Recreating a Deer Woods

[Chainsaw]

Dave, as snows melted and compacted, I finally was able to make it on the mountain for the first time in a month. Where I saw 30 deer a month ago, tracks were very few and far between. Where I did find them, it was clear they’d focused on apple tree browse. I didn’t appreciate how favored the browse was compared to an abundance of various maples, oaks and dogwoods. Sadly, I also found a number of carcasses (mostly fawns). I did not go through are sanctuary which is where most of our hing cuts are. Perhaps they yarded up. I’m hoping the bulk of the deer were able get off the mountain before the 40” or so we got a month ago. Sadly, I’m not optimistic. The 2 deer I did see were very thin.

I'm very, very sorry to hear this Tom. And even if this thaw completely opens the woods and immediately wakes up new growth I'm afraid that additional loss of young deer may still occur. That recent tough winter when we had the huge die off with a final body count in the high thirties on this single property alone, they were almost all fawns and most of them were found in the apple tree areas. That is where the small ones here lived their last days when movement was impeded. The heavy snows bent over the upper branches giving them food here they couldn't reach elsewhere as well as overhead shelter. The habitat work we all do is not wasted however; hopefully at your property you will experience the same unbelievable high recruitment rate and deer influx from the surrounding area as we did. Likely most of the two year old deer will get a jumpstart towards regaining weight when the clover, rye/triticale wake up this week. Take some pictures of carcasses and send them off to the DEC biologists; I'm sure they will expect this but maybe your input will be of use to them in determining the amount of doe tags issued next season.

To those who live in areas without this kind of snow these die offs are something that occur here during years of prolonged heavy snow cover and extreme cold; in addition to hitting higher deer populations and poor habitat areas it also occurs even in low deer populations with excellent habitat. When the snow pac hardens and covers all of the ground browse from three feet or more down it doesn't matter how much browse there is; it is simply out of their reach.

 

[Elkaddict]

North country deer face many challenges indeed. I need 14” of compacted snow to melt before triticale and rye cand do their indespensible spring thing. In the mean time, my surviving deer will have to survive on browse. At least they hit the last month in fine shape.

Dave, doe tags in this unit have been reduced in recent years already. We have traditionally only taken a doe or two on our place. I had planned to up those numbers..... We’ll have to see what spring brings.

 

[Chainsaw]

That snow is really hanging on in your area Tom. Luckily for us we are living tropical in comparison. Spent a few hours yesterday actually weeding fresh weed sprouts from one of my daylily seedling beds and without gloves. The temps were a bit biting but the soil was warm to the touch. Deer are very well dispersed now with large sightings in any one field over with. With temperatures forecasted from above freezing to the high sixties next week your snow will surely disappear and you could be very green by the end of the week, (assuming you get the same) hopefully!

In this area there were way more doe tags issued than doe taken. It seems like there is a stupid amount of deer when you see them in the spring or only happen to look at four or five of the better properties; The problem is that in between the better properties(habitat wise) that are seemingly over run with deer, deer sightings are really tough to come by. That makes it pretty tough to get the doe tag thing right. Then throw in the politics of it all and the true biologists have a tough balancing act. Luckily those of us in this immediate area with the better properties habitat wise have recently held off on doe shooting as you have done and I think it has paid off for the good of the whole area as far as us hunters are concerned. AND we got lucky this winter that the second half of the winter here was not a big deal compared to the first half.

From what I have seen eaten over the last couple of weeks here though, coupled with the mud and even eroded deer paths throughout the property, I don't think we in this area with the better habitats can NOT hold off on the does much longer. Regardless of how few deer there may be overall, our individual properties being almost over run with them can only take so much before they too become seriously degraded. It is amazing how quickly the population here has rebounded in the good habitat areas from the devastating winter OF a few years ago and yet remained low and stagnant in nearby but poor habitat properties.

Edit; I should have added that it is not just the habitat but also the compliance to harvest regulations and common sense regardless of how many tags DEC had given out that kept the deer from getting to too low of a density to start with. On smaller properties even with great habitat with a few tough neighbors, holding or growing the population would likely not have been possible in recent years.

 

[Chainsaw]

My farmer friend fertilized the rye and triticale fields this morning. The deer have been feeding in them steady for quite a while now and even though there are 35 acres total or so in rye and triticale, it grows slow enough in this colder weather that the deer feeding is keeping up with its growth. It will be interesting to see how quickly it takes off now as warmer days will come soon and the fertilizer should give it a big kick as well. It sure is a perfect setup to have a farmer friend have a planting program that benefits him and is exactly what I would be doing myself for the deer. It frees me up for other habitat work and saves me a lot of dollars as well as time and with his experience it grows a lot better than if I were doing it. Growing better translates to more deer food, more timely deer food and a heavier fawn cover for the month of June.

I am still unable to post pictures on this forum as I used to. The deer forum program says the pictures are 100% loaded but then simply won't post them. If anyone has any ideas as to what might make it work please let me know. Thank you.

