Management of previously logged timber for deer

[avboiler11]

Too late in the season to do anything now, but figured this is as good a time as any to poll the membership...

This is my second season hunting deer on property my wife and I closed on Jan 2016. I have lots of deer activity on my property including multiple shooter bucks but it is mostly used as a travel corridor; deer bed on the property one side of me (storm damage blow-downs) and travel across my property to an ag field two properties the other side. My challenge is drawing deer and holding them a bit while they travel between their beds and the crop field. I plan to sew at least one 1/4 acre food plot next spring and even have a small natural clearing to do so (nexus of two small streams, within 50yd of a travel corridor.

The property was logged about 15 years ago; pretty much the only large trees remaining are a handful of large beech trees and multiple clusters of small but mast-producing white oak (!!!). Years without a significant canopy spurred lots of undergrowth, both briar and young trees.

A decade and a half later, much of the land now looks like this:

Anybody hunted similar ground?

I'm thinking of clearing some of these trees out this winter to open the woods up a bit, but I'm concerned it will cause significant changes to deer movement. Don't know what I don't know, figure others here have been down the same path...

 

[HuntMeister]

IMHO, opening up or clearing the woods is a bad move if you want deer to feel comfortable on your property. I like the view of your woods. I would do some selective hinge cutting which will bring good browse down to their level and open up some pockets to allow for clear shots especially if you are bow hunting it.

 

[spencer rifle]

Burn it.
Prescribed burn after leaf fall. Encourages the growth of deer yummies.

 

[bocefus78]

Are the skidding roads still open? Planting those in a good perennial food mixture will help quite a bit. Oats, clover, chicory, wheat etc. imo mixed are better than a monoculture plot.

Do a soil test. Lime and fert accordingly.

Btw, how much land are we talking? Sometimes you just have to be happy they even travel thru. Holding deer in small parcels is next to impossible.

 

[Restroyer]

Deer typically follow the same trails from bedding to feeding areas (especially the does). They may have several paths that they follow. When we bought our property we found the paths that they used and we widened them just a few feet and kept them cleared. Deer like to take the path of least resistance and then they will use those wider paths more often. Then during hunting season use those paths as your kill zones and shooting lanes. Use the tendency of the deer's habitual paths to your advantage. Just my advice.

 

[avboiler11]

Are the skidding roads still open?

No, they are now grown in with up to 3" diameter trees and in a couple areas, a LOT of briar. Some of them appear to be used as deer trails, however.

Btw, how much land are we talking? Sometimes you just have to be happy they even travel thru. Holding deer in small parcels is next to impossible.

28 acres...thrilled to have it. Lots of game on cameras and little surrounding hunting pressure, just need to 1. hold the deer a little along their travels to and fro, and 2. see them a bit better.

 

[natdscott]

I dunno, but you sure need a slug gun!

Arrows = notsomuch.

 

[snapping turtle]

Long rambles :

We had a couple of close woods to each other that had a tornado not land but twist the tops of the oldest trees off and after a few years the area looked just like the picture. You could not swing a gun without hitting a tree sapling lots of briars and turned very thick. The were also not bedding areas but pass they areas like you described.

Woods Number one: we did not disturb the area outside of the two major trails coming into the woods. We trimmed shooting lanes from two stand locations one from the southwest of the trail and one from the northeast. We just hunted the correct one for the wind during the season. We could hunt this woods each day no matter the wind and at least 70 precent of the time the deer entered at those two locations. The other times they were more than likely pushed out of the other woods into that one. It is only a three acre woods and does not ever seem like it holds many deer but they alway pass thru.

The second woods also got trimmed back for farm lot after the storm. They seemed to drop the trees back on the west side so the whole side had two small areas of escape on that side. For many years that west side had nothing happening on it. Then about four years after the big trees got cut the area inside the trees had rubs and scrapes all over just inside those trees. Stomping areas at both of the clears areas to exit. Something about that hard to reach westnside started to attract bucks like a giant magnet. We build a nice little platform on a downed tree with a wooden ladder to get up to it. Nice little fork in a down tree where one could set all day if one wanted. It produced nice deer for years until the old fence rows leading to the west side were removed for more farm land tillage. I still hunt that area once a season but it never has produced like it did now that the area is a small woods in a one mile corn or bean field. There’re is a small depression in the field that I have seen many a deer lay down in. Laying basically in the open in the middle of the field. The fence rows gone seemed to have made the woods a non factor.

