INVASIVE UNDERSTORY and DEER DAMAGE
Over the past years, I have come to realize that many people have no idea of the scope and complexity of establishing regeneration and the effects that deer density and understory have on it. I thought in this spray season I would document, each week, my work showing these effects. Feel free to pass this on to others for I firmly believe that the political debate (deer debate) is nothing but a lack of education.
Jim Rutt
J & R Forestry, Inc.
June 4 - 9, 2007:
The following two pictures are from a private 5400 acre hunting club in Liberty, PA in Lycoming County. Review the first two pictures and see if you can tell the story behind these two pictures.
The top two pictures are part of a 100 acre fern plot that I sprayed to control fern to allow regeneration. For those that are not familiar with the fern, fern puts a toxicity into the soil that hinders regeneration. Our fern in these 100 acres is a secondary problem, not the primary problem. The primary problem in these pictures was deer density. This tract that we're spraying had mature oak and all the oak was cut out 8 - 10 years ago. All that is left was a thin stand of cherry and maple. Normally when a tract is logged, the logging activity rips up the ground and exposes bare mineral soil. Regeneration happens best in bare mineral soil. If you have a high deer density and the deer clean out all the regeneration, the fern will move in. Fern grow best in full sunlight. Once you have fern, your chances of getting regeneration are slim.
Take a close look at the following four pictures that I took inside the 100 acres that we sprayed. You will notice some regeneration in all four of those pictures. Why is there regeneration in those pictures and not anywhere else on the 100 acres that we sprayed?
As we had stated before, regeneration needs bare mineral soil and minimal deer pressure. Deer will browse from about 6 inches off the ground to around 4 ft. in height. In these pictures, you will notice some of the mature timber had blown over, (still laying in the fern although you can't see them), the root ball came out of the ground ripping and exposing bare mineral soil, allowing the seedlings to germinate that were on top of this root ball. Being these root balls were above 4 ft. in height, the deer did not get to them, allowing them to be the only regeneration that I found in these 100 acres.
Out of 100 acres I found one oak seedling from the previous crop of oak
that was cut out. I found it growing inside the old remains of a massive
oak top that was logged out. The top was too massive for the deer to get
into and it protected the oak seedling allowing it to grow. Also in this
top, you will notice one cherry growing through. This regeneration started
immediately after logging activity, when the fern was not at toxic amounts.
If the deer would not have cleaned out the regeneration in the above picture, it
would have eventually looked like the following picture:
Eleven years ago, when I first started forestry herbiciding, the clear-cut in this picture was one of the first jobs that I sprayed. It was for this same camp. They immediately erected a deer deterrent fence around the majority of the tract. To the left in the picture is where the deer fence went. To the right, was a few acres they did not fence. The fence has since been taken down. Our children's future timber in now growing in this formally fenced tract.
This picture shows a deer trail coming out of our spray area, heading towards an 8 acre food plot, which you can see in the background.
When the Unified Sportsmen's Association claims there is no difference between the inside and the outside of a fence, most sportsmen will accept that because they do not have a clue.
They also claim we're cutting some of the best hardwoods in the world despite the deer pressure. The oak that was cut off of this tract started growing about 1920, when deer numbers were near non-existence. Despite the lone oak in that tract, you don't see our children's regeneration growing. On the bright side, this tract still has potential. We still have an overstory of maple and cherry that are still producing seed. This tract still could be turned around with the proper management techniques. Later on, I may have the opportunity to show you failed clear-cuts that have no viable seed source. These are the tracts were the future is bleak.
June 10 - 15, 2007:
I had the opportunity to check a spray site we treated.
This will be it's third growing season, located in Conoy Township, Lancaster
County, on private land. We did a herbaceous treatment (herbaceous means
soft tissue plants, not woody) for grasses and mile-a-minute. We did not
take out the woody understory in this treatment.
In this picture, we are looking at a fairly large opening in the canopy. The canopy is the very top level where the tree tops are. In this area I counted no less than 25 Ash seedlings that had germinated that the deer have heavily browsed on to the point that has severely effected their ability to survive.
Here, you can see where the leader of this tree was browsed off and this tree is trying to survive by using it's lateral branches to form a new leader. This slows the growth of the tree allowing the deer more time to browse. Then, in the background of the first picture, what is not Ash is Dwarfed Hackberry, a woody shrub that the deer do not browse on and it will probably overtake this Ash and suffocate it in the near future.
