Sustainable Winter Browse - Zone 4

[frlu0501]

I'm looking for opinions on sustainable winter browse that will not require the maintenance of food plots. I have a variety of large acorn producing oaks that are great for early season. However, come mid/late-November and December, the acorns are gone and deer yard-up elsewhere. Late season hunting is a struggle. I want to provide more browse and cover for winter. I'm located in SE Minnesota.

I'm hoping to plant once, water/protect for 2-3 years and remove cages for browsing.

Over the next couple years I will be planting the following:
- Dogwood (red/grey)
- Hazelnut
- Ninebark
- Elderberry
- Apples (Midwest crabs, variety of late dropping apples)
- Plums

Am I on the right track, any additional suggestions for late-season winter browse? Any and all opinions welcome. Thank you in advance.

 

[SD51555]

What kind of trees are in your woods now? Buying and planting browse is going to be cost prohibitive, especially in SE MN.

**I should add, if you've got basswood, drop all of them and get the stumps low to the ground. It'll be great browse, but won't be cover. A #1 browse maker is sunlight.

 

[Bassattackr]

I'm looking for opinions on sustainable winter browse

- Dogwood (red/grey)
- Hazelnut
- Ninebark
- Elderberry
- Apples (Midwest crabs, variety of late dropping apples)
- Plums

Of your list there, the majority of the berries/fruit will be gone by late winter. Foilage gone on these as well by winter. Not sure I see any of these plants as a good winter solution? I do know that deer prefer to browse ninebark and elderberry with the leaves, but I'm not sure how late into the year. You may look into the Red Osier (red twig) dogwood as well.

 

[frlu0501]

I do have a lot of basswood, some was logged a couple years ago. I could cut down more basswood, that's a good thought. We have a variety of trees in our woods but we're lacking browse. We have some choke-cherry, elderberry, and plums, but very minimal right now.

My thought is, the list of shrubs/trees I listed will provide limb browse in the winter, similar to basswood stump browse, and similar to the limb browse provided when we logged a couple winters ago. I never had the amount of deer beds in the winter as I did the winter we logged. They were destroying the tree tops on the ground. That is what I'm attempting to imitate with shrub limb browse.

I'm open to additional thoughts on winter browse.

 

[homerj1]

You gotta ask yourself why isn't there a bunch of shrubs/bushes now? If your woods is mainly mature oaks with a high canopy, that would be one reason you're lacking lower growth.

 

[Bassattackr]

How long ago was the property logged?

 

[Tree Spud]

If you have a heavy tree canopy, you will need shade tolerant shrubs such as serviceberry, ninebark, elderberry, & red & grey dogwood.

If you open the canopy you can see what pops up and is in the seed bank. Hinge cutting less desirable trees wiir create winter browse.

I know some will chafe, but honeysuckle is a great understory shade tolerant shrub that greens up early and holds leaves late for browsing.

If you have heavy browse, you will need to cage or tube them to get the height & multi-stem needed for good browse and survivability.

 

[ruskbucks]

Sd said exactly what I was going to say. I would go with cutting whatever trees you have. You would have to plant a ton of shrubs to provide enough browse to last any amour of time. I had my woods logged 5 years ago, I bet they cut close to 500 red maples, plus other birch, ash, and aspen. I almost could not find a single stump that they didn't browse. Besides the stump sprout that usually had at least a dozen shoots on them the sunlight caused all kinds of other browse trees and shrubs to grow.

 

[ruskbucks]

Sd said exactly what I was going to say. I would go with cutting whatever trees you have. You would have to plant a ton of shrubs to provide enough browse to last any amour of time. I had my woods logged 5 years ago, I bet they cut close to 500 red maples, plus other birch, ash, and aspen. I almost could not find a single stump that they didn't browse. Besides the stump sprout that usually had at least a dozen shoots on them the sunlight caused all kinds of other browse trees and shrubs to grow.

That tree behind the kid is one maple stump sprout that has been feeding deer for 5 years and still providing browse. Unlike my beans the trees are still able to withstand the browse and flourish.

 

[ruskbucks]

Out of your list of shrubs I would mostly go with red or silky dogwoods. One you get those established for a couple years the deer won't be able to kill them. Elderberry is the same but it doesn't seem to be long lived, although when one dies another pops up somewhere else. I have grey dogwoods on my land. The deer, bear, and birds hammer the white berries, but I never seen any browse on them. They are also short compared to the other dogwoods.

 

[Ben.MN/WI]

I'm in Olmsted County in SE MN and in my area deer will browse the shrubs you have listed. Since those shrubs get browsed it sets them back and gives lesser browsed shrubs like buckthorn and honeysuckle a chance to take over. Shrub thickets are awesome for deer and small game though. If your goal is to provide late season browse I would cut (or hinge cut) every undesirable tree/shrub and let the sun hit the dirt. You probably will have a bunch of buckthorn sprout, but also some good shrub species as well. Keep after the buckthorn for several years and hope the good stuff takes over.

