Best winter thermal cover

Looking for some input on Winter Thermal cover. I have two swamps on my property that are covered in great summer thermal grasses. However I’m missing good winter cover. What would be some options to improve that? I’m In zone 5 and we do get some good snow fall.

I know nothing about your area, but since no one else is answering, I will give you my advice:

Evergreens and/or conifers make great winter cover. In my area Eastern Red Cedars that are spaced far enough apart to let sunlight reach their bottom limbs are great. The same goes for Norway Spruce and Eastern White Pine. If sunlight is cut off to the bottom limbs, these limbs die and you end up with green tops and dead bottoms. In a situation like that, the evergreens may still block some snowfall from the top side, but that's about the extent of their value. You can walk up to a stand like this and see 200 yards into it from ground level. However, if they are spaced to where they stay green at the bottom, they continue to provide a lot of cover value down below.

The worst thing you can do is plant species that aren't adaptable to your conditions. I would love to have Hemlocks and Mountain Laurel like what grows on Dogghr's and George's land, but that won't work for me. Four primary factors (along with other things) dictate what will grown well on your property. These are:

• Your USDA zone conditions
• Moisture (range of mesic to xeric)
• Soil Type (PH and other factors)
• Amount of sunlight received (A hemlock can survive and stay green with 5% sunlight. A cedar will die at that level)

Obviously this is oversimplified, but the message is to plant something that will thrive from your location and conditions. My suggestion is to look around for places in your area that have cover which suits you and try to create something similar. Best wishes.

I was thinking along the same line as Native.... but I would shy away from pines, personally. Pines work fine, but they can be browsed by deer and stunted and the larger ones tend to have weak branches and trees can be fairly easily damage with heavy snow and/or ice. Pine also seem to be a favored rub tree around here as well. Spruce and cedars are what I would focus on. And like Native mentioned look for something that fits your conditions and is hopefully native to your area as well. Another thing I see in my area is the deer like to use vine honeysuckle here. Here it's basically an evergreen as well, the deer seem to like when it grows up into the trees or shrubs and creates a barrier. Now it can get out of hand so you will need to manage it. I have it growing on a wire fence as part of a road screen project. I am not familiar with holly bushes and the like to know if those would be of benefit or not.

It would be hard to beat the great white cedar swamps of northern Maine. Besides providing super thermal cover and a great edge to still hunt when flanked by alders, white cedar is reported as being the only single plant that can sustain a deer through the very long northern Maine winters. If cedar grows in your area of Maine, creating a white cedar stand in and along one of your swamp areas would be an awesome accomplishment. It would take a huge effort and seedling trees would need to be fenced for sure to get it started. Whiter cedar swamps though have been a key ecosystem for winter deer yards since "forever" and likely are among the best winter deer yard areas anywhere. Keep us updated on whatever thermal cover you decide to plant.

Chainsaw said:

It would be hard to beat the great white cedar swamps of northern Maine. Besides providing super thermal cover and a great edge to still hunt when flanked by alders, white cedar is reported as being the only single plant that can sustain a deer through the very long northern Maine winters. If cedar grows in your area of Maine, creating a white cedar stand in and along one of your swamp areas would be an awesome accomplishment. It would take a huge effort and seedling trees would need to be fenced for sure to get it started. Whiter cedar swamps though have been a key ecosystem for winter deer yards since "forever" and likely are among the best winter deer yard areas anywhere. Keep us updated on whatever thermal cover you decide to plant.

Click to expand...

That’s where deer spend their winters around here, too. They head to the cedar swamps toward the end of December


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Chipdasqrrl, I got to tour a property in Michigan many, many years go ( actually not that long ago--maybe twenty-five years give or take a few) and the cedar swamps there were just awesome. The moss which was THE undergrowth of the cedar "forest"was so deep and cedar stem counts were so high I remember thinking that a cruising deer and a still hunter could pass within thirty yards of each other without sensing the others presence. It was an awesome experience to see such great cedar swamps as I saw in Michigan on that trip. They reminded me so much of the great Maine cedar swamps that I had still hunted thru as a very young deer hunter.

Chainsaw said:

Chipdasqrrl, I got to tour a property in Michigan many, many years go ( actually not that long ago--maybe twenty-five years give or take a few) and the cedar swamps there were just awesome. The moss which was THE undergrowth of the cedar "forest"was so deep and cedar stem counts were so high I remember thinking that a cruising deer and a still hunter could pass within thirty yards of each other without sensing the others presence. It was an awesome experience to see such great cedar swamps as I saw in Michigan on that trip. They reminded me so much of the great Maine cedar swamps that I had still hunted thru as a very young deer hunter.

Click to expand...

They sure are neat. I’m competing with thousands of public acres of nearby swampland of different types. I’ve only explored the actual cedar swamp areas a couple times during Winter, I want to get back in and study them a bit. They’re a bit off the beaten path. I know for a fact that all of this swampland is hiding some old deer, and I’ve heard stories from people that hunted in there over the years.
I don’t have any pictures of the cedar swamps but I took this in the same area - doesn’t look like there’s any cedars but I think this is like the moss undergrowth you were talking about. It certainly gets better - I’ve seen some beautiful blankets of moss in there

Wish I could post the better quality version of that picture, oh well


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Picture is fine, good enough to feel the place. That is the look of the swamps I had in mind where deer choose to bed regularly. The difference with that and the white cedar of course is that in the case of the cedar they have it all, thermal cover and food.