tree protection

[martingarwood]

I am beginning to notice increasing amounts of deer browsing of young trees and coppiced hazel in my wood. I have seen both Roe and Fallow, the latter a more recent and more destructive discovery. I need to scale up my tree protection and am looking into buying mesh type tree protection on a (50m x 1.2) roll so Ican cut to suit different needs. Can anyone suggest where I might get the best price ? Many thanks....

[The Barrowers]

Can't suguest on cheepie price or where to buy

No expert but we have 1 by 1 surrouned our hazel stumps with plastic mesh and posts but up more than 1.2 metre, more like 1.6 metre as they love to stick their heads over and browse.

This years hazel saplings have grown fast and will need protection for 3 or 4 years. I have thought of HERAS fencing, the large metal fencing used on building sites/cheap / long lasting????

Theresa and Bernie

[Stephen1]

Protecting planted trees within woodland using mesh is usually more successful if you go wider rather than higher. However as long as you're trying to protect trees planted within woodland you could consider using the 6 foot (1.8m) tall tree planting tubes;

http://www.tubex.com/en/products/detail.asp?id=16

Do not use these if your trees are planted in the open - as they will not develop roots that will provide good support against the wind when their time being nursed is complete. (the architecture of tree roots develops in response to the swaying of the sapling in the wind - the 6foot tubes prevent the young tree moving sufficently in the wind to develop an appropriate root hold)

The long term problem though is that you can successfully protect your trees against deer but ultimately they will reach a size and stage when squirrels will be a problem - unless you're prepared to take sustained and intensive action. For reasons unkonwn and unexplained squirrels do seem to preferentially target planted trees. (hypotheses include different fungal associations on the roots of transplanted trees etc.)

Other things to think about when planting trees in woodland with deer problems are the relative palatability of trees and their differential abilities to recover from grazing.

For example Alder (which contrary to popular belief doesn't need wet conditions to grow you see it in wet places because in the wet it can outcompete other species)Alder is very unpalatable, and unless there is nothing else at all availsble to graze or browse alder is usually left untouched. Ash, Hazel and Oak are usually a favourite of deer and hard to protect, with beech and birch being somewhere inbetween.

Birch although often browsed by deer usually recovers better than other tree species- as long as the shade in which it's growing is not too dense. If you're planting in a shadier spot within your woodland then small leaved lime is very tolerant to being browsed and recovers very well even after sustained browsing year on year.

I would suggest getting some of the 6 foot tubes and including some alder in plantings within woodland - as long as the canopy isn't too dense.

The choice of species to plant in woodland is very complex. In my oppinion the NVC system usually used to choose what sort of trees are appropriate was developed by looking at woodland in britain - but in many ways ignores the impact of human management and use on the combinations of species present. The question of whether adding alder or small leaved lime into woodland is not a simple one - and to just quote that any given wood "should" be a particular kind of "standard" woodland and include only certain species is very involved and ultimately unresolved. Everything is changing climate change, diseases a massive increase in the number of deer. Woodland 'types', if they were ever anything other than a human construct, are certainly in a state of flux, and, I believe, should not be held as gospel.

Anyway I'm going off on a tangent!Ultimately your best bet will be to change your diet to one which is based on venison!

[Darren]

The one thing I've notice with Hazel in tubes is the caterpillars are protected from the birds.

[docsquid]

It isn't in any of the books but last year we used stock fencing. We had a lot of broken fencing to remove and replace. The barbed wire was not much use, but the stock fencing had some good bits among the broken bits. We cut this and made small fences around individual stools or groups of stools, allowing enough room for the stools to regrow, and banged them into the ground with steel stakes. OK, we had some to re-use, but it isn't too expensive, and this year we can remove it from the stools cut last year (some have already grown 7 to 8 feet) and use it again.

This has completely stopped muntjac damage (which has occurred in places we didn't put the stock fencing - odd trees that were cut for a variety of reasons out of the main coppice area).

We also put spiral guards on smaller stools and fresh trees planted to gap up to keep rabbits out. Unfortunately we secured these with bamboo canes. Something small that could get through stock fencing came along, lifted up the guards, and nibbled the canes, sometimes taking the trees as collateral. A visit from a FC officer told us that bank voles really like bamboo canes and it was probably their work.

So, you need something that will keep out the deer, but if you want to avoid bank vole damage, avoid bamboo canes too!

[martingarwood]

Its nature red in tooth and claw out there ! Voles, squirrels and deer !! What about them cuddly little creatures of the forest....!? More seriously, thank you for advice. I will give Alder a try although we are on highly acidic soil which i do not think it likes. I am trying to broaden out from sweet chestnut dominance by gradually killing off stools and replanting with hazel and oaks when the space is big enough, but I am realising that its like building a deer sweet shop. In the end I decided to get some tree protection on a roll from Acorn fencing so I can cut to my own requirements and move around over time. I am also beginning to plan for some culling at a point in the future. I went for a really useful half day session in the summer run by the Deer Initiative and the key message was culling as the only real answer to control deer numbers. But I am not at that point yet in terms of their impact on my wood and those around.

[Dave99]

We used scaffold debris netting round small coupes of Sweet Chestnut & Hazel, 50 M roll about 20 quid, poles from our own wood.......seems to keep deer out...........use wire or cable ties to fix net and it can be reused.

[Darren]

Will be using debris netting around the coppice this year as well with chicken wire around the bottom to keep rabbits out.

[Meadowcopse]

Farm Forestry at Bishops Castle in Shropshire have an interesting range of tree protection...

http://www.farmforestry.co.uk/

Regards,

Daniel

(Chester)