Cheap browse and cover - easy too.

[Bowsnbucks]

For those who have recently cut or will cut trees on your property, cage some stumps. Use whatever fencing is appropriate for your area. We use concrete mesh 5 ft. tall.

Maple and oak will put out a large volume of sprouts off the roots and stumps. Other tree species may be good candidates as well - I don't know everyone's native varieties. Both are preferred browse for deer. Un-caged, the stumps will push sprouts, but the deer will nip them off down to the ground in most cases. Not much gained. Caging some stumps will let the sprouts grow up & out of the cages and you end up with thicker cover and new trees capable of being browsed without being killed.

We've seen small stump sprouts ( caged ) that turned into clumps of cover/browse from 3 ft. tall to 6 ft. tall in one growing season. These will eventually self-thin to the strongest trees. Easier than digging holes, watering, etc. with seedlings - and much quicker results due to existing large root system. Areas with few deer may not need to be caged if a large area was logged. - - - FWIW.

 

[Catscratch]

Funny you bring this up. I just did a walk couple of days ago and took pics of this very thing.
Elm:

Oak?

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[Catscratch]

Hedge:

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[Tap]

Great idea.

SW Pa

 

[Bowsnbucks]

Cat - Amen, brother !! That's the real deal in your pix. Really nice growth and excellent browse / cover. We need to cage where we are to get growth like that - usually for about 2 years, then off with the cages. Thanks for the pix !!!

 

[Catscratch]

Cat - Amen, brother !! That's the real deal in your pix. Really nice growth and excellent browse / cover. We need to cage where we are to get growth like that - usually for about 2 years, then off with the cages. Thanks for the pix !!!

Lol, It works! Been doing it for yrs. The trees in those pics were done 2 winters ago. I'll take a chainsaw to most of them again towards the end of this winter. I kicked this buck out of a ring of stump cut hedge while taking the pics. Great bedding area because everytime the trees start to reach for the canopy I bring them back to deer level.

You must have either a short growing season or a lot of deer to keep mature tree roots from sprouting. I can't imagine having to cage these things.

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[Bowsnbucks]

Cat - Nice buck. ^^^ We certainly aren't overrun with deer around camp. But even with lots of food plots - good ones - the deer find the stump sprouts. I caged a couple maple stumps within 10 ft. of one un-caged ........ the one with no cage was down to about 3" from browsing. The caged ones were up out of the cage in one summer. Caging all stumps in a 22 acre cut is impractical, but where we want thicker areas, the cages go on. 2 years is usually enough, then we move them to other stumps. Quick return on little work !!

I like your idea of cutting the sprouts back every couple years to get them back to eating / cover level.

 

[Catscratch]

How many cages do you keep? Do they like the freshly uncaged sprouts like candy?
You've got me thinking... rotate the cages to different stumps every yr. Give them the sprouts of half of the stumps, while the other half are caged. Switch cages the last two weeks of season to provide new winter browse and maybe a hunting opportunity. Leave these caged for a yr and then switch again.

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[KDdid]

Google "coppice" or "coppicing". Our ancestors across the pond have been propagating firewood trees this way for centuries. Cutting in the winter promotes better sprouting, and the stump is cut at an angle to prevent water from standing on the stump.

 

[yoderjac]

For those who have recently cut or will cut trees on your property, cage some stumps. Use whatever fencing is appropriate for your area. We use concrete mesh 5 ft. tall.

Maple and oak will put out a large volume of sprouts off the roots and stumps. Other tree species may be good candidates as well - I don't know everyone's native varieties. Both are preferred browse for deer. Un-caged, the stumps will push sprouts, but the deer will nip them off down to the ground in most cases. Not much gained. Caging some stumps will let the sprouts grow up & out of the cages and you end up with thicker cover and new trees capable of being browsed without being killed.

