You are right on the money. When Alt and foresters point to the lack of understory in pole in saw timber, they are looking at a perfectly natural occurrence that will happen with or without deer. The Brady's Lake browse study showed that browse production in a clearcut drops by 75% after twelve years without any deer present.

Over the years I have watched areas progress from fields , to cedar and sumac, to polar of saw timber quality. The understory decreased as the amount of shading increased. I also watched what happened when areas of saw timber ,with no understory was cut. The cut area produced abundant regeneration ,while the uncut adjacent ares still remained wide open.