I have a few scattered mature buckthorn on my small property, but the new growth is now 4-6' tall. It opened up for several years, but now with the buckthorn coming in it is getting great again. "Make Open Hardwoods Great Again". Deer love eating it, and like you said, the leaves hang on late into the season. Another bonus is that if a mature buckthorn dies morel mushrooms will grow under it if conditions are right. 👍
Great video. Exact tactic I've been running since 2018. Find a thicket in an oak flat in the middle of October and you'll kill any buck in the area. Last 5 years I've killed a 143, 153, 145, and 200" buck. 90% of my sits are 8-12' off the ground. Sometimes higher if I'm hunting a hillside.
I moved. Started hunting a very small ravenous property, it had what I know now is buckthorn. I had no idea what it was but noticed all the points of what you’re saying in this video. It certainly is super thick, and it can be VERY difficult to get through younger stages of it on the edges of good more open stuff. By More open I mean I can walk normally-ish. It served me well my first season I killed 2 big ones one from the ground one from a tree in it.
Appreciate the knowledge Dan. I don’t have much buckthorn in my area but this video opened my eyes to how to attack the thick laurel my area is covered in. The deer don’t leave it in daylight
I’m glad to see this video,I got a state park I hunt with big bucks in it and it’s loaded with buckthorn, they also love the blueberries off them in November on into the winter. I shake the trees and set my cameras on them, there like the apple trees in winter that little berry is magical in winter.
Love your videos brotherman...Blue collar, average Joe kinda guy, helping hunters by sharing what you have learned over the years...Hunting and scoring on public land with the tips and stratagies your sharing and showing on video has helped countless...l love hearing "looks like i got me another one" its hard earned and well deserved...Keep layin em down n stay safe brotherman...
I always seem to be hard press between my two favorite hunting locations one being buckthorn patches and the other being raspberry patches all of them seem to be found after select harvest cut in the forest give that a few years
Great video Dan. Very useful info as more and more places start to get invaded. There's always been a bunch of buckthorn in some of city herd reduction hunts I've done. You can cut buckthorn for shooting lanes, and very commonly after a substantial trimming, deer would come in and browse the clippings within hours or the next day.
When I saw the subtitles, my heart dropped...s.o.a.b. there goes the honey hole. Buckthorn from the ground, up close and personal. Can't beat the rush!
I don't think we have the buckthorn, where I am at. But if you got it, can't be too far away. As for that bicycle tab, that's mine. That's the exact area I took my sixth wife, on a biking date. She was pretty active. As you can tell by her knocking my sticker off. Just thought I'd let you know😊
1985, next year will be our 40 year . Crazy to think about. Didn’t realize they liked it for food. We don’t have much of it if any that I’ve ever seen. Northern Michigan
Love the content, tips and strategies. I have noticed you keep talking about saddles. I promise you anywhere you put a lock-on....I can put a saddle. I've even put my platform on the front of the tree and stood on it like a lock-on when branches have prevented me from hunting on the back side. I guess you would have to show me what you talking about. From the set ups I've seen you talking about....I could totally hunt out of a saddle
@thehuntingbeast yes, and if my platform doesn't work out I also carry a ring of steps. I've been hunting with a saddle for 4 years now. This will be my 5th. I hunt Michigan, Missouri, Kentucky and Tennessee. I can only think of 2 times I had to set up on the front of the tree. Never and I mean never have I thought once about packing in a lock-on since I started saddle hunting.
@thehuntingbeast so picture this, your set up in a saddle behind the tree. Your expecting deer to come from in front of you or left or right. Say a deer comes in from over your left or right shoulder. You pivot and shoot. It's the exact same if your on the front of the tree except I'm facing sideways in the direction I most likely think the deer are coming. The guys you saddle hunt with can't make those kind of shots?
I have hunted with guys who own saddle platform companies and they cant do it... a lot of it is buckthorn trees which has a wall of close branches so its like hunting in a cluster of trees to thick to shoot thru or around. Limbs so thick you cant even stand in some and the ones you can stand in you are locked tight ti the tree... I can think of 3 trees I hunted out of in the last few years that the top was broke off and you could not teather above your waste. Hiw about cedar bushes? what about the situations where I strap three or four buckthorn together to have a strong enough structure to get the stand in? i think you just dont hunt the type of terrain and trees I hunt, I get that, thats why I have the success i do...
@thehuntingbeast it could be the difference in terrain. I have also strapped trees together and tied branches back (seen on RUclips) lol. I myself have not seen a situation where a lock-on could go but a saddle couldn't. Love the beast style of hunting!
In my experience the same concept works well in the south west mesquite bosques. Short gnarly hardwoods that can produce good feed. I see very few hunt this way out here.
It's funny you say deer love the leaves. Google says deer avoid buckthorn. I've witnessed them last 3 years, ( doe/fawn groups, basket rack bucks) eating the buckthorn outside our foodplots. Plots have recently been put in, buckthorn took over excess sunlight where we made out plot edge and must be out competing any native early succenntial growth? Get excited for every video because you always teach me something new, and sure glad I did your workshop this spring.
Unfortunately we have glossy leaf buckthorn. You cut it and it comes back twice as thick. They will eat the tips ,only after the regrowth is about 3ft tall.
On buckthorn and browse preference, deer do not prefer buckthorn and you want basically any other shrub if you have the choice. The reason you have observed deer walking through clover to eat buckthorn is that deer are browsers, they balance out their diet to keep their gut microbes happy, every ruminant does this to some extent. Buckthorn rates down their with ironwood and beech as bottom of the barrel browse quality. As to hunting in buckthorn it's security cover and its hard to walk though and in alot of southern wi where there is no pulp market and high herd numbers its the only security cover available. Where I am in NE WI the same dynamics play out in glossy buckthorn thickets by the bay and aspen and red maple coppice cuts and if you go down south the same concepts work in pine thickets after cutovers. Deer are keying on the structure, not the plant.