 

[cutman]

My farmer friend fertilized the rye and triticale fields this morning. The deer have been feeding in them steady for quite a while now and even though there are 35 acres total or so in rye and triticale, it grows slow enough in this colder weather that the deer feeding is keeping up with its growth. It will be interesting to see how quickly it takes off now as warmer days will come soon and the fertilizer should give it a big kick as well. It sure is a perfect setup to have a farmer friend have a planting program that benefits him and is exactly what I would be doing myself for the deer. It frees me up for other habitat work and saves me a lot of dollars as well as time and with his experience it grows a lot better than if I were doing it. Growing better translates to more deer food, more timely deer food and a heavier fawn cover for the month of June.

I am still unable to post pictures on this forum as I used to. The deer forum program says the pictures are 100% loaded but then simply won't post them. If anyone has any ideas as to what might make it work please let me know. Thank you.

This sounds stupid, but uninstall the Deer Hunter app and download it again. The Forum app is based off of tapatalk and I don’t know of others having problems so I expect the problem is on your end. I’ll help you work through the options but try that first.

 

[Chainsaw]

This sounds stupid, but uninstall the Deer Hunter app and download it again. The Forum app is based off of tapatalk and I don’t know of others having problems so I expect the problem is on your end. I’ll help you work through the options but try that first.

Thank you Cutman, I'll give it a try tomorrow (when I can free wife Anne up from her current craft to give me a hand with it) and let you know how I make out. I don't recall ever loading something called Deer Hunter app but it sure doesn't mean I didn't.

 

[cutman]

Thank you Cutman, I'll give it a try tomorrow (when I can free wife Anne up from her current craft to give me a hand with it) and let you know how I make out. I don't recall ever loading something called Deer Hunter app but it sure doesn't mean I didn't.

Hmm. I might have confused you because I myself was confused. I assumed you were using the Deer Hunter Forum app on your phone/tablet. If you are using a computer please tell me which browser you use.

 

[Chainsaw]

Don't have phone or tablet just the computer. I use Google browser and cut JPEG pictures by 50% using Paint program and am in windows 10.

EDIT-see post 431. Thanks Cutman.

 

[rusty1034]

I was able to get in the woods and work on a new foodplot. The ground was frozen enough to support the tractor, yet all the snow was gone.
I have been working on this small area in sporadic short periods for a couple of years. It's an old pasture that has grown up to thorn-apples, prickly ash and bush hawthorn. Right now it might be 1/2 acre, but the soil looks fairly rock free, and it is surrounded by white cedar and a hardwood swamp. There's room to make it larger, perhaps up to an acre. There are also several mature apple trees in and around the plot.
I'm thinking in addition to a soul test, I'll start with a heavy crop of buckwheat, followed by a rape/ptt/gfr mix for the first season.
I'll keep you posted.


Rusty

 

[Chainsaw]

View attachment 11635

I was able to get in the woods and work on a new foodplot. The ground was frozen enough to support the tractor, yet all the snow was gone.
I have been working on this small area in sporadic short periods for a couple of years. It's an old pasture that has grown up to thorn-apples, prickly ash and bush hawthorn. Right now it might be 1/2 acre, but the soil looks fairly rock free, and it is surrounded by white cedar and a hardwood swamp. There's room to make it larger, perhaps up to an acre. There are also several mature apple trees in and around the plot.
I'm thinking in addition to a soul test, I'll start with a heavy crop of buckwheat, followed by a rape/ptt/gfr mix for the first season.
I'll keep you posted.


Rusty

An acre is plenty big enough; Looks like a honey hole in the making! I'd add a ten ft. strip of clover mixed with some chicory around the outside edge if possible. It would really compliment the brassica mix. And of course rye mixed with the clover planting as always. Glad to see your ground bare Rusty; Many places in New York are still snow covered.

 

[Chainsaw]

Testing--Got it Cutman or at least two out of two loaded so I presume it is working again. Thanks for the help. Might have been on a Microsoft assigned browser thinking it was Google. I went to google and searched for Deerhunterforum (DHF) to access under Google for sure and relogged in-no pics would load. Then went to Google Chrome , searched DHF to access and normal picture loading worked again. So I'll stick with chrome for a while and see how it works.

 

[cutman]

Perfect. When in doubt always try a different browser. It’s amazing how finicky they can be.

 

[Chainsaw]

Perfect. When in doubt always try a different browser. It’s amazing how finicky they can be.

I would never have thought of changing browsers had you not have brought up what browser was I using but it did the trick. I am so happy that I can post again with pics. Pictures really add to every ones' posts.

 

[Weasel]

Good stuff Chain. Glad to hear you aren’t buried in the snow anymore. Tough winter down here which means terrible up there.

 

[Chainsaw]

Good stuff Chain. Glad to hear you aren’t buried in the snow anymore. Tough winter down here which means terrible up there.

Thanks Weasel. Surprisingly temperature wise every one of our winters are tough with minus twenty -five happening annually and sometimes minus thirty-five. So what makes our winter tough here deer wise or not is simply which way the wind blows on snow days and the temperatures that follow such snow events; a few compass degrees difference results in no snow, two feet or five feet in a bad week. So our winters are not all that relative to others winters away from the Lake Ontario Snow Machine.