We've seen small stump sprouts ( caged ) that turned into clumps of cover/browse from 3 ft. tall to 6 ft. tall in one growing season. These will eventually self-thin to the strongest trees. Easier than digging holes, watering, etc. with seedlings - and much quicker results due to existing large root system. Areas with few deer may not need to be caged if a large area was logged. - - - FWIW.

I've taken the opposite approach but I'm south of you. Winter is not a big stress period here and there is more than enough browse to cover it. Instead, after we clear-cut some low quality hardwoods, we waited for the stumps to produce suckers and for them to leaf out. We then brought in a crew that sprayed all the stump suckers and everything else with a herbicide cocktail. This deprived the stump root systems of the energy from the leaves on the suckers. After everything browned up good, we conducted a controlled burn. This further ensured a good kill of the hardwoods and cleaned up leaves and debris from the clear-cut.

These areas are now going gangbusters with lush herbaceous growth. This will provide a lot more high quality food during our major stress period. It is already growing broomsedge bluestem NWSG that is in our native seed bank which along with the 6' tall herbaceous growth provides great cover. Every three or four years we will conduct another controlled burn to keep this in early succession much longer than it would be if allowed to naturally regenerate with no management.

Just goes to show how completely different technique, almost opposite, can be beneficial in one location and not another.

Thanks,

Jack

 

[Catscratch]

Google "coppice" or "coppicing". Our ancestors across the pond have been propagating firewood trees this way for centuries. Cutting in the winter promotes better sprouting, and the stump is cut at an angle to prevent water from standing on the stump.

Sure enough! (and I thought I had an original idea ;), thanks for the search topic)
Interesting read:
https://midwestpermaculture.com/2012/11/coppicingpollarding/

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[Bowsnbucks]

Hey Cat - There's a small fee attached to me sharing that cutting edge, " insider " info on stump care / caging / rotation !!! :D:D

I keep about dozen cages on stumps. I may add just a few more this next spring.

 

[KDdid]

Sure enough! (and I thought I had an original idea ;), thanks for the search topic)
Interesting read:
https://midwestpermaculture.com/2012/11/coppicingpollarding/

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There's that sneaky link! I was looking for it this morning, and had to head off for Christmas dinner. Thanks for sharing.

 

[Catscratch]

Hey Cat - There's a small fee attached to me sharing that cutting edge, " insider " info on stump care / caging / rotation !!! :D:D

I keep about dozen cages on stumps. I may add just a few more this next spring.

I can handle a small fee, usually pay up in beer but that's hard to do on the internet!
I think I'll try a couple of trees side by side this yr. One with a cage and one without.

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[Catscratch]

There's that sneaky link! I was looking for it this morning, and had to head off for Christmas dinner. Thanks for sharing.

Ironic, I wouldn't have found it or known anything about the practice if it weren't for your post. Hope Christmas dinner filled ya up.

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[Chainsaw]

Great idea Brownbucks! Thanks for sharing.

 

[Bowsnbucks]

Chainsaw - I learned lots of good tips from others on here. I'm just adding what I can to maybe help others when I've tried something and know it works. Sort of paying it forward.

 

[Bluecollaroutdoors]

Very interesting. I gotta try that one.

 

[Tap]

Here is an example of the stump sprouts an ash can produce. I cut this tree while it was still alive, but is was soon to die from Emerald Ash Borer. I did not cage this, or any others that I cut but I have a lot of other ash that I cut and their stump sprouts were browsed to death. This stump is heavily browsed but is holding up well. I really should try caging some of the others that are clinging to life.

BTW, the stump in the background is also an ash that was cut the same day. Except the only difference is that the EAB had already completely killed that one. My opinion...as soon as you start seeing moderate EAB damage to ash in your area, cut 'em down. They will be dead within a few years anyway (and it's much safer to cut them while they are alive, too). I assume caging the stumps would help ensure others to stump sprout like this one in my photo.

 

[Bowsnbucks]

For us, cages keep the deer off the sprouts long enough to grow the new shoots big enough to handle being browsed. Without cages, we'd never get a result like the one above. ^^^^

Nice clump of sprouts, Tap.