Interesting, but I can say that I see deer feed on it a lot. To the point that in areas with few buckthorn the leaves are often eaten off as high as I can reach. I appreciate your input and would like to find more info on this. As far as the food plot scenario, it was on a regular basis over several years not just once. They ate the clover, but more often they went to the buckthorn trees 1st or spent more time there. and usually not within the cover, but eating smaller tree leaves in the open woods.
@@thehuntingbeast from USDA Plants database; IMPORTANCE TO WILDLIFE AND LIVESTOCK: Common buckthorn is not a preferred browse species for wildlife and livestock, partly because of its spine-tipped branches [175], but it may be heavily browsed in some plant communities (e.g., [236]). Obvious avoidance of common buckthorn by native wildlife was noted at Sutherland Beach in Saskatoon. Although common buckthorn stems greatly outnumbered native stems, they remained untouched while 32 chokecherry stems and 2 Saskatoon serviceberry stems had been girdled over the winter [45]. Mammals: Food: Common buckthorn does not appear to be a major food source for mammalian herbivores [116], but it may be used in some plant communities. Common buckthorn was not used by white-tailed deer in a deer yard in southwestern Quebec from 1985 to 1986, when several other deciduous hardwood shrubs were available for browse [28]. Common buckthorn occurred in browsed, but not in fenced areas in Sharon Woods Metro Park, Ohio [8]. However, observations in Wisconsin suggest that white-tailed deer, and probably cattle, preferred common buckthorn over eastern redcedar [236] (see Old-field succession for details). A review by Knight and others [116] notes cases where common buckthorn saplings were avoided by eastern cottontail and American beavers. On a 3-acre (1.2 ha) site in western Massachusetts, common buckthorn received only a trace amount of feeding injury from eastern cottontail during the winter of 1947 to 1948 [211]. Common buckthorn seedlings were damaged or killed by unknown herbivores in old fields in New York [65] and by spring browsing by rabbits in England; few common buckthorn individuals were damaged in summer and fall [79]. Mice and other rodents may consume common buckthorn seeds in some locations (see Seed predation). Cover: Common buckthorn thickets in wetlands at the University of Wisconsin Arboretum appear to be favored places for white-tailed deer [74]. Apparently, buckthorn thickets are favored places for deer herding in Europe, too. It is thought that the name buckthorn may have arisen in Europe, where it provides shelter for the male deer or bucks (USDA Forest Service 1937 as cited by [74]).
@@thehuntingbeast browse preferences can be very local and seasonal and most of our observational data is coming during October and November. Right now oak maple ash seedlings are germinated and available, dogwood is regrown and there is just a ton of browse available. I would not expect buckthorn to be being browsed at all right now, but by Nov when all those other higher preference sources are exhausted buckthorn might be the only thing left in the kitchen as far as browse goes. It's counterintuitive but the more deer hate something the more they have to eat it because over generations of deer and shrubs they shifted the plant communities composition towards the species they hate. I've been on property in Shawano Co with hedged ironwood under sugar maple and I've been on property in Brown Co where the landowner had issues with concolor fir and Norway Spruce browse just because of the lack of winter food sources. The dairies like to do fall tillage on the heavy clay so there isn't much for ag available late in the year for the critters. Deer are absolutely going to be eating buckthorn in that setting. I thought that the last comment about the name on the big quote I posted was interesting. European estates do a lot of drive hunting with beaters moving game. It makes sense that roe bucks would be hiding out in dense security cover to avoid that style pressure. Pretty similar to the public we hunt.
@@danhoff4401 They for sure are not eating the buds or stems much if at all, its just the leaves... But its a pretty heavy rate here where im at. and stays a browse longer than other plants cause it keeps its green leaves much longer than most native plants.... Local? maybe, can't say I have really looked much outside of S/E Wisconsin, but if they like it here its hard to believe thats not happening in other locality's.
@@thehuntingbeast yeah we should expect the same thing in other places with dominant buckthorn communities right? I think they are eating it because it's the only halfway decent browse available though not necessarily because they like it. And that's really important info if you are hunting where buckthorn isn't dominant.
Great video, but some things you have to keep secret. I struggle finding actual buck sign in buckthorn. No need for cameras, tracks tell the story! Shot 2 bucks and a doe, all under 10 yards, never saw another hunter all year.
In some cases the platform works great, but in a lot if the scenarios you cant even stand up and have to be in a sitting position. To each there own, my point was to not limit yourself to less opertunity with your choice of equipment.
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I really admire how you've remained humble and authentic no matter how much you've achieved. You're the man!
Huh?
Take a look at the price point of his stand and sticks 😂
@@roosterdope6778 I honestly think I got what I paid for.
Appreciate everything you do for the hunting community, your videos and knowledge as helped me a bunch
I have a few scattered mature buckthorn on my small property, but the new growth is now 4-6' tall. It opened up for several years, but now with the buckthorn coming in it is getting great again. "Make Open Hardwoods Great Again". Deer love eating it, and like you said, the leaves hang on late into the season. Another bonus is that if a mature buckthorn dies morel mushrooms will grow under it if conditions are right. 👍
I think we are ready for bucks. Turkeys are fun it’s cool. But it’s about time to get the cams out and get this deer season started
Man havnt watched many videos since hunting season..hearing your voice has me fiening for hunting season bad
Dam you're old 1985...wait crap so am i 😅 1985 for me also.
Me too...😆 It was so awesome.
Awesome video