SUSTAINABLE FORESTRY
Hunters constantly ask me for advice on food plots, because they want to know which foods offer the best nutrition for whitetails. Although their motives are genuine, they usually fail to see the big picture. Why? Because few consider the importance of good forestry practices when it comes to deer management.
Natural habitat management might not be exciting, but it’s much more beneficial to whitetails than food plots and mineral supplements.
My introduction to the importance of natural habitat came long before I knew anything about food plots. In the late 1970s, I spent a day with legendary wildlife biologist Bill Severinghaus. I tagged along with him when he visited western New York to study the whitetail’s effect on habitat in traditional wintering areas.
At the time, I thought deer in that area never lacked nutrition. I was wrong. After a day of observing heavily browsed seedlings, Severinghaus concluded the habitat was in poor shape, and the herd’s health was at risk.
OUT OF SIGHT, OUT OF MIND
A deer manager once said, “As goes the forest, so goes the deer herd.” Unfortunately, many hunters fail to truly understand the link between forests and whitetails.
