Originally Posted by
Tony_Loyd
If you got less deer and they are only targeting the hardwood sprouts what is the forest going to be mainly consisted of?
Junk trees and shrubs.
You let these grow and they will block the sun that is needed for plant life.
Now you got more fast growing maples than you ever had before.
Now tell me this?
How do you plan on getting rid of the over abundance and dominant species of maples if the deer herd is reduced so much that they can now be picky about what they eat because there is no competiton over the best browse?
The maples will continue to grow without any predation on that plant from the deer and the target species now is the hardwoods and the junk trees get to grow and choke out the rest of the forest floor.
I allready told douge that and he cant understand it.
I fully understand all of that Tony.One of the main reasons we have as much maple as we do is because we suppressed forest fires for much of the 20th century.Oak needs special treatments in order to get it to regenerate.You seem to have been in TL when the dog,I mean mountain lion tracks were discovered.If you live there,I can show you example of example of areas that have decent oak regeneration and show exactly why.I can also show you areas that failed to regenerate the oak and explain exactly why.Oak is just one component of the forest.In fact,oak isn't one of the primary components in the majority of forests in Pa.Presently only about 40% of our forests are oak/hickory.Many areas are northern hardwood stands and simply don't have oak.Trying to get oak to grow their would be a waste of time.
None of that changes the fact that the existing habitat can only support so mnay deer without further damage.One the habitat gets as poor as it is in many places,it takes far less deer to continue to have an impact on it.You seem to think that nothing will frow under a closed canopy.That simply isn't true.There are many species that do just fine under a closed canopy.It just so happens that oak isn't one of them.