Planting late dropping apple varieties is also a good idea, but it will take a decade before apple production is decent.

One thing I've had good luck with at my place is finding the scattered high value shrubs and removing competition around them. I usually leave some cut brush around them to reduce rubbing issues, but eventually those good shrubs grow, drop seeds and expand. That has been more successful for me here than actually planting new shrubs. I've done a lot of that as well, but my success rate hasn't been great.

 

[Tree Spud]

Out of your list of shrubs I would mostly go with red or silky dogwoods. One you get those established for a couple years the deer won't be able to kill them. Elderberry is the same but it doesn't seem to be long lived, although when one dies another pops up somewhere else. I have grey dogwoods on my land. The deer, bear, and birds hammer the white berries, but I never seen any browse on them. They are also short compared to the other dogwoods.

On my property grey dogwood withstands browse, ROD is a great browse.

 

[H20fwler]

I'll second ROD as great fall/winter browse, just plant a LOT. Once it gets established it will be very hard for deer to hurt it. Everywhere they nip it back it will branch out and grow thicker and bushier instead of just up. Very easy to plant on your own from cuttings off any existing that you have growing.

 

[Diesel5610]

Red Osier Dogwood is a great browse. I have a couple acres of it and the deer browse it heavily. Protect the plants for 2 years and the deer will not be able to kill them. Elderberry has given me similar results and may be better for partial shade. They definitely have to be protected for the first 2 years to get the roots established. I have some pictures of the ROD and the browse it is subjected to in the old thread below.

what to plant

I have an old muck field I want to plant in cover and food for deer. Im looking for ideas. I want to put trees/bushes in most of it with 3 food plots. The field is 12 acres. 3 acres are wet. I thought about dogwoods and willows. maybe some button bush in the wet areas(under water spring and...

habitat-talk.com

 

[4wanderingeyes]

Where do you buy ROD to plant an area of an acre or so? How many plantings do you do, how close together? How big of plantings did you plant?

 

[Brian662]

Red Osier Dogwood is a great browse. I have a couple acres of it and the deer browse it heavily. Protect the plants for 2 years and the deer will not be able to kill them. Elderberry has given me similar results and may be better for partial shade. They definitely have to be protected for the first 2 years to get the roots established. I have some pictures of the ROD and the browse it is subjected to in the old thread below.

what to plant

I have an old muck field I want to plant in cover and food for deer. Im looking for ideas. I want to put trees/bushes in most of it with 3 food plots. The field is 12 acres. 3 acres are wet. I thought about dogwoods and willows. maybe some button bush in the wet areas(under water spring and...

habitat-talk.com

That looks awesome, how long had it been since you planted there? They look pretty mature.

 

[Brian662]

Where do you buy ROD to plant an area of an acre or so? How many plantings do you do, how close together? How big of plantings did you plant?

You can take cuttings from a mature tree and stick them in the ground or you can buy rooted plants from a nursery. It would take several hundred to do an acre. May be better off getting several established and then use the cuttings from those to plant more?

I've bought some from my SWCD as rooted plants and I've done cuttings from a roadside ditch. The only thing that survived the deer were caged. If you don't cage the cuttings they can just pull them right out of the ground before roots establish.

 

[ruskbucks]

On my property grey dogwood withstands browse, ROD is a great browse.

Maybe they do browse them and I just didn't notice. They are different then my other dogwoods and seem to grow more single straight trunks that are only 3- 4ft high. Silky, red and, yellow dogwoods I have multiple trunks growing upright like a thick 10ft high bush.

 

[Diesel5610]

Our State Tree Nursery and county Soil Conservation Offices have tree seedling sales that sell 2 year rooted dogwood cuttings $60 for 100 plants. Pretty easy to put a couple hundred in with a dibble bar in a day. After planting several hundred trying to get ahead of the deer, I would opt for planting 20-25 a year and protecting them with a tree tube or some kind of cage. I would do 20-25 a year and after 2 years transfer the cages to a new 20-25 plants. In 4-5 years you would have a pretty good patch started and the shrubs will spread some on their own.
The shrubs in those pictures were probably 8-10 years old and were never protected. They would have been that size much sooner had I protected them.

 

[Brian662]

To the OP you may try opening some canopy near some good hingable trees, that will sustain your browse for years to come. Stump sprouts are awesome and very palatable for deer but they aren't a renewable resource like a hinged tree is. Box elders and basswood are great trees to hinge cut.

Open up some canopy by felling some trees (1/4 to 1/2 acre) and then hinge those basswood into some side cover with a small canopy and you'll have bedding within the first year, guaranteed.