Have we been overlooking the perfect browse plant?

Native Hunter

5 year old buck +
I was noticing the weeping mulberry in my yard today and how the deer come in at night and devour the low hanging branches. I've always known that mulberry is a favored browse species - I think right up there with apple. A weeping mulberry might just be the perfect browse plant because of how it weeps. All of the new growth is going down within reach of the deer rather than up in the air like lots of other plants. And as you can see, my tree looks healthy despite all of the carnage. Just thinking out loud.........

Oh yea....I love those tasty little mulberries and the deer do too.......

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If we hunted in the spring. No leaf’s left by fall.
 
Up by me Id vote for beaked hazel. Always gets trimmed by deer, never gets much over 7’ tall, doesn’t need protection, it’s prevalent, makes good cover, and still puts on the nuts.


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Up by me Id vote for beaked hazel. Always gets trimmed by deer, never gets much over 7’ tall, doesn’t need protection, it’s prevalent, makes good cover, and still puts on the nuts.


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Beaked Hazel works good here too. Last year the bushes were so loaded that they were blocking the road where I drive. I had to tie some of them up with ropes until the nuts fell. It's a good one for sure but not browsed to the same level as apple and mulberry. But strawberry bush exceeds them all. I'm establishing a bunch of those in cages right now - along with some red osier dogwoods.
 
That weeping mulberry sounds like a great idea, if deer browse them that much - at least during the warm months. I'd love to plant some of the things you guys do, but with bears, they'd 100% destroy a mulberry of any kind - and hazel nuts of any kind. Hazel bushes / shrubs would a great thing at camp - but the bears would tear them right out of the ground. We had big elderberry plants established a few years back, but once they bore good clusters of berries - the bears tore them up - roots & all. We lost them all.

You guys that don't have bears are lucky. Plant away .......... and good luck with all your plantings!!
 
Stay tuned. I have a project I am going to implement and test. I wanted to get it done this Spring, but will make it a higher priority next year. A perfect browse species right under our noses I think.
 
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Stay tuned. I have a project I am going to implement and test. I wanted to get it done this Spring, but will make it a higher priority next year. A perfect browse species right under our noses I think.
Looking forward to hearing about it.
 
I posted this on May 11, 2020 ... however, if I had one that began producing fruit, I'd kill it since they can become almost invasive.

"In my area, there isn't anything under 6' high that gets browsed more than morus rubra - especially in the spring after leaf out and into early summer - ... if you have very many deer on your property at all, they will keep mulberry trees in the bush form. If a mulberry tree starts to shoot a central leader, whack it off and let your deer continue to enjoy the browse.
While not as wide, I've seen mulberry bushes almost as thick as plums (not thicket forming ... but you could plant several close together) ... monitor for any that produce fruit and replace so you don't end up with a problem. I plant a dozen tomato plants in concrete remesh cages each summer and often have 12-20 mulberry starts (collectively) at the outside bottom of the cages ... birds sit on top of cage and leave a deposit."
 
Osage orange as well as mulberry here.
 
Osage orange as well as mulberry here.

We’ve been cutting Osage orange (hedge) and selling the logs as fence posts. The mineral stumps that are left get hammered by the deer.


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When in the PAs state forests, I've always seen heavy browsing on green briar. Surprised no-one has mentioned propagating it.
 
When in the PAs state forests, I've always seen heavy browsing on green briar. Surprised no-one has mentioned propagating it.
We are trying to keep ours intact on our place, but I am a little concerned that spraying the Bush Honeysuckle will kill it as well. With the green stem it makes me wonder if it would be more susceptible to Glyphosate.
 
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