Deer preference on apples
- Thread starter ruskbucks
- Start date
Interesting. I have a granny Smith apples at home that I take apples up to my place in Northern Wisconsin and they devour them. You must have some picky spoiled deer. Do you have other apples near there that they the do eat ?
Turkey Creek
5 year old buck +
Deer feeding on apples (like anything new) is a learned behavior. Especially if they are not food stressed. Some of the podcasts I have been listening to lately by biologists say it takes at from 2-3 generations of exposure to a new food source before it becomes a actively sought after food and then again if there is something else available that they have fed on for years they may still key in on that. Deer are very selective browsers when food is readily available. Look at all the guys who plant brassicas or other crops not common in their area and swear the deer wont eat them, so after 1 year they stop planting them.
Prof.Kent
5 year old buck +
They sure like my Honeycrisps. Burns my bottom every time my trail camera shows them eating $4 apples.
But to answer your question, as far as I can tell, a deer's favorite apple is the one they can reach. Jap beetles have more refined tastebuds than deer do
I have 2 peach trees. Not sure what kind but one has yellow flesh and one has white flesh. The white fruit peach is the best peach I've ever had. The Japanese beetles won't touch the white fruit but the yellow they are all over.
They dont know what an apple is. Almost nobody grows them here. My deer would not even eat purple hull pea vines or sweet potato vines for a couple years - now you cant plant them because they devour them
bigboreblr
5 year old buck +
Got big japanese beetle issues here. Whats ones do they avoid? Got a prefered control method? Really thinking I need nastier stuff than bonide. Didn't notice much difference last year.
The proclaimed disease free trees are getting ate up by tent caterpillars much more than the trouble maker varieties. Freedom, enteprise, and liberty. Freedom is a bit rusty too. Oddly enough, I have a crossbow crabapple barely nibbled by caterpillars.
R.E. Gould
5 year old buck +
I had deer aggressively singling out Goldrush on one of my multigraft trees. They were standing on their hind legs trying to get every last one, ignoring all the Northern Spy and Fireside apples that surrounded them.
White Oak
5 year old buck +
Same here....planted two Lowe's Granny Smith Apple trees in the front yard probably a year or two after moving here. So I'd estimate they are 17-18 years old and the deer devour them as well. Just planted a Liberty and two Enterprise apples in the vicinity of the Granny Smith's this spring, so it'll be a while before I can see if the deer have a preference .
bigboreblr
5 year old buck +
I'm planting a few cider specific additive crabaples. Redfield, franklin, trailman, and hopeful I can get a cranberry next year. Any of those high acid astrigent trees they don't care much for?
When I hear deer won't touch certain trees, I am wondering if they smell a scent of a certain animal in that area that freqnets that tree.
I have tns of the same tree at home, deer prefer trees near their escape route. If a part of an orchard is more open or farther away from seclusion, they may appear to have a preference.
When I hear deer won't touch certain trees, I am wondering if they smell a scent of a certain animal in that area that freqnets that tree.
I have tns of the same tree at home, deer prefer trees near their escape route. If a part of an orchard is more open or farther away from seclusion, they may appear to have a preference.
cavey
5 year old buck +
They definitely have preferences when given a choice ... and maybe like people they each prefer something different - and... depending on how hungry they are and what time of year it is.... When there are lots of apples on the ground they can be fussier, they are true samplers - nibblers here and there.
So I go with the ":variety is the spice of life" theory - give them a little of everything, I let them make the choice and not worry about it. I could be better at optimizing drop times and stand locations but if your planting and pruning your not hunting, seems like I have less time to hunt with every additional tree I plant.
The common denominator I have found if all things are equal which they rarely are but ... the sweeter the better, I think sweeter apples may also have a stronger aroma which may help draw them into the apples.
So I go with the ":variety is the spice of life" theory - give them a little of everything, I let them make the choice and not worry about it. I could be better at optimizing drop times and stand locations but if your planting and pruning your not hunting, seems like I have less time to hunt with every additional tree I plant.
The common denominator I have found if all things are equal which they rarely are but ... the sweeter the better, I think sweeter apples may also have a stronger aroma which may help draw them into the apples.
b116757
5 year old buck +
In my experience they do have favorites I’ve had them definitively favor one apple verity over another at least until they cleaned up the one then it’s game on for the other. I’ve also experienced the lack of interest in food plots I’ve planted my local deer here don’t seem to care for turnips. I’m sure if I kept adding them to my plots they would likely learn to eat them but I’ve started straying away from annually planted plots.
Wild Thing
5 year old buck +
We had an overabundance of apples last year and I manually thinned them several times.
These were mostly, Honey Crisp, Cortland and Red Wealthy. Can you imagine how sour these little apples would have been?
I dumped them out in the woods near the orchard. The next time I came by, every last one of them had been cleaned up (by deer I am certain).
The deer certainly don't show a preference to apples here. If they can reach it they will eat it.
These were mostly, Honey Crisp, Cortland and Red Wealthy. Can you imagine how sour these little apples would have been?
I dumped them out in the woods near the orchard. The next time I came by, every last one of them had been cleaned up (by deer I am certain).
The deer certainly don't show a preference to apples here. If they can reach it they will eat it.
White Oak
5 year old buck +
I don't understand your logic when you say "If your planting and pruning your not hunting , seems like I have less time to hunt with every additional tree I plant" .
I plant trees in the spring and water my trees once or twice a week and check for bugs through the 1 st week of Oct. . Once Bow Season starts the 1 st Sat in Oct ,the trees are on their own, I stay out of my tree plot (caring for trees) from 1 st Sat in Oct until 2nd week of Jan when late season hunting ends. Then do any pruning in Jan / Feb or early March . If YOU CHOOSE to plant / prune DURING hunting season that's on you... If you plant in the spring and prune in the winter after the seasons over....it wont take a single minute away from your hunting time...
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Bowsnbucks
5 year old buck +
A cousin and I raked up a bushel of dime-sized crab apples from a roadside tree, and put them out behind his house just to see if deer would go after the tart little things. They didn't at first, but after a couple days, they turned "cider-y-smelling" and the deer cleaned up every one. They were originally so tart, we didn't think deer would even bother with them.
sandbur
5 year old buck +
cavey
5 year old buck +
Its just a Joke statement, with the twist of reality for those of us that have planted and grafted more trees than we need...... Some of us here have become addicted to grafting, planting and so on; which has resulted in an abundance of pruning needs, needs that are almost impossible to keep up with. There are likely 300+ or so fruit trees on my property that need care.
It was a joke, not a rule or a discouragement to planting or pruning.... when Im sitting idle in my stand waiting for a deer Im thinking of all the stuff I could/should be doing which often includes staring at my apple trees that need pruning and or looking at few "empty" spots I could still plant a tree or two into.
Bowsnbucks
5 year old buck +
Possibly. If they got tipsy from their first taste - they certainly kept coming back!!!
Not one was left on the ground, so we went back to rake up more the next week. That was some years ago - but the lesson was learned ........... tart, small crab apples will get eaten. The small-fruited crabs we planted about 25 years ago at camp have been feeding deer & turkeys since they first bore fruit.That was our plan ......... get the deer drunk enough to fall over, passed out - then just walk up & knife 'em. No wasted bullets.