I had the opportunity to work with the Game Commission, this week, on State Game Lands #211, #80, and #52 to release herbaceous material consisting of mile-a-minute, Japanese stilt grass and hay scented fern. The following two pictures are on Stony Valley, Dauphin County, Game Lands #211, a shelter wood cut that had excellent regeneration of Poplar and Oak with very minimal deer pressure. But the mile-a-minute was present in the majority of the tract. Because of the excellent regeneration, they wanted to control the mile-a-minute and stilt grass to allow more time for the Oak to push through. This tract was going through a severe Gypsy Moth infestation and had stripped all of the Oak and was working hard on the maple when we sprayed this job. Gypsy Moth are easy to identify because of their back markings of blue dots followed by red dots.
The following pictures are on Game Lands #80, Lebanon County, where we treated for hay scented fern inside a deer deterrent fence.
Take
a close look at this picture. Looking from this view, one could get an
opinion that this deer fence is not doing any good. From this view all you
see is hay scented fern. This tract was about 40% covered in patches by
hay scented fern with Oak, Poplar, Black Gum, Sassafras and Birch seedlings
scattered throughout this woods in great numbers.
This next picture is one of these areas not covered by fern that has Oak regeneration that are just establishing themselves. Because this area is fenced and there will be no deer pressure, this treatment will guarantee at least this tract will regenerate in Oak.
This is a five foot tall Oak regeneration from a stump sprout that has never
been browsed on. Notice there is only approximately three leaders on this
tree. This stump can concentrate on feeding those three leaders.
This is a photo of an Oak stump sprout, from another location, that had severe deer pressure and eventually died. You will notice every time one leader was browsed off, another leader would try to grow until eventually this sprout ran out of energy. Notice the difference between the two stump sprouts.
This
is a picture of an Oak stump sprout, just outside the deer fence, which you can
see in the background. You can see the leaders have been browsed off by
deer pressure, only about 16 inches high, with new leaders trying to grow.
This is an area we treated last year for the Game Commission on Game Lands
#80 that we got to see this week.
We
did a complete understory control (woody and herbaceous). This stand was
primarily Poplar and Oak. They are attempting to establish the Oak
regeneration seedlings in this stand before they do the first stages of a
shelter wood cut. Oak regeneration will establish itself better than the
Poplar in these shady conditions. If they succeed in establishing Oak
seedlings, they will do a shelter wood cut, fence it if they feel the deer
pressure is too much, and the Poplar will surely follow.
The next picture is inside a fenced area on State Game Lands #52.
They
have excellent Poplar regeneration underneath the first stages of a shelter wood
cut consisting primarily of Oak and Poplar. This area was heavily infected
with Japanese stiltgrass. Because this is the third growing season, the
Poplar, in most cases, is established enough that it will overcome the Japanese
stiltgrass. We released the Japanese stiltgrass with hopes of
establishing Oak regeneration in the next two years. If the Oak does not
establish itself within the next two years, this stand will convert itself into
Poplar.
This
picture shows an unfenced area that we treated, that was heavily infected
with mile-a-minute. Mile-a-minute is one of those invasive species that
will climb and totally blanket the forest floor, suffocating everything
underneath it.
These
pictures are in the same area that has not yet been infected with mile-a-minute,
showing Maple stump sprouts browsed off by deer pressure.
I found American Chestnut on these Game Lands, still struggling to survive. Notice the last picture, where the canker killed the tree and it's trying to shoot stump sprouts to survive. Notice the leaders have been taken off by deer, this spring.
We
did a small job for a client in Lehigh Valley on a 110 acre farm that he manages
strictly for wildlife. We did a complete understory control on a small
section that they will clear cut and fence to allow maximum natural
regeneration. After the regeneration has established itself and has gotten above
the deer browse, they will remove the fence creating a better wildlife habitat
than they now have in that area.
The last two pictures are a field of buck wheat planted strictly for deer, which deer ran out of just before I snapped this picture, and a field of wildflowers.
