Deer will eat beech and be happy and healthy at over 30 DPSM. The herd is being managed based on the regeneration of commercially vauable timber ,rather than on the carrying capacity of the habitat.

Wrong,beech is not a preferred food and deer don't generally touch ituntil they've cleaned up the rest of the preferred browse.

I didn't say it was a preferred browse species. I said deer will eat it and be healthy and happy at over 30 DPSM and that is a fact. Deer are like goats and will adapt to whatever food sources are available and beech provides more browse than any other tree that I am aware of.

OK then,we'll just let the deer eliminate all the other browseso they can be sustained like goats eating beech.Great management plan.That's pretty much what's happened in many parts of the northern tier.

I suppose that explains why there are thousands of acres of oak pole timber that is 20-60 years old all across the NC counties.

BTW, in 1983 the PGC said 72% of the clearcuts surveyed had adequate regeneration of commercially valuable species. So maybe that is the real answer.

That was then This is now.

Data from 1983 and prior is not relevant

20-60 years ago the deer population wasreasonable enough to allow oak regeneration

The data is certainly relevant if it shows we had better regeneration at much higher deer densites than we have now at much lower deer densities.

Thank you very much for showing everyone how little you know about the history of our herd. During the 70's the herd in the NC counties peaked at over 40 DPSM compared to 8-10 DPSM that we have today. Furthermore, in 1983 the herd in what is now 2G was around double what it is today and still they had 72% regeneration.

I have personally never seen a deer touch beech, and the benches of the ANF where i hunt are polluted with them. I don't know where you ever came up with that!
Maybe if they're starving they might, I dunno.

Maybe if you knew the whole story, your view would be relevant..and correct. The herd in the 70's lived in a regenerating forest derived from massive clearcutting decades before. There was simply no way they could eat all the regrowth, and the understory was healthy as well because of available sunlight.
Clearcutting is not happening now, and it seems it probably never will again. The forest has matured, and the understory has vanished. Any selective cutting that happens, does not provide the amounts of food that earlier logging methods produced. As soon as the regen starts, the deer move in and decimate it, leaving beech in their wake. The beech is left alone, all else is decimated. The beech then grows a canopy that chokes the sun from all else. You end up with a jungle of beech saplings and bare dirt under it. No wonder there. Just reality.

BTW...Oak is very dependant on soil chemistry. I know of huge expanses encompassing thousands of acres where you will not find one single Oak, of any size. They simply will not grow.

Kindly provide the links to back up your claims