Woodland owners commonly cite wildlife as a top reason why they own property.
The challenge is that wildlife and particularly white-tailed deer can damage young trees,
where it causes issues with their growth and survival. So in today's video, we're going to talk a little
bit about deer and the type of damage they do, but more importantly, what landowners can do to help
mitigate that damage.
So white-tailed deer cause damage to trees and particularly young trees by feeding on young twigs and the buds on trees.
The other way deer can damage young trees is by bucks rubbing their antlers up against the main stem.
so the good news for landowners is there's things we can do to control white-tailed deer damage to young trees.
The method that you choose will really depend on a couple different factors including what type of equipment you have available to you,
how much money you're willing to spend and how much time you're willing to invest in the process.
Just to show you the kind of damage white-tailed deer can do. You can see these two fields in front
of us, the tree planting on the right was planted at the same time as the left, the only difference
you're seeing is the field on the right didn't use any fencing or any other methods to deter white-tailed deer.
Electro fencing is a common method we use to deter white-tailed deer browsing
of young seedlings. The cost of your fence is really going to depend on the setup, how many
strands you have and the size of the area that you're going to protect. You're going to be more
efficient protecting blocks and large blocks. For large blocks, your cost is going to be more because
you've got more fencing but the cost per unit acre actually decreases the larger area you protect.
The basic components of the fence include the posts which are typically fiberglass rods, the wire which
can be a bare wire, it could be a poly wire or a poly tape and then the charging source.
For this particular fence, this is a single strand, poly wire electric fence. It's designed for white-tailed deer
and so our strand is 30 to 36 inches above ground. Typically with these types of fences, we will also bait them.
Deer can jump 30 to 36 inches no problem and so while we call these fences,
they're actually more of a frightening device. so the idea is if we bait these fences, deer will walk up,
lick the bait, turn around and run away. There's a couple options you can use. A lot of manufacturers
will have bait cups, metal bait cups with some type of a polyfill in there that you can add a lure to
or you can use the old standby which is simply peanut butter with a little bit of aluminum foil
that's folded over the wire. Couple tips to remember when you're using electric fences
is you want to keep the ground below and on either side of the fence clear of vegetation
to as much as possible. You want deer to be able to see the fence and not be surprised when they come
up to it. The other thing you want to do is you want to scout the perimeter on a regular basis.
You can have a limb or something like that fall and if that happens and deer have access to that
planting, then you're in trouble because they know they can get in there, they know they have food
and so you want to continually scout that perimeter, make any necessary repairs you
need to make as soon as possible and then also do regular mowing and trimming around the fence.
So you have a choice with this in terms of where it's applied. In most places, we use electric fences
on regular tree plantations that are in a relatively open area.
It's going to be more of a challenge to use this method in areas where you've got a lot of tall
mature trees because you'll have branches and limbs fall down. So unless you're out there,
looking at that fence almost on a daily basis, they're really not going to be very effective in
a woodland situation. Of course the other situation you're going to have with that is the charger is
not going to be in the full sun probably and so it's not going to get an adequate charge to function properly.
A seven-foot woven plastic mesh fence is another way to protect plantations from deer.
These fences can be used in any size area, the larger the fence, the more expensive it's going to be because
more material more labor to install it. To find out more detail on how to install these fences,
visit the link to the publication in the video description below. The basic construction is you
use metal or wood posts as the framework to lay out the fence and then you attach the woven mesh
plastic to the fence as well as string it along wire from the top and the bottom of the fence.
We also typically will put flagging halfway between each pole. This allows the deer to actually
see the fence so they don't run into it, which can sometimes be a problem. There's also a J stake
located between each pole that affixes the fence to the ground. You definitely don't want any gaps
in the bottom of this fence because deer actually are just as likely to crawl under a fence as
they are to jump over it. In terms of maintenance, maintenance of these fences is actually quite easy.
Typical to other fences, you want to scout the perimeter on a continual basis.
You can have limbs fall on this and so you have to remove those and make any repairs as necessary.