June 16 - 23, 2007:
This week we finished up the PA Game Commission Southeast work. Our last job was on SGL# 46, Lancaster County, a 63 acre tract, where the understory was mechanically removed and allowed to re-sprout so that we could follow up with a herbicide treatment and get better control, in preparation for an upcoming timber sale that will be a shelter wood cut, meaning a few of the best seed producing trees will be left standing in each acre for a good seed source for better regeneration. The primary understory in this tract consisted of spice bush, multi-flora rose, mile-a-minute and Ailanthus. This picture are areas that mile-a-minute has infested large areas of these 63 acres. Mile-a-minute is a invasive specie that will climb 12 feet and will suffocate anything beneath it. Notice the mile-a-minute is already six feet up the truck of this tree and it's only the middle of June! The chances are very slim for any regeneration to get through this material.
In this tract, there was a fair amount of invasive trees called Ailanthus. In preparation for the timber sale, all of the Ailanthus trees in this tract were basaled and taken out of competition. The first picture is an Ailanthus seedling growing among this mile-a-minute. Ailanthus is one tree specie that can grow fast enough and grow ahead of it. Most of our native trees cannot keep ahead of this vegetation. The second photo is a picture of an Ailanthus tree that was basaled last year and is now dead, thereby eliminating seed source. The Game Commission's goal is to establish this tract back to the native trees species as much as possible. Of all the clients that we work with, I give the Southeast Region high marks for following good proven forestry practices. Many times private landowners do not want to spend time and money to enhance good regeneration. They just want to cut what they've inherited and run with the money.
This tract had fair amount of deer pressure. As I treated this tract, many of the spice bush re-sprouts have already been browsed off this summer. Notice in this picture where the tips of this spice bush have been eaten off.
We
did a private tract for client in Centre County that consisted strictly of big,
mature Oak. This landowner has treated the understory for fern and will be
erecting a deer deterrent fence to establish Oak regeneration, before he does
his timber sale. The landowner acknowledged that without a deer fence, he
has no chance of bringing Oak back in this tract. The picture shows a
small Hemlock tree where our landing was, that the deer have picked clean and
deer generally don't pick on Hemlocks. More photos will follow of this tract.
One of them will be of a neighbor who clear-cut his property 20 years ago and
the failure that followed. This gentleman stated that he will not do that
to his property. Ironically, this property sits up against Rothrock
State Forest in Centre County.
These pictures show the failed clear cut mentioned above. This property owner removed all of the good seed source trees when he clear cut it/ This was primarily an Oak stand, just like the property we sprayed for. This is definitely a good example of deer damage from 20 years ago. Because there was no seed source left on this property, the few maples that did establish themselves in this property probably blew in from the neighboring properties. You will notice a few evergreens that established themselves in this clear cut. This is one of the few species that can establish themselves under deer pressure. The chances of establishing this failed clear cut back to a productive forest is slim.
These are pictures of us treating ferns under this clients Oak stand in preparation for a selective cut and deer fence.
One of the privileges we have every June is to see the new wildlife. The following two pictures are of two turkey chicks in Warren County, PA, that could not have been hatched more than a few hours. Mom did not appreciate this family portrait. Next week's work will show what we are doing on this client's property.
June 24 - 30, 2007:
We are working for a client who has 100,000+ acres in the Northwest corner of PA. This company manages their ground strictly for timber and oil reserves. All of this company's ground is open for public hunting. Over the next few weeks we will treat roughly 1000 acres for this client. The areas we are treating are anywhere from shelter wood cuts to stands that have yet to be managed. We are taking out the undesirable understory which consists of anything from fern, birch, beech birch, striped maple, Hercules club, grasses, and False buckwheat.
The
best way to measure deer pressure on any property is to go on a harvested tract
and look at the stump sprouts. Deer head for the stump sprouts as soon as
they start pushing off the stumps. The stumps that get the heaviest
pressure are the Oaks and Maples. The above two pictures show an area we
are treating, where the majority of the Maple stump sprouts have all had their
leaders taken out this spring. Ironically, as we were treating this tract,
a gentleman and his grandson walked by and complained there were no deer here
anymore. I am sure if you asked the Maple sprouts, they would have a
different story.
