Brush Piles

[Bowsnbucks]

With winter cutting in the woods going on, and spring cutting approaching, who's a fan of making brush piles for wildlife ?? Do you use them in any certain way ........ steering deer, camouflaging stands, etc. ?? If you have enough room to build and leave them - tell us what you do.

 

[Bill]

The only piles I make are on field edges where I can use the front end loader to make the pile. Not a fan of hard work :)
The one thing I like the best about it is the way the quail use them.

I have a few spots where the main objective is to give the deer limited placeswhere they can enter a field. It works quite well. Cut trees on the edge and push them in with the bucket leaving a few openings. It also helps keep the field edge from being to shaded for my clover. If I can find the time this spring I have this very project to complete on one clover patch.

 

[Mortenson]

I just make them in the most logical places for me, and leave them be for the rabbits and birds. After a few years of rotting down and grass/weeds growing up around them, they're not even an eyesore anymore.

 

[Northbound]

I'm with Bill on this one, I sit in the seat and push out of my way with no thoughts of wildlife using the brush. They do become good bunny hang out places.

Anyone who's considered buying a dozer blade for fel or skid steer, you'll love it for brush pile stacking

At my place in upper Michigan I do use the brush to pile and burn in plots to up soil ph a bit.

 

[Catscratch]

I like brush piles for multiple reasons; good small game habitat, and a super easy way to grow brushy cover.

The pile protections saplings from browse, dominant grasses get shaded out, the seedbank springing up, and birds perch/poop to add to the seedbank. I have piles from 2yrs ago that are complete thickets right now. Super attractive to all game including deer. I didn't have to plant anything.

 

[trampledbyturtles]

Gunna try something a little different this spring with some of the willows that came down this weekend.

Keeping any solid logs for splitting for use in the woodstove next winter.
Any usable wood that is slightly spongy will be split for the fire pit this summer.

Any tops that retain their spreading structure after hitting the ground will be used to try an protect my Dogwood plantings this spring.
Have 100 going in the ground. Plan on grouping them in clusters of three using a 4x5 piece of fabric to help in suppressing weeds.
Will arrange the tops around the plantings to try an create a living fence as the reed canary grass grows up between the tree tops.
Only have enough spare fence for around 20 clusters.

Excited to see how it turns out.
Will be more eye appealing then having more an more fence going up all over the place that is for sure.

 

[j-bird]

Depending on your intentions you have some options. Placing them at the edge or different habitat/cover types tends to get the most actual animal use. Put the larger logs/limbs at the bottom and then the smaller branches and limbs on the top. These will tend to become homes for rabbits, groundhogs and other critters. Brush piles in the woods themselves you can use to manipulate deer travel and potentially screen hunting access or hide stands/ground blinds. When doing that I like to try to almost stand everything up as much as I can to try to create as much height as possible. Sting up some old clothesline wire or the like to support your natural "fence" if you will. Many wood lots here tend to have woven wire fence just inside the tree line as well - I like to use that if possible as support to help screen from the larger open area. Lots of things to do depending on what you are wanting to do. I have even pulled tree tops and large limbs up into trees to create front or especially back cover in stands as well. Works better with trees with their leaves, but a good dense tree top will work as well to break up your movement. Or even to brush in a ground blind.

 

[Natty Bumppo]

I do so much logging on my land each winter that I generate way more brush than I care to stack in piles. I do use much of it to brush in the down-wind side of my tree stands. I use some to block off areas in front of stands where I don't want deer going. But most of it I burn in my plots.

 

[4wanderingeyes]

I usually make an edge for the wildlife around my food plots, or where ever I am trimming them. I dont haul them to different areas, but I will pile them up to make piles, or walls around my food plot to help steer deer into the food plot from certain trails. I like having as much tree clutter in my woods as possible. It drives my wife nuts though! She likes it neat!

 

[ksgobbler]

I loosely pile them for the quail and even have some in a teepee shape for th quail.

 

[JFK52]

I construct my brush piles in areas close to where the brush is being produced from tree work. I tend to pile them high when I can as they all seem to settle down over the years. They are a great place for rabbits and birds of all sorts.
When I did clears cuts years ago I had a D3 push the Scotch pine brush into huge piles. When it was the dead of winter with a good snow cover, those piles were torched. The results of the burning made those areas some of my better small food plots. I did have the same D3 snag out all the stumps before the piles were burned so I had a clear area for food plot tractor work.

 

[Bowsnbucks]

I'll add our use(s) of brush and what we've seen use them.
We make piles or lines of brush where we cut trees and do any "limbing". Not going to carry / transport it !! We've used brush to make ground blinds for archery and late muzzy hunters. We usually ( though not always ) make them in & around pines or hemlocks because members think the darker shady areas in them make for better ambush possibilities. In the areas we logged, we made piles in crescent-shapes with the open side facing SE to give deer places to bed with wind protection and sun exposure. Like J-bird said, we put bigger wood on the bottom and pile smaller as we go upward. We had deer move right in the same night we finished logging / piling !! They made quick use of the shelter and the tops for chow.

I also use brush to break up the bases of ladder tree stands. A little camo never hurts !!

Our brush piles also make good protection for seedlings / saplings to get a good start, and as Catscratch said, birds perch and poop seeds of all sorts and that helps to spread diversity. Hopefully those spots will become clusters / islands of saplings and native brush & briars. Grouse seem to like to perch on some of the piles and drum, and I've seen some strutting in the spring and fall to impress females that must be watching. Turkeys seem to like laying eggs up against brush piles at our place too. Hens caught sitting on eggs have been the proof. Some of our piles made in or very near pines & hemlocks have made good winter shelter for deer and grouse during snowy, sleet and ice times. I've seen grouse tracks go right into a pile in the snow, and also kicked them out from under pile limbs and logs. Rabbits too use our piles, but we don't have many due to our location - miles of woods. We've only had them since we started food plotting.

And we use some lines of brush to steer deer past spots we want them to pass - usually for archery purposes.

 

[H20fwler]

I'm all about brush piles...mostly because I like bunny hunting so much. I stack branches whenever I cut, it's something my wife even enjoys doing.
I have knocked over a couple good sized locust and walnut on the edges of our bigger orchard and have made some sweet piles. My buddies tell me I'm crazy for actually encouraging rabbits in an orchard but I screen fruit trees high and do my part to keep the bunnies thinned down in winter. We have deer bed right up next to them and all kinds of birds year round use them. Found a turkey nest next to one a couple years ago.

A few at the orchard;

 

[Northbound]

This might be a dumb question but what dose a turkey nest look like? Never thought of it till now but I've never seen one. That nesting time of year I don't daylight for anything besides work. Never seen Pheasant nest either

 

[H20fwler]

Just a depression in the grass with round eggs a little bigger than chicken eggs tan colored with brown speckles on them.

Here's one I found that coons or a skunk got into.

 

[Lee Haakenson]

Too much brush to pile...lol

Sent from my SM-G930V using Tapatalk

 

[blueKYstream]

I'm doing some edge feathering and other hinge cutting this winter. I don't have as much experience as others, but I recall hunting turkeys from one large pile of trees. It was about 80 degrees at 2 PM and I'm wondering why I'm not taking a nap. Anyways, after a call here and there, I saw 2 nice long beards to my right. At the same time, a bunch of hens came out to my left. The ones on my right walked past my shooting lane while I took a look to the left. Well, one of the hens ended up sitting on her nest 5 yards from me. I'm sitting right in front of her calling to get those toms back while she's probably flipping me the bird. She either got annoyed or hungry and walked away. That was a long way of saying that turkeys like to roost in them for sure. Of course, rabbit hunting has improved as a result as well.