For those of you who have timbered your farm

leave the tops,

one other benefit you may see is that if you have a high deer pop... in and around the tops is where a higher percentage of saplings will survive being browsed by the deer. The tops afford some added protection to new growth saplings.
 
Clear-cut and let the tops lay 3 years ago. I agree that they provide sapling browse protection. The only place I see oaks growing is in tree tops.
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Yikes! We're deer the demise of all the pines? I thought I had it bad when they ate 298 of my 300 scotch pines. They were knocked back a couple years but most of them still made it.

Short answer - yes every single tree.


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variety of natural regeneration on my place about 4 years after a select harvest of mostly red pine and mature aspen. The aspen and willows are great....and hold a high stem count....and trees are now about 3" diameter. I saved all the burr oak from harvest.....which are found throughout my property;
The pines rebounded in many areas (shown below) and I consider thinning some of these to provide some bedding pockets within what will become dense pines over time.
 

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variety of natural regeneration on my place about 4 years after a select harvest of mostly red pine and mature aspen. The aspen and willows are great....and hold a high stem count....and trees are now about 3" diameter. I saved all the burr oak from harvest.....which are found throughout my property;
The pines rebounded in many areas (shown below) and I consider thinning some of these to provide some bedding pockets within what will become dense pines over time.
I suppose I will get my brush hog hooked up this year and clear a few pockets. Not too fond of hand labor....grin.
 
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