It's not difficult to establish regeneration. As from the following
pictures, the first shows a patch of bare forestland that has Cherry, Maple, and
Beech Brush started. The second just shows Maple that are establishing
themselves on the road banks. What is difficult is getting that
regeneration above the deer browse. In many of these failed clear cuts and
shelter woods that we treat, the germination is not the problem but from
the smorgasbord effect that the deer pressure creates, the last thing standing
is what nobody will eat. We'll treat thousands of acres this year,
cleaning off the stale smorgasbord that nobody wanted, in an attempt to create a
new smorgasbord that, hopefully, the effects of less deer pressure than we've
had in the past, will create a completely different understory, hopefully
comprised of more diversified species.
This is a picture of one such shelter wood cut on this client's property where this tract was shelter wooded, leaving some of the best seed trees for a seed source. When I first saw this area from the vehicle, it appeared that the fern had moved in before the regeneration established itself. But when I walked this tract I found plenty of Maple and Cherry seedlings that were well established, as the following pictures show:
I found plenty of regeneration in this tract among the ferns. The jury is still out on whether or not this regeneration will be taken out when it pushes through the fern
July 1-7, 2007:
We treated an 100+ acre shelter wood tract that was shelter wooded a year ago. They've allowed the understory that was there to come back. We have now removed the understory through our treatment, allowing the good seed source trees that are left to throw down fresh seed, hoping for a new beginning. As I sprayed this tract, I couldn't help but notice all the Maple stump sprouts that had taken off, but the Beech Brush was left intact. This was the smorgasbord effect that I had talked about before. One of the above pictures shows a Maple stump sprout beside a Beech Brush stump sprout. Notice the Maple has been stripped of it's leaves and the Beech Brush has been left alone. This tract was shelter wooded by using a whole tree chip operation, where the whole tree is removed, top and all, chipped and sent either to a paper mill or a particle board plant in Mount Jewet. One of the above pictures shows trees that were pulled out but not yet chipped. We played "King of the Mountain".
On our last tract that we treated for this client, we treated
Stripped Maple, Beech Brush and fern underneath an Oak stand.
Of
the 45 acre stand we treated, I only noticed a few Oak that have established
themselves since the last harvest about 15 years ago, But out along the
road bank, the road bank was littered with Oak seedlings. Upon examination
of those Oaks, all those Oaks had been browsed, to almost a bush, hindering
their ability to push a leader and form a straight tree. The reason they
survived along the road bank is that the road banks are trimmed of other
vegetation on a regular basis. Back in the woods the Stripped Maple, Beech
Brush and fern took over and would have slowly smothered out any Oak seedlings
that were trying to survive the deer browse.
July 8 -14, 2007:
We worked this week with a client that owns 50,000 acres in northwest PA and NY. We treated 300 acres of Beech Brush, fern and Striped Maple. I have no pictures of these clients. The tracts that we worked on will have a timber operation in the near future, most likely being a shelter wood cut to enhance natural regeneration.
We started working with DCNR at the end of this week. We
will be treating approximately 1200 acres for them in District #15 & #16
in north central PA. Our first tract is a rather old stand of timber that
had a high mortality rate of die back and blow downs with a very thick
understory of Beech Brush, Striped Maple and fern.
This picture shows a moderately heavy Beech Brush understory. As I treated this understory, I noticed something I hadn't seen all year yet.
The
Beech Brush in this tract is being browsed by deer. When you see this you
know the deer are down to eating shoe leather. Rarely do I see browsed
Beech Brush. Beside this spray tract there was an old spray tract that was
shelter wooded. The forester was telling me that last year the Red Maple
reached the deer browse level. This summer, very little of it is left.
The Birch, Beech Brush, Striped Maple are still there growing. If none of
that desirable regen succeeds in getting ahead of the deer browse, we will have
in that tract exactly what we have in this tract I am treating, despite all of
the effort. The deer pressure in this area isn't all that great - there
just isn't anything left to eat.
July 15 -21, 2007:
This week we are working with DCNR District #15, spraying Beech Brush, Striped Maple and fern. After being in this business for 11 years and seeing first hand what a couple decades of excessive deer browsing have done to the northern PA forestlands, occasionally I will run across a prime example of this, that even for me is hard to believe. This week I had a couple of those opportunities. The above three photos were taken from the exact same spot. The first photo is standing on the state forest boundary line, looking down a deer deterrent fence with the fenced-in area to the left. The fenced area is privately owned. They did a logging job, which looks approximately 10 years old. Immediately following, they had erected a fence to protect the regeneration. To the right of the fence, in the third picture, is the area we are treating that had 100% hay scented fern, waist high. The middle photo is showing the regeneration inside the fence when you removed the deer browse from the equation. Inside that deer fence were all the species that should be there, including the good and bad: Cherry, Maple, Beech, Striped Maple, and Fire Cherry. It's hard to imagine the only reason the third picture shows nothing but hay scented fern is the deer equation was not removed. Hay scented fern loves full sunlight. As any regeneration in that patch was taken out, the fern continued to get thicker, to where we have it to the point it is today. I was informed that this tract will receive a fence. This job was off of Nelson Run Road, in the Susquehannock State Forest.
