Planting Sumac from seed - help?
 

I think its called staghorn sumac, it makes the red seed pods.

This stuff seems to grow wereever you don't want it, or on the sides of roads. The last couple years I picked pails fulls of pods, and scattered the seeds in a couple hedgerows hoping to "thicken" them up, but cannot seem to get the seeds to germinate.

Does anyone know if the seeds most be scarified, or pass through the gut of a bird or other animal, to germinate? I can get all the seeds I want, and would like to use Sumac, because it grows fast, and offers some cover, we are lacking in places.

Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks

RE: Planting Sumac from seed - help?
 

farm hunter; I get my best sumac growth in my grape rows. The birds eat the seeds, sit on the grape wires and voila, weedy little sumacs grow where I don't want them. I don't know for certain but they probably need hydrochloric acid treatment.

Dan O.

RE: Planting Sumac from seed - help?
 

Thanks Dan, I suspect the same - I'll do a little research on the
treatment, and give it a try in my basement for a test this winter, before I waste a lot of time on a batch.

RE: Planting Sumac from seed - help?
 

Why sumac? Do the deer eat it? It has good color in the fall, indians used it as a natural red dye, buy thats about it. Once the sumac matures, it shades the undergrowth so nothing grows there.

Poplar, aspen, or dogwood thickets grow fast, and deer will browse on them. Highbush Cranberry thicket will provide food and cover for deer. and berries for birds, plus bloom in the late spring.

RE: Planting Sumac from seed - help?
 

Good Question 1sagittarius - But I have an answer.

Deer do eat on the seed pods in the winter, especailly in heavy snow. I wouldn't consider it a great food source though. As far as I've seen, they rarely browse the branches.

But the reason I want it in a hedgerow setting, is to widen the hedgerow from 15 ft wide to like 40 ft wide. The hedgerow I have in mind splits two good sized fields, and connects two bedding areas. Sumac, when it grows in clumps offers an excellent canopy overhead, that will rarely exceed 20 ft tall. Yet deer can easily travel between the trunks of the trees.

Finally, in good deer country, rarely will you find a clump of sumacs without a multitude of rubs. I think the deer really like to rub sumac because of its fragrance, sap, and size. Kind of like balsam fir.

We already have a ton of aspens, and I realize I could plant widely spaced pines or spruce with a similar result. I may end up going with a conifer, in the end, I just thought that if sumac would establish, Its a 3-4 year proposition, rather than a 8-12 year one.

Thanks for asking.

RE: Planting Sumac from seed - help?
 

Farm Hunter; on my property up north the deer love the sumacs for bedding. I don't know if it's the visibility they get when they're under them but they use them in the spring through summer.

Dan O.

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RE: Planting Sumac from seed - help?
 

Thanks For the information Brian - I truly appreciate it.

- I'll let you all know if I have good reluts.

RE: Planting Sumac from seed - help?
 

Yes they do eat the stalks, primarily the tips which happen to be an excellent source of food for them, probably not very tasty as they wait until there isn't much else. But they are good deer food. the trick is to thin the more mature ones out so smaller ones will start, these seem to be the ones they work on the most. And once you get them started they will propogate through their root systems, so brush hogging the bigger stands shouldn't kill them out.