RE: Its a great day in PA
 

I'm not sure what else of relevance may be gleaned from the remainder of the article, but what we had earlier was a great example of how the mindset and mission of the PGC has changed for the worse. They once had the outrageous idea that decent deer numbers (would 20-25 dpsm be too much to ask?)and healthy forests could be managed together. Of course today's biologists and foresters would certainly scoff at such nonsense. We all know deer are nothing more than varmints and the sooner we eradicate them the better. Who's in favor of an open season?

RE: Its a great day in PA
 

Did anyone mention that timber prices have dropped like a rock, or that a few of the timber cutters walked away from their PGC bids, because they'd lose money if they actually did their contracted SGL timbering?

RE: Its a great day in PA
 

Did anyone mention that almost half of SFL is off limits to logging no matter what the market may be?

RE: Its a great day in PA
 

First of all the article is over 25 years old and a lot has changed in that time. I have seen areas that still looked pretty good in the late 1980’s turn into wildlife deserts, due to excessive deer browsing, following the decline in antler less allocations and low harvests that prevailed in these same areas throughout the 1990’s.

Anyone who doesn’t realize that conditions changed over the past twenty-five years simply isn’t being observant, realistic or objective.

Bryce Hall, the author of that article, is still the Game Commission Forester for those same areas, but I assure you he has an entirely different message about the conditions of the clear-cuts, and the habitat in general,in the years since that article was written.

If you want to hear what he has to say about the habitat conditions of both the pastand today come to our next deer/habitat management tour to be held on May 31.

R.S. Bodenhorn

RE: Its a great day in PA
 

That is probably your most ignorant , arrogant and biased post you have made in quite awhile. All the areas that were successful regenerating clearcuts in the 80's are now pole timber stands with no under story and a carrying capacity of 5 DPSM.
That is simply the natural progression of forest development and it has nothing to do with the deer density in the area in question?

RE: Its a great day in PA
 

You really have no idea what you are talking about.

Ibet you haven'teven seen a foot of ground, or a stick of habitat, within Elk County in the past twenty five years, so how could you know what has been happening here during that time period.

I can show you hundreds of old clear-cuts that have almost no quality deer browse regenerated in them during the past twenty years, until just the past few years when deer numbers have been a lower number.

If you don’t know that a cut can be over browsed, and even to the point of failure, after five year, or even ten years, of successful regeneration you are only showing how little you know about the ability of deer to affect their habitat when they reach a state of over population.

The pole timber around this area are mostly the places that were clear-cut more then twenty years. That was back when all of the real factual evidence, such as buck harvests, indicate there were fewer deer in this area of the state then there were anytime between five to twenty year ago.Fifteen to twenty years of over population can result in serious damage to the habitat, including any clear-cuts.


R.S. Bodenhorn

RE: Its a great day in PA
 

I m amazed that anyone with the IQ above a stump would make that claim. Stump sprouts will exceed the reach of deer within a year or two. A clearcut that regenerates successfully will be successful after 10 or 20 years.

RE: Its a great day in PA
 

"You really have no idea what you are talking about. "

And of course, as ALWAYS, you know it all! LMAO!

Careful BB, Rsb will get one of his ruff tuff boyfriends to kick your butt ifn ya don't drink the koolaid!

RE: Its a great day in PA
 

Once again you obviously don’t know anything about this area. Stump sprouts here got chewed off to none existence every year until the stump simply died. They would send off stump sprouts year after year but after years of having no surviving sprouts more then inches tall and no leaves all summer they simply died after about seven to ten years of trying to survive and send up a sprout.

I can show you stumps like that, with chewed off stump spouts all day long even yet with the lower deer numbers we have today.

Pretty nearly any place that wasn’t fenced during that twenty year period, and longer in many areas, ended up with no surviving stump spouts. A few areas did have a few beech sprouts that made it though only because they were so poor in nutritional value the deer wouldn’t eat enough of it to eliminate them.

As I said, you are now only proving just how little you really know about how over populations of deer have affected their food supply and habitat n this part of the state.

Guys like you need to come to one of our tours so you can see all of those affects. We placed hundreds of small demonstration fences (a few square yards in size) just to show those very affects that you claim don’t happen. The deer and those small fences have proven you are wrong and simply don’t know what you are talking about.

R.S. Bodenhorn

RE: Its a great day in PA
 

If you knew anything about deer RSB you would know that sprouts are like candy to deer. They will eat everyone they find and know how to find them. Now is it because there is no other foods for them or is the reason is that they love sprouts so much they will pass up all other foods for them? Again you might also say what season your talking about all these sprouts are being eaten? Deer will take the easiest foods they find. If a sprout is hanging out from the snow of course it is going to be eaten and not only by deer either.