Another example of the deer browse is the first photo, looking in a newly erected fence, which is two years old, and showing regeneration that is just getting started and is in the deer browse zone. But because of the fence this regeneration is protected and appears it is going to make it. This fence is an electric fence and electric fences are not as effective as woven wire fences. But they are easier to put up. Woven wire is almost 100% effective. It is not uncommon to see a deer inside an electric fence. That is why we call them deer deterrent fences. But without question, it protects that regeneration enough to get established. I did notice some maple stump sprouts that had deer browse inside the fence. The second photo is standing at the same spot looking outside the fence. The only regeneration outside the fence is what was established this year. You will notice none of the two year old regeneration outside the fence that you can see inside the fence, which gives this new regeneration outside the fence a slim chance next year when it reaches deer browse height.
Even with the deer numbers down and with the outcry of some sportsmen, that fence does not lie and tells any forest professional that the deer numbers in that particular area are too high to establish satisfactory regeneration. Sadly enough, after working in the northern PA forestlands in the last years, I have been able to comprehend that there is a big gap between what the sportsmen want and what is sustainable.
I would like to interject my thoughts on the Unified Sportsmen Association and the integrity of their spokesmen. Their spokesmen claim that there is no difference between inside the fence and outside the deer deterrent fences. They want you to believe that we are harvesting the world's finest hardwoods despite deer pressure. They are correct in saying that we are the Cherry capital of the world. What they leave out is that the hardwoods that we are harvesting have established themselves in the early 1900's, when deer numbers were near nonexistent. Most people don't understand that the Game Commission was established to keep deer from becoming extinct. What the USP doesn't mention is that the majority of the tracts that have been logged out the past 20 years in northern PA have established themselves in Beech Brush, Striped Maple and fern. I hope our grandchildren can figure out a good use for these species. Being one of the biggest deer hunting sportsman in the state, I firmly believe that if the majority of the sportsmen would understand the complexity of the issues, this political issue would melt away. But because of the naivety of the majority of the sportsmen, they suck up the lies and deception of the USP.
Although the state owns 3+million acres between the Game Commission and State Forest, the majority of the woodlands of PA are held by private entities, many of which I work with as they manage their woodlots for timber production. These private entities deal with the same problems that the State deals with. Many private entities are leery about putting up deer deterrent fences for regeneration due to cost and maintenance. Most people don't understand that the State puts10% of their timber sales back into regeneration projects, such as fencing, herbiciding, and planting.
Rolling through thick Beech Brush and Striped Maple as we're treating a stand.
Many times, we go back service roads that haven't seen heavy vehicles for several years. This such road was 4.5 miles long. At the end there is, many times, no place to turn our trailers around. We unhook them, back them into the woods and drag them out with the skidder.
We
had the opportunity to get into some interesting predicaments. In this
incident, we attempted to take a shortcut to the service road instead of the
long way around. Even with the blade up, the blade caught the road bank
and locked in dirt. We had to bring in a skidder to dig the road out so we
get free. When we were done, we had to fix the road up.
While working with a large client, last year, we were traveling on a private forest road moving to our next spray tract in a heavy thunderstorm. We came to this spot of red clay with the road bank sloped slightly to the left. All of our vehicles slid off the road into the ditch with the trailer and skidder overturning. Fortunately there was a pipe line company not more than 1/2 mile away laying plastic gas line, which you can see laying along the road in the second photo. We contacted them, and they came up and brought their crawlers and loaders out. In a few short hours and a bunch of dollars later, we were sat up and ready to go.
Treating understory with our equipment using airblast . The chemical we
use is Round-Up.
