christmas tree field with sporadic hardwood trees in the middle and thick hardwoods on the ends. The center of this pine forest is typical of unkempt pines - tightly packed (3-6 feet between trunks) tall straight white? pine. The bottom 10-20 feet is dead branch clutter making it somewhat difficult to walk through (for humans at least). There is very little ground cover like grass or clover as there is little sunlight breaking through the canopy. This strip of woods is approxamately 250-350 yards long, by 100- 300 yards thick. And sloped up hill towards the open field in varying degrees between 25 and 45 degrees.


O.K. my question is -- should I go in there with a chainsaw and thin out the pines to let in light, or just remove the dead low limbs to open up the forest floor, or just leave everything alone. I'm hoping to make this more inviting to the deer.
Thanks for the opinions...
Legion

I've seen a buck with his rack go through a barb wire fence and hardly break stride...IMO, the thicker and nastier a place is the more it's apt to be used as a bedding area, sanctuary, etc...so if it was me I wouldn't touch or disturb a thing.

I'd scout around every foot of the perimeter and find the heaviest entry/exit trails in and out of the pine thicket, then figure out how the prevailing wind typically blows across what you just described, then locate the best camo'ed spot in the hardwoods for a downwind stand site overlooking one of those trails...may be able to set up a stand in the hardwoods on each end if the wind shifts back and forth during the course of the season.

Critical, however, will be your ability to get to the stand location(s) from downwind...if a good buck is bedding in there and you let hm get a whiff more than once he'll leave and set up somewhere else...you'll never see him.

Scout soon, get it figured out now, then set out a 50lb block of regular old white salt like that used for cattle...they'll develop travel patterns to it during the spring and summer months and will still occasionally wander through that geography when hunting season rolls around...attract the ladies and the bucks will find them come the rut.

 

[Legionair]

I wasn't thinking of drawing the deer to feed on the pines, but thought if I could get some light in there I might get field grass started along with brush for feed. But I was wondering if the thinned area would appear to "dagerous and exposed" to them, keeping them from traveling there.

Normally I set up on under a big oak on one end of the woods just off the field, and try to catch them coming or going. When the weather cooperates (ie Nasty rain or snow), I like to stalk them to their bedding areas. This appears to usually be in the full hardwood forests on the other side of the open field.

I was hoping to draw them into my end of the field more regularly.

There's very little undergrowth in my pine forest, just the low dead limbs on the pine.

Is there any resource, maybe the DEC, that helps in forest/wildlife management?

thanks....

Legion

 

[ffffg]

in montana the deer love tough unmanagable brush to hide in, leave it alone. then if here id plant alfalfa in the open field where you want them to go.. youll have something they like in you part of the country.. if your season is late in the year youl need something that will bring them to that during that time of year.. if its a small woods i doubht it would hold many deer, maybe a single buck once in a while. as stated above if they get wind of you they will be off to another woods that doesnt get bothered until they get pushed out of there.. a guy told me his brother lived on a farm in wisconsin.. he planted some goodies for the deer in his field, and built a clubhouse on stilts.. complete with shooting ports, couche, tv, lights, heat etc. . he always left the tv on so the deer were used to the noise and would go there during season and watch for awhile and fall asleep.. neved did hear if he got anything, but it sounded like fun.. ps put men only on the door!! so you dont have to clean, vacumn, carry out the trash and etc.. :haha: dave.

 

Hey Legion...

Averaging your nmubers and calculating the acreage, you're talking about an area of approximately 13 acres, give or take.

You didn't mention what was in the "isolated field" Is it row crop or pasture?

Regardless of what the "isolated field" is, I'd clear out some areas inside the pine patch and establish some kind of food plot. It would have to be something shade tolerant and I'd think an area 50-75 foot square...which isn't going to be much given the height of the pines. I'm not sure how many of these I'd clear out. One every 2-4 acres should be close tho. Also, as the trails you make from one plot to the other are going to provide some open area where browse can establish itself and the deer WILL use them. You're gonna have a lot of stumps to do something about......

Also, once cleared, you could establish a couple patches of native browse, which may have a hard time doing that on it's own given the density of the pines.

I'm inclined to agree with you that the deer are bedding in the hardwoods instead of the pines. They probably only use the pines a very few times of the year.

I believe you're on the right track and that doing nothing is the exact wrong thing to do. Our Conservation Dept. offers some help in this area so it would be worth a phone call to the counterpart in your state. I called our Conservation dept. and that was their recommendation with some adjusments from me. I'm doing the same thing on a piece of ground about 3 times the size of yours except it's ALL hardwoods with no row crop within 20 miles.

Good luck and keep us informed. I'm curious as to what you decide.

Vic

 

[BS]

It depends upon so many THINGS, hunter pressure, do the deer tend to leave after opening day?

You have excape routes, main bedding, feeding, and travel routes. You need to know all these.

Pattern the deer, it is called now.

