Aldeer.com Forums Alabama Deer Talk Aldeer General Forum Post Timber Cutting - Spray or no?

I remember reading on here that the deer avoid areas like the plague after the timber company sprays.

The timber company is currently clear cutting my mature pines. The plan is to spray in the summer. Then burn next Jan, and replant.

I want to plant some egyptian wheat, sorghum, (something tall) late summer to provide some food & cover. Would you let them spray or tell them no? Not a lot of briars, or much else on the property. It was pretty open.

Hunting is a priority over pine tree farming.

There is a dirt county road ~200 yards from where this pic was taken.

One option is to just do nothing and let volunteer pines grow. Surprising how many pines will grow. As far as spraying and then burning, I have never noticed a decline in the deer but maybe for a short period of a few months. It usually is just a few months between spraying and burning, if that, and then deer will be back along with lots of other wildlife.

Are you interested in wildlife or timber? If It's wildlife I wanted to maximize I would let it grow and start burning off different areas on a 1 to 3 year rotation. I would spray out all Invasives and sod grasses. There is no need to plant cover, you'll have it.

By not spraying, you'll be leaving all the hardwood stump sprouts. They make excellent deer forage.

Impossible to answer without more information. Send me a PM.

If you don’t spray, your risk having a thick jungle of sweet gums and other unfavorable plants. If you spray, you get to decide what’s growing in there. The resprouts are great at first, but once they get bigger, they shade out all of the other food deer and wildlife look for.

I’ve seen people just burn and not spray and do fine. You need to burn at the right time though. I planted some two years ago without spraying and it’s doing fine, but it was majority hardwood.

Clear cutting pines stands like that doesn't leave the mess that a hardwood clear cut does. Not knowing the specifics of that site like size, terrain, surrounding landscape its hard to make a true recommendation. In a general sense, spraying late summer and burning in the winter will give you a better chance at creating a habitat long term that will benefit both deer and hunter.

Spray and just feed corn for the next season

Definitely have it sprayed. You won’t have a good outcome, if you don’t. If you’d like to talk more about it, send me a PM with your number and I’ll be happy to talk to you about it.

If it’s being cut right now, I wouldn’t plant this winter.

I am sure there are situations where not spraying will meet your goals. The majority of unsprayed tracts grow back in volunteer pines and sweetgum. The volunteer pines are too thick and typically choke each other out while significantly slowing growth.

Probably plant next year in Feb 2027, burn in Jan 2027.

Like Matt says, there's a lot more info that needs to be considered. However, I will tell you my experience from last year. Two years ago this April, 200 acres of our leased land was clearcut - it was mixed mature timber. The timber company didn't do anything that first year - and we had a LOT of deer traffic in the cut in that subsequent deer season. Last August, they came in and sprayed. Come fall deer obviously weren't in it like they'd been the previous year... but then they came in a week before gun season and burned it. The deer totally vanished - probably in part to the fact that most ground cover disappeared. Even on the edges of mature timber, we didn't have deer until late in the season. I'm sure the acorn crop had something to do with things, but it was terrible (picture Charles Barkley saying it). I'm just hoping the turkeys will use it this spring.

How many acres are you replanting??

Spray end of next summer and plant 2027 is a good plan. Skidder spraying might be a good option over aerial for your application.

If you spray get a firm contract with time limit of no later than August or September and be there when they spray. For that matter get an early last planting date and become their worst enemy if they don’t meet it. Dont listen to their bull chit like I did. The result was 40 acres of crap. By the time they sprayed it was so late there was not anything green left and blew smoke up my ass about “residual” blah blah. Frankly I am almost certain all they did was make a few passes with a skidder full of tap water. Never saw a sign of this so called residual and 1/3 of the cut is a complete mess of pine regen and I let it sit two years. If properly sprayed that regen should have been dead and not out competing the planted pine which is nowhere to be found in the existing mess. Other areas were 6’ tall in weeds the spring/summer after planting. They blew the last planting date by 6 weeks and later when I expressed concerns about all the dead pine seedlings I was seeing blew more smoke up my arse about “ planting shock”, blah blah, it will be fine. Well it was not. Probably because I got the dregs out of the warehouse that had been sitting drying up for 6-8 weeks. Called them using last year and asked them to come out a give me their opinion on this mess which they did not do. Might give them one more call and then get on the phone with the forestry commision. I worked in a state regulated profession from 34 years and if the Forestry Commision is anything like the Florida Appraisal Board I will make their life suck. If I had ever got referred for anything comparable to this I would have got bent over and done prison style by FREAB

Talk to Matt and N2Turkeys. However, keep in mind that if the site is clean and you plant next winter you can always do a release spray later if hardwood encroachment is too high.

You would need to wait a couple of years and spray late fall once the new growth has hardened off.

What part of the world you in?

[video:youtube]https://youtube.com/shorts/ruyVkON4ywg?si=56vdWi1yrkPBKyBf[/video]
We spray everything on our farm, but this is my personal property. I didn’t have 5000.00 laying around to spray this.
I sent my dad this comparison video back in January. Mine not sprayed vs Weyerhaeuser sprayed. Again, mine was mostly hardwood and very open, and volunteers were not as big of a problem here. Just an fyi. I didn’t burn either. I cleared, waiting till the next winter and planted excellent seedlings. I’ve done this enough that I know, with this much of a head start nothing will out compete these pines.

We lease from a big land-owning family. They cut and then plant the next January.
Said in their opinion the cost of prep isn't worth it

What county is the tract in?