The results of an understory treatment, where we removed the undesirable, interfering understory, allowing for a fresh start of regeneration
July 22 -28, 2007:
This week was dedicated to District #15 and starting District #16, spraying Beech Brush, Striped Maple and fern. One of our jobs was under an Oak stand that was fenced a year ago in hopes that in the next few years we will have a good acorn crop and that we can establish Oak. When we arrived at the job site the forester and I walked the site and were surprised to find that we had a tremendous amount of Oak that regenerated within that last year. We then changed our treatment to the site using a product that will take the fern out but would not effect the Oak. It's a pleasure to work on a site where we know we have Oak regeneration and the deer will not be able to get it. We had the privilege of seeing four monster bucks, this week.
These two photos are of a fenced-in site in Tioga State Forest,
outside Arnot, Pa.
We
sprayed a 45 acre site right beside this fence that had the thickest Beech
Brush, Striped Maple and Birch that I had treated so far this year. The
fenced in area had been sprayed a few years ago. From the outside looking
in, it did not look very impressive. As I walked through the plot I
noticed ample regeneration of Maple, Aspen, and Black Cherry, which is what the
overstory predominantly was. Mixed in with that was Beech Brush,
Striped Maple and fern. Although, right outside the spray block it
consisted of Beech Brush, Striped Maple, Birch and fern. It is
amazing to me to see the difference that a deer deterrent fence has on
regeneration.
As I was standing on the edge of that fence early one morning, getting my thought together for the day, a bob cat walked down along the fence and up to within about 55 feet of me. What a privilege that was!
July 29 - Aug. 4, 2007:
We finished spraying for DCNR District #15 & #16, where we treated 1200 acres. The top two photos are a fenced in area under an Oak stand. When I drove by the stand I noticed charred marks on the lower part of the mature Oak trees. This site was intentionally burned in 2004 with a low intensity fire. It is a proven fact that one of the best ways to bring Oak back is to have a fire that will burn just the understory but not get too hot that it will burn and kill the crown and overstory of the larger, mature trees. I talked to the forester and he stated that they try to do one burn a year, if conditions are just right. It's definitely a practice that caries high liability with it. This job was loaded with Oak seedlings. As I walked around part of the fence inspecting the job, there was even Oak regeneration outside the fence. It did show some deer browse. I think some of the Oak outside the fence is going to make it. When we can get Oak regeneration to establish itself and get above the deer browse zone outside the fence, that is a good sign that we have the deer pressure down to where it should be.
I had the opportunity to inspect one of my 2004 spray jobs that
just had a timber harvest completed on it. As you can see from the picture
we can do an excellent job of removing the bottom 15 feet of the understory.
As you can see, there is ample sunlight now hitting the forest floor. This
will be the first growing season since it has been mechanically harvested.
I took a walk to see what had established itself. This overstory consisted
of Oak, Maple and Black Cherry.
Sure enough,
as you can see from the photos, we already have Cherry, Maple and Oak
establishing themselves.
Many people don't realize that seeds need partial to full sunlight to germinate. Some seeds germinate better in full sunlight; some do better in partial sunlight. Timberland that has an already heavy established understory, whether it be Striped Maple, Beech Brush, fern, mile-a-minute multi-flora rose, Spice Bush, etc. , will inhibit seeds to germinate until the understory is dealt with. There are different ways to treat understory. We treat with herbicides. Mechanically, is another way but is not nearly as effective because it does not kill roots and rhizomes. Those roots and rhizomes will re-sprout and quickly out compete anything that had germinated from a seed. Much or our understory that has established itself comes from either invasive species being introduced into our landscape, some of those that we deal with are multi-flora rose, mile-a-minute, Japanese knot weed, Japanese stiltgrass, and some of our native less desirable understory have established themselves simply because the deer removed, through browsing, our higher quality hardwoods such as Oaks, Maples, Aspen, and Cherry, leaving Beech Brush, Striped Maple and fern.