The other thing you got to look for is the bottom of the fence, you're going to have to
look for rabbits chewing through the fence. And so even though you'd think this mesh can keep them out,
well, certainly the size will keep a rabbit out, this plastic they can easily chew through that and
so rabbits will chew holes through that and then deer can actually access those holes accordingly.
You can actually fix those by taking a small sheet of the mesh fence
and fixing it over that hole using zip ties and so it's a really quick and easy repair to make.
Single trees can be protected with welded wire cages, five to seven feet tall. Now the way these
cages work, it prevents deer from browsing on most of the tree and it also prevents deer from rubbing
their antlers up against the tree which can actually kill it when they're young. So the way you
assemble these is you cut a section of fencing and you tie the ends together using zip ties or wire
and then you affix it to one or two stakes, again, using zip ties or wire so it's really easy to
assemble. So what we're doing here is we're trying to protect the terminal bud. As the tree gets older
and grows taller, the terminal buds exceed the reach of a deer and this tree will be good to go
You can also see with this tree is that some of the lateral branches are already sticking out from
the side of this cage and that's okay. A little bit of light browsing on those lateral branches
really won't affect the growth and survival of this tree. We want this tree to grow straight and
tall, so from that respect, it's really not bad at all.
So I'm standing in a bottomland conservation
hardwood tree planting. And what you're seeing behind me is each individual tree protected by
a tree tube or tree shelter, those terms are generally used interchangeably. There's many
different designs of tree tubes. This one right here is four feet tall, that's pretty typical for
tree tubes, occasionally, they'll be taller. Some of them are solid. This particular model here
is ventilated it has holes in there and that allows airflow to kind of prevent things from
getting too moist inside the tube. This one is also fitted with a ventilated mesh cap, and so these
just slide over kind of like a sock on a foot and that tree will grow up right through there.
And what these do is they prevent wasps and birds from getting inside there which you don't really want.
In terms of installation, what happens is sometimes these are already form-fitted round like this,
but most of the time you buy tree tubes and they're flat and so you've got to roll them up and then attach
them to some type of a steak. This particular steak is a wooden steak, some people also use a pvc steak.
Regardless of the type though, you have the state close to the seedling, you slide the tube over the
seedling and you put zip ties through the holes of the tube as well as around that stake and that
holds it. So these are used not only to help the tree growth, but also to prevent wildlife damage.
For deer, obviously when the tree is small, it's going to be below the height of this tube.
It prevents any kind of access to it, so it prevents deer from browsing on those seedlings.
Certainly, once it grows above the height of the tube, deer can access it and so that's why some
people choose the five-foot tube if they're really concerned about deer browse, because it gives it
another foot growth before it comes out of that tube. Another benefit of the tree tube is it
prevents bucks from rubbing their antlers on these trees. And so as trees are older, the bark thickens
and they can withstand some rub damage, but when trees are young like this, their bark is very thin,
and so bucks can actually kill trees just from rubbing their antlers on the individual tree.
Chemical repellents are another option landowners can use to deter white-tailed deer damage to young
trees, there's basically two types of repellents, there's area repellents so you're trying to spray
kind of an area and keep animals out of that area or there's taste repellents where you're trying to
prevent an animal from tasting or browsing on a specific part of a plant. Our recommendation
to landowners is try and find out what works for you, you might want to talk to neighbors or others
in your area to see what works for them as well. Because really it depends on what the habitat is
around, how large of an area you're protecting, what other food sources do they have available
and so on and so forth. And quite frankly, the number of deer you have.
So which method is best for you?
Each wildlife damage management practice has its own advantages and disadvantages and those
can vary by location, so you're going to have to figure out which works best for your situation.
Usually, combining different methods increases success. So sometimes you want to combine different
methods that target different species. For example, you can use tree tubes in combination with either
welded wire cages or electric fencing. Other times you'll want to stack different methods
that target the same species. So for example with white-tailed deer, you can use deer repellents, deer
hunting and deer fencing all in the same area. A professional forester can make suggestions for you
and also provide a cost-benefit analysis to help you figure out which is right for your situation.
For help in finding a forester near you or more information
about wildlife damage management, see the links in the video description below.