The second woods now has a feed plot to the east side. Has shown some late season promise. The first woods now has a new owner who put a pond in where the field was. Either he did not do a good job or wanted a 2 foot deep large pond. It attracts ducks well but not so much on the deer. While walking out last year I noticed no less that 5 deer stands on that pond side of the woods. Talked to the new owner and he has harvested three does in three seasons off the property. He placed two feeders in the woods that he removes before season. He said that the coons get the feed. I told him of the trail coming into the back side from the pond were we had the stands year before. He said it was to thick to hunt. Three days later I saw blaze orange in that area. I also heard a shot from there so I think he got something.

You can can help out your area with food plots browse and water. You will have a hard time making a pass thru area into a deer bedding area. Planting honeysuckle small persimmon trees ect can help in years to come. Late food plots with root type crops can help also. It will take years of little disturbance of any area to make it into a bedding area. My best bedding area is a small woods off a small ditch area that is home to a very old lady who has lived there as long as I can remember. Nobody goes into the woods but deer. It is much thicker than the picture or the two woods above. Coyotes just barely come thru it. I think the key is that it never gets disturbed other than in July when we pick the raspberry for her. We hunt where the ditch enters the woods. Most deer are taken first day morning here entering the area as hunters move the deer around after light.

 

[singlestacksig]

I have a ton of land that looks like that, it is crawling with deer.. you just have to change your hunting style.. go in early & wait all day.. they will come into the thick cover mid day.. and they often come in a herd..

 

[Mgderf]

The property I hunt now has apple trees in the front yard.
I hunt the hill in the back yard, but guess where the deer come in.
Do you like apples? Even if you don't, plant a few apple trees in the middle of your property.
They will stay long enough to gorge themselves on apples if there are still any left when the season starts.

If no apples are present during the season, I bring an apple scent into the field...

 

[two70]

IMO, holding deer is the wrong thing to be focusing on. You own the travel route between their bedding and feeding areas, you already own the best of the three locations. Developing access so that you can get in and out would be priority number 1 for me. You will see and kill more deer if you can get in and out without disturbing deer.

Second I would do a lot of intensive hinge cutting in carefully selected locations. This will do three things for you, first it will increase the available browse for the deer. Second it will improve the cover on your property. Lastly, and most importantly, while increasing the cover at ground level for the deer it will also increase your ability to see and shoot into that cover. Along the same lines as the hinge cutting, I would select a few of the briar thickets to improve, preferably near the center of the property or slightly closer to the food source. You should keep them relatively small, trim shooting lanes around these areas and fertilize the briars along with hinge cutting all the trees in the area. The idea is to create a few small but very thick bedding areas that the does will seek out when they are trying to avoid bucks and that the bucks will have to travel from the main bedding area to check when they are looking for receptive does. Wild plums can also be planted around these areas to make them even thicker. The fruit will be long gone before hunting season but the trees will form quite a thicket.

The foodplot along the travel route is a good idea but 1/4 acre is not likely to be large enough to last throughout hunting season. The third thing I would do is either open up the clearing(provided it is located where you can access it without disturbing deer) to at least 3/4 acre, preferably a full acre or slightly more. Adding another similar sized plot elsewhere wouldn't be a bad idea either. When creating the plots, plan your stand site and access first, and the plot location last. Ideally, the plots should be crescent shaped with your stand near the center of the crescent since deer will naturally gravitate to that location in order to be able to see both ends of the plot. Fruit and mast trees can be a good alternative to a traditional foodplot and can work in smaller areas but will limit your visibility until fully mature.

 

[Hawkeye]

Help me out here. I'v eseen a couple of reference sto "hinge cutting" - that's not a term I am familiar with. Could someone please explain it?

 

[two70]

Hinge cutting

Basically you cut most of the way but not all the way through a tree so that it falls or can be pushed over but the tree remains alive for a time.

 

[Hawkeye]

Hinge cutting

Basically you cut most of the way but not all the way through a tree so that it falls or can be pushed over but the tree remains alive for a time.

Thanks! That explains it pretty well.

 

[indiucky]

Burn it.
Prescribed burn after leaf fall. Encourages the growth of deer yummies.

The Amerindian way for 8,000 years or so.....It works....

 

[Leadeye]

My ground has a lot of areas like that, it limits range and you hunt with your ears. On the plus side deer like the cover.

 

[two70]

Thanks! That explains it pretty well.

The QDMA website actually has some good follow up articles that explain the type of trees you should(small, not valuable for timber, palatable to the deer) and shouldn't be hinge cutting and about how to use planned hinge cuttings in small areas to funnel deer movement that are worth the read as well.