News from the preserves, parks and backyards of Princeton, NJ. The website aims to acquaint Princetonians with our shared natural heritage and the benefits of restoring native diversity and beauty to the many preserved lands in and around Princeton.
Monday, October 20, 2014
Training Deer To Eat Invasives
I first noticed it on the Veblen House grounds, where some volunteers at a Rotary workday had cut down a multiflora rose bush that had long stood in a knotty tangle in the bed of iris in front of the house. The volunteers, Steve and Teresa, braved the thorns, cut the stems and dragged the giant weed over to a pile at the edge of the woods. The intelligent thing to do next in that situation would have been to treat the cut stems with a tiny squirt of 20% glyphosate that would then transfer into the roots and prevent any resprouting. I didn't, though, choosing not to wield chemicals during a workday. The intent was to follow up later, so the shrub wouldn't regrow.
Fortunately, no followup has been necessary. The shrub has not grown beyond the stubs. So what's going on? Two things are stunting the shrub. Some of the leaves are red--an indication that the rose is being attacked by rose rosette disease. But in addition, the deer are eating the fresh sprouts. Herein lies reason for hope. High deer numbers in combination with invasive species has long been spelling trouble for ecological balance. The deer are accustomed to eating native plants, which gives exotic plants a competitive advantage in forests and fields. Every land manager has dreamed of the day when deer would take a liking to exotic invaders and give the natives a break.
Nearby in Herrontown Woods, there's more good news to feed that dream--another invasive exotic, winged euonymus, that was cut down and hasn't regrown despite lack of treatment with herbicide. Its shoots, too, show signs of having been browsed repeatedly by deer.
So, here's a concept: By cutting invasive shrubs at a convenient height along pathways that deer frequent, we can tempt them with tender (re)sprouts of the invasive species they would ordinarily reject. Once accustomed to eating the tender sprouts, they might start eating the more mature vegetation. It would be a boon for the deer, since most woods are packed with invasive shrubs--a potential food supply that up to now has gone begging.
There may be an art to this, or at least some craftiness. Since deer are creatures of habit, it may mean learning their routes, cutting where they are most likely to pass by, at times of year when they are the hungriest. And might deer take a visual cue--if the resprouts are cut with clippers, might a deer see that as evidence of browsing by other deer, and conclude that it must be edible?
In any case, it's a way to entertain hope, and possibly enlist deer as partial allies.
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Hey Steve, I realize this post is way old, but did you track how the multi-flora rose and winged euonymous fared in the ensuing years?
ReplyDeleteThanks for taking me back ten years to this concept. I had forgotten the part about deer maybe interpreting a cut stem as a cue to chow down. If there are too few deer or too many cut/untreated invasives, then the invasives grow back. We had areas with many cut winged euonymus, and the deer just didn't keep up with all the regrowth. Now that we have the Buckthorn Blaster, it's super easy and super frugal and targeted to treat. It's still an interesting concept, perhaps to tempt deer along their accustomed routes with a few fresh sprouts of invasive species. We have a few little privet in an otherwise completely cleared area, and I see the deer browsing on them, for lack of anything else nearby.
DeleteSteve, I'm glad you are still monitoring this thread. The reason I ask is I've seen a similar phenomenon where I live in Stamford CT. We have a little bit of woods in the back yard where deer tend to congregate. There is a dense stand of Japanese knotweed down by a small stream. A few years ago, I started foraging the tips of the knotweed in the spring and noticed that the deer continued to browse the knotweed through the summer. Every time the knotweed would send out new shoots. The deer would browse the tips. At first they just browsed where I foraged, but in the past few years now they have expanded the browsed area and are actually beating back the knotweed. If you see any knotweed browsing in your area, I'd love to hear about it. Mark
ReplyDeleteThat's fabulous! Do you happen to have photos of the browsing, with or without the deer? I'd like to write about it. My email address is in the profile. A couple questions. If you're eating the foraged tips, are they proving tasty enough that you've been moved to eat more? And is there anything particular about the woods in your backyard that causes the deer to congregate there?
DeleteSteve: Yes, I have a few photos. I'll forward to your email and we can discuss a writeup.
ReplyDeleteThe foraged tips are much tastier than the full stalks. The full stalks are very sour, but the tips themselves are nice and mild. I like to sauté them in butter.
I think the reason the deer congregate in the back yard is that there is good cover for them (bamboo and knotweed), a spring-fed stream that never runs dry, and all those tasty suburban yards they have easy access too.
Sounds good. FYI: you may have noticed that there's a delay in publishing comments sent to this blog. I have to review all comments to weed out the spam.
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