For example Elk Addict also in New York had a much tougher winter than Farmhunter also from New York. And Farmhunter had a longer winter than we did. The toughness of the winter here deer wise is measured in how many days the ground is covered in three feet or more snow. Both had more snow over three feet on the ground days than we did. Next year it could be opposite with it hitting us instead. Chummer on the other hand though not very far from us is almost always in the lake effect cross hairs! What saves Chummer from deer extinction is his deer migrate out towards us and closer to the lake to spend the winter.

 

[Chummer]

Unfortunately some did not migrate out this year. I was up a couple weeks ago to do some pruning and there were two fawn beds right behind camp. Still two feet of snow pack a couple weeks ago. Went up today to plant some apple trees and one fawn was dead in my food plot( torn and scattered in a 50 yard radius). Another was dead 100 yards from camp across the road. Only found one other set of tracks, and yes we still have snow! I have a bad feeling this horrible cycle has not hit bottom yet. I am going to change most of my plots over to brassicas this year in hopes of drawing what is left of the deer herd to my area. Other than that if there are no apples this year we may not see many deer. I have been doing the habitat thing for 6 years now and there is no payoff, most years a high percent of the fawns die and I do not have an answer for it. You just can't expect them to live through six months of snow cover, I don't how, or why any of them live here.

 

[Elkaddict]

Chummer, we’ve lost significant deer 3 of the last 4 winters, all despite our best efforts. Yes, it’s disheartening, but in the end life finds away. The trick is to enjoy the journey that is habitat improvement and learn to roll with that we can’t control. Hang in there!

 

[Chainsaw]

The two fawns must have migrated back too soon. In either case it is difficult to grasp they could have made it until now with that much snow if they had stayed the winter on the Hill. It is a big loss to lose deer this time of year where populations are likely down to the low single digits per sq. mile. Your habitat improvements Chummer are absolutely top shelf and I think they made a huge difference to the deer there. Your improvements made the good years significantly better and the marginally poor years less poor. However as you said when ground is covered in heavy snowpack for six months it is beyond livable for the deer given the general poor condition of the habitat on the Hill and many of the surrounding and ever shrinking deer yarding areas. Sure weather patterns will likely change again sooner or later and if and when it does the deer population around your property will have a shot at rebounding quicker than other areas on the Hill but has the Hill changed and become less deer friendly than it once was?

The Hill was not known for widespread deer conservation nor management efforts and may be even worse now. More people now live there which raises hunting pressure and the forestry industry of today is not as deer friendly as it once was. The old ways of diameter limit cutting made for more early succession regrowth that big woods used to be famous for. That type of logging prescription is of course a way of the past; it just wasn't the most profitable way to manage a forest.

The view from here is that todays' general logging practices in this area no longer causes enough food to grow to sustain many deer. Only a few are improving the habitat for the deer on the Hill. Some are still shooting every deer they can regardless of how the law and how few deer there are so unless things change substantially poor hunting will continue in many sections on the Hill. I agree with you Chummer, all of the habitat efforts you could possibly make on your two properties are not going to change this trend. However if you could teach and convince a large amount of area landowners and clubs to improve the habitat and shape up and follow not only the game laws but common sense as well to maintain healthy populations, deer hunting may again be excellent there. Is it doable? Of course it is doable and can be accomplished but is it worth it?

Every property is of course different in it's attraction to us as hunters and it's attraction as growing places for our families. Our lives on earth are short; I'd choose to give up on the Hill at least in that area and start over. As a married couple with no kids living nearby, I'd define what makes a great area for my wife and I and then what would make a great property for us as well. Starting over would not mean that I gave up but simply another swing and a miss which just keeps bringing me closer to a homerun.

I agree with Elk to "Hang In There" meaning the Habitat Improvement Game but think there are more deer friendly and family friendly areas to Tough It Out than the Hill. No areas nor properties rate a perfect ten in every way but why struggle with an eight property in a three or four area when eight's are available? I don't mean to offend you Chummer and I understand the allure of the Hill, but maybe it's time has past at least in that area.

 

[Chummer]

No offense taken, thank you for that thought out response. I am definitively pulling the plug on the new land. I will focus on the land at camp. I don't think I will ever give up on that piece. I have much more invested there than hunting. In a way I probably always knew this would be a loosing proposition. It is why I probably spend so much time on apple trees. I needed a new challenge, growing apple trees on the Hill isnt much easier than growing deer and equally frustrating at times. My wife and I still think of it as our retirement spot so until that changes I will keep doing the work there. Perhaps, looking at it more as a landscaping job than a habitat job. If a deer or two wanders through than so be it.

 

[Chainsaw]

Sounds like a super excellent approach Jeremy. I fully expect that your camp property will draw as many deer as there are in the area each year and it for sure is a nice place to be at. The second property will be a slam dunk for a person who has snowmobiling as their priority passion with deer hunting second. It is a definite ten for area and location within for snow mobiling.