Idea #1

I would cut a trail thru the pines and make them an easy trail too use. Then create two funnels of heavy brush or even a fences leading to the trail. Make them use it, and hunt the end of the funnel. :grin:

Have three stand locations set up, that can be easily approached from down wind.........the wind direction will determine which one too use.

and.................at the end of this funnel would be a great place for a salt block!

 

[Legionair]

O.K. Some specifics.....

The 75 acre open field is fallow and brush hogged a couple times a year.....

It is maybe 5 x 12+ acres in dimension.....

It has one lone oak (huge) in the middle....

Surrounding hardwoods are mainly maple, oak, black walnut, some cherry, birch maybe .....

I have one STEEP, old log road cut into my woods from the field.... but it is very eroded and not really much more than a path now, upper part is all brambles (only spot of undergrowth in my woods except field edges....

The deer are fairly migratory, coming down into my area sometimes but not staying.....

Since the sportsmans club is not 1/2 a mile up the road, they are not spooky (last two were shot at under 60' range).....

Also have coyotes, fox, supposedly a few blackbear, and rumored bobcat......

The wind is usually out of the field into my woods from northwest to southeast, but on bad days its all over the place.....

Think that does it... no wait, I'm 5'9" and 160#.... :haha:

Thanks

Legion

 

[Stumpkiller]

I believe pines are a starvation food for deer. They are about the last food available and it has to do. If you clean some out and encourage other browse to grow, not just the open sunlight, you'll draw deer. Poplar grows fast and is used by deer (and grouse) as food and throughout the year. Broadcast some soy bean or alfalfa in the trails and just let it have go.

Ask your local co-op what browse plants are good for a wild food plot. Here's a site where you can download Adobe files of plantings to benefit deer & wildlife in general. http://www.huntfish.info/

 

[Vic Price]

Good question and many good comments. There are a great number of areas just like this in the Conservation Reserve Program ( CRP ) and what is typically recommended by NRCS to improve wildlife habitat ( including deer ) in these sterile pine plantations is to clear cut a 2-3 acre openings. The more of these, the better. Besides this I suggest thinning the remainder by at least half. You'll encourage growth in the understory and the resulting grasses, forbs and shrubs will attract whitetails, turkeys, etc. While you're at it plant wildlife shrubs around the openings in clumps and not rows.

Regards, Vic

 

[bpollock_sr]

Deer need the thick pines for protection from storms and freezing cold in the late winter. The temp in the pines is actualy 1-2 degrees warmer and this sometimes makes the difference between wether they live or die.It all has to do with the amount of energy they must expend to keep warm and the starvation rations they live on before spring comes.

 

[Slamfire]

I'd not expect to find white pines in a Christmas tree plantation, maybe some fir or balsam. Be that as it may, the shed needles have made the soil very acidic, and if you wanted to establish a food plot you'd have to lime the ground pretty heavily. Soil samples taken to the local Ag office will give you some specifics. I'm assuming the field is not yours. If that so perhaps you could get some buckwheat to grow along the edge on your side of the line. Beyond that I can't help much. :redface:

 

[paulvallandigham]

If you open up some small areas, so that you can grow grasses, or legumes( alfalfa, soybeans, peas) for food, while giving them a bedding area, you can expect that bramble will soon grow around the edges of any opening you make. Within 2-3 years, you will have to use a tree stand to see into the openings at all(Unless you cut the bramble back periodically, or do controlled burns! When I say small, I am talking 50 by 50 feet, at most, connected by existing runs and trails, or just off such a trail. Plant grasses in one area; food in the other. Set your ambush between the two. In bad weather, the deer will seek the cover of pines to get out of the wind. If you have any up and down ground, like steep ravines, on the property, or in the forest, use those areas for food or bedding areas. Deer like to bed down in grasses in the sun during the Fall. If you have an area with a South facing slope that you can clear, so that you can grow grasses, or at least let nature grow the grasses, you will find deer bedding there. The slopes let them get out of the wind so they can hear better, the empty air lets them see better and farther, and the warm sun helps them reduce energy use to stay warm. If the wind is blowing into their faces, you can sneak up on them from behind, and they will never know you are there. Since deer feed before first light, and then at last light, it is easier to set up on a stand over a food plot in the late afternoon, than in the morning. The morning is when you want to be ready to ambush deer coming to their beds from your food plots.

YOu might want to remove some of the ground clutter just to reduce the fire hazard to the property. The trees are so thick now, that you can't get any underbrush to grow there. Taking a tree or two out here and there will open the woods up enough to begin the growing of underbrush, and that is the food deer normally nibble on at the edges of fields. If choice foods are growing in the woods where the deer feel safe, they will stop and eat a little when they are passing through. Set up some food spots along well used trails. Avoid the night trails, as you can't hunt then, anyway! You can spot night trails because they are on ridge lines, or are very wide, and allow a human to walk down them without having to turn sideways or duck very often. Almost nothing is growing on a night trail, because so many feet use the trail that nothing has a chance to grow!

 

[Legionair]

Thanks all....

Theres some good info I hadn't considered.

I'll think on this for a while before acting (besides, its too cold out there now).

I'll keep you posted...... thanks again....

Legion