Aldeer.com Forums Alabama Deer Talk Quality Deer Management Let's take a walk around the farm...

I bought mine from Nativ Nurseries when they were having a sale on them, but if I had to do it again I would buy 5ft tubes, especially on any fruit trees. The deer hammer my fruit trees as soon as they come out of a 4ft tube and it slows them down. 5ft would help a lot with that. They don't bother the oaks as bad, but bucks will come by and break the tops off if they can reach it.

Even better would be 5ft cages and I have started transitioning by bushier trees over to cages. Cages are more expensive than tubes, but they last forever and can be reused indefinitely if you have future plantings.

I second this, my crab apples and chickasaw plums get destroyed as soon as they get out of the tube. I have the 4ft ones from Nativ Nurseries as well

Double creek or anyone else, I just order some oak trees from Nativ, white oak and chestnut, what should be the spacing?

I did mine on 40ft spacing for the large oaks and 30ft on the chestnuts/sawtooths. In hindsight, I would do 40ft on the chestnuts and sawtooths as well. I have been very pleased with the quality from Nativ and their rapid mast system instead of bare root.

I do 40 on oaks and similar canopy trees. 20ft on plums and more shrub like trees.

Thanks!

The more space the better......I think I'd do 100-150 ft if I had to do it over again......The best producing trees are the ones that are allowed to grow big full rounded crowns

Nothing wrong with that approach either as 40 ft could definitely be too tight for mature oaks. I figured when I get to that point, I could terminate the weaker trees. Also figured I’d lose some a long the way.

This is a mature Shumard Oak that's been grown in the open and has a fully formed crown.....It produced an unreal amount of acorns last year......The diameter of the crown is roughly 60 ft across......

Thanks CNC, that's a nice tree!

Keep in mind if we took this exact tree and duplicated it……a 60ft spacing would have the tips of the limbs touching one another…….which would be shading out lower limbs……In order to grow a fully formed tree like this you would have to get out there in the 100-150 range I would think……However far it takes so that you get enough sunlight to the lower limbs that they don’t prune off due to shade.....The closer you put them together the more lower limbs you're gonna lose......and once they're gone, they're pretty much gone even if you do cut down the one next to it

It's definitely an issue. Soccer field down the street planted a bunch of oaks about 10-15 years ago on roughly a 40 ft spacing. They are starting to crowd each other out. I figure at $5 a piece from Nativ Nurseries, I'll just deal with thinning them down the road when necessary. I also don't underestimate the probability of a hurricane or tropical storm doing some of the thinning for me.

Heck, I am worried the lack of rain is going to thin mine out! CNC makes some good points. I would consider at least 60-80ft spacing after reading what CNC wrote

No doubt! There will definitely be some mortality this summer on my place.

A couple more things to consider too would be if you were just planning on planting one row or if you plan on making it more like an orchard……Once you start adding a second and third row then the shade becomes more all encompassing from every side…….Also if you want there to be any kind of ground vegetation at all in an orchard style planting then you’re gonna have to leave gaps beyond just tree spacing to allow that to happen……I know wider spacing probably isnt the best for tree sales but from the landowners perspective I’d have to go with fewer trees that produce the same amount of acorns in one tree as a narrower spacing would produce with 4 or 5 trees……Its less to take care of and produces an overall prettier tree…..To each his own though……If there is any consideration toward possibly selling these trees at some point in the future then a narrower spacing would produce a cleaner first log…..but I doubt that is something many are gonna do with specially planted mast producers like we’re talking about

I thought this was a cool pic. Deer working on the vetch and the cattle egrets in there with them. I guess they are following the deer around and grabbing the bugs that are stirred up? First time I've had a pic of that.

Thanks for starting this thread. It's got me interested in trying vetch on my place next summer. I may have overlooked it, but what seed rate did you use for the broadcasting method? Did you broadcast into tilled soil or or go the throw and mow route?

I ran a drag with tines down over my clover plots to scratch the surface and spread 50lbs over 2 acres. I got very good germination but I also had 20 inches of rain in the 6-8 weeks after spreading, so I’m sure that helped. I’m going on 6 weeks without a decent rain so I’m anxious to see how it’s doing now. Hoping to go check it out this weekend. It’s a small seed, so whatever works for clover should work ok for vetch.

I appreciate the info. I watched some videos regarding planted it
and they all drilled it in. I don't have the budget for that.
Good luck, hope you get some rain!

I have been listening to some land and legacy podcasts that feature Alan Summerford from Alabama, and he seems pretty fond of joint vetch for a summer forage. I am like you, this thread has me very interested in it.