My last job I did for DCNR was a 42 acre tract that had a predominately Oak overstory, located just south of Leetonia, nestled in the Tioga State Forest off of Bear Run Road. In this tract we treated some heavy Beech Brush, Striped Maple and fern. Throughout this tract, there were areas that had minimal understory that totaled roughly eight acres. Established in these areas was regeneration of Oak four feet tall. My business is to help clients establish adequate, high quality regeneration. Here I was, spraying some Oak regen knowing that I have a good potential of knocking it out. A couple weeks before we got to the job site, a number of the foresters got together and went in these areas and clipped off the majority of the established Oak. The Oak that was clipped off will re-sprout from it's own root system but they did not clip all of the Oak. The only other option for this tract would have been hand work: basaling and herbiciding, which is too time consuming. So, they simply did the next best thing, which was less time consuming and will still assure that the established Oak that was clipped off will come back. Of the thousands of acres that I have treated, it is one of the very few tracts that I have seen Oak get above the deer browse line without a fence to protect it. Oak is one of the harder species to establish because it does not throw a good seed source every year and the seed source is only good for one year, where some seeds will lay in the soil for 30 years and germinate when it finally gets sunlight. Fire Cherry is one of those. Although, the Unified Sportsmen Association's spokesmen would like you to believe that acid rain is the only reason that we are not regenerating Oak, I have seen far too many herbicide jobs and most recently since the deer numbers have been down, natural regeneration of Oak in areas that are not overwhelmed by overstory. I do believe that acid rain is playing a part in the decline of some of our hardwoods in higher elevations of PA, but it is not the scapegoat that it is being claimed to be.
August 5 - 11, 2007:
I had the privilege this week, to check on one of the sites we treated for the PA Game Commission, SGL #46, on the week of June 16th. On viewing the first picture you will notice we took out 100% of the herbaceous material. You will notice there is no mile-a-minute on the hillside that you see on the previous photos in the previous diary of June 16th. The vegetation that is left on that hillside is Spice Bush, green briar and Ailanthus. Not all of the vegetation acts the same way when treated. Herbaceous material will die off within weeks. Some of the more woody material will take a whole year to fade out. When I examined the Spice Bush on this tract, it had stopped growing since we sprayed it, which is a good indicator that we took it out of competition. The green briar still was green but most likely will not be there next spring. The last picture shows an Ailanthus sprout that is growing off one of the Ailanthus trees that was cut down, when the Game Commission manually mowed this site before spraying. The growth of that Ailanthus has all been since we treated that tract. As I stated before, Ailanthus is one of the fastest forms of our invasive regeneration. Since the Ailanthus has grown since we treated the site, it is there to stay. But all in all, it looks like a very successful treatment. The ground is ready for the overstory seed source and the viable seed source that is in the ground to germinate next year.
I worked with NY Dept. of Environmental Conservation on some of their state land, this week. The first job was located near Walton, NY. It was a shelter wood job where I was treating fern and some Beech Brush in the understory. They also had a ground vine called False Buckwheat, which is similar to mile-a-minute but not as aggressive. In most parts of NY the deer pressure is nothing like PA has seen. This particular job the deer pressure was relatively light. The second picture shows some Maple stump sprouts in the tract we had treated, which had very light deer browse on it. Deer love to browse on Maple stump sprouts. The fact that these stump sprouts were as high as they were is a direct indicator of the deer pressure on this tract. The last two photos are the fern we are treating.
The second tract we treated was just outside Deposit, NY. Again, we were treating fern and Beech Brush. But in the middle of this 65 acres is approximately 15 acres of excellent Oak regen that we did not treat.
These four photos are of the Oak regen that we did not treat. The fact that this regen was four feet high was again, a good indicator that the deer pressure is light. The third photo shows some of the regen that has been browsed. But for the most part, a good part of this regen appears that it will make it.
In
the thousands of acres they we treat in the four different states that we work
in, it is amazing the unusual things we come upon in the forest: marijuana
plantations, old oil pumping equipment, hand laid stone walls at the
most unusual places, abandoned buildings and abandoned quarries. On
this job I can add a new one: a launch pad for hang gliding. This
particular job was on top of a mountain. The sawmill that bought the
timber had to build haul roads and skid trails to get tot the top of the
mountain. Yet, as I treated this tract I came upon a professionally built
launch pad. The date on the concrete pad was 1991. The forester that
was assisting us at the job site said it was an illegally constructed launch pad
that was being used as of this summer. They're not exactly sure how it is
accessed but assume they come from a neighbors property on some old log trails
on top of the mountain. Amazing! Someone has had a
private launch pad on State Forest ground for 16 years and hasn't been shut
down! The second photo is of an abandoned rock quarry, with a ledge about
20 feet tall, that I drove within 10 feet of the top ledge before I saw it.
This first photo shows a six foot Oak seedling on State Forest ground, along the edge of an old logging road. When you can get Oak regen like that out in the open, deer pressure is light. Upon examination of the seedling I noticed that the side had been browsed on this year but the main leader is past four feet, above the deer reach. This Oak is home free from future deer pressure.
We came to Potter County, PA to work with another large client. They own 116,000 acres in PA and millions throughout the United States. We will be working with them for the next few weeks treating future timber sale areas.
August 12 - 18, 2007:
This
week we worked around Ulysses, PA. This client has many blocks of ground
scattered throughout Potter County. We sprayed Beech Brush, Striped Maple
and fern, and some areas of false buckwheat. All of the areas that we
treated will be future timber sale areas. On one such tract of ground that
was 7000 acres, we got stuck and had to bring in a skidder to free us. On
this particular tract deer pressure seemed to be extremely light. This
client leases all of their ground to hunting clubs. From what I understand
it runs about $7 per acre.
This photo shop a shelter wood area that is a few years old. In the background where the shelter wood stops, is a 55 acre tract that we treated. I came into this tract assuming that the deer pressure was as light as the tract we treated earlier. From a distance, the understory that you see in this shelter wood consists mainly of blackberries, a good sign for regeneration will survive quite well in blackberries. So, I took a walk and what I found wasn't what I had expected. The deer pressure in this tract is quite extensive. The overstory in this shelter wood consisted of Oak, Cherry, Ash, and Hard Maple. I found no Oak, Ash or Cherry, and all of the Maple that we found was being browsed off as it was trying to push through the blackberries and fern.
What was surviving in this shelter wood was the Striped Maple and Birch. It will be very interesting to see what this tract looks like in a few years. But for sure, the Maple does not appear that it will make it because of the deer pressure. I examined this tract and took these pictures just before dusk. After examining this tract we went for a drive down to Ulysses. As we came down the mountain on this private tract, which consisted of 1300 acres, we counted 24 deer within the first 3/4 mile. No wonder that shelter wood looked the way that it did. It's amazing how deer pressure can vary from one area to another in such a short distance.
August 19 - 25, 2007:
We had the opportunity to check out a couple of previous tracts. The two pictures above, are from a tract south of Galeton, PA. This tract already had the timber harvested before we were called in. The forester in charge evaluated this tract and decided that too many undesirables had already established themselves. In essence, we "cleaned the slate" and will allow the overstory to throw fresh seed supply for the next growing season.
We are still working with our large client that we previously talked about, in Cameron County, just north of Emporium. In the process of getting to this one job, we passed through a tract that we treated for another client three years ago. The above pictures are from that tract. In this business, not every tract we treat turns out to be successful for various reasons. Sometimes we can figure it out, sometimes we can't. But for the majority of the time, when everything is done in proper sequence, we can do marvels of bringing back adequate, high quality regeneration. This such tract is one of those. The first picture is just looking through the shelter wood. Not very impressive looking, is it? But upon further examination, this tract was full of Black Cherry, Cucumber, Maple, Birch, and it also had the undesirables such as Striped Maple and Beech. Being this regeneration had all started on the same footing, at the same time, I am fully confident that in a few years they will be able to remove the rest of the overstory, leaving a clear cut that will have more than ample regeneration that is well established. As I walked this site looking for deer browse, the only browse I noticed on this tract was on the Maple, and the majority of that is going to make it anyway. The pictures from left to right are: shelter wood, Cucumber Tree, Black Cherry, Cucumber, Maple, Birch, and Black Cherry.
As I stated in our previous paragraph, not always do we have success 100% of the time on everything that we do. I retreated a portion of a fenced in area. The area we treated was approximately 11 acres. It was under an Oak and Cherry stand that came back in as Birch and Beech. Although Birch is not the worst thing to come back they wanted to start over for the reason that they already had a deer fence up and wanted to try one more time to bring back the Oak and Cherry.
August 26 - 31, 2007:
Our week didn't go as planned, this time. For various reasons we had a short week and broke down towards the end of it. What we put our KMC track machine through is nothing short of abuse. Our right front final drive has a bearing going out. So, we will be down for a period of time. Depending on what else is wrong, this may spell the end of the 2007 season for our crew. Our acres covered stands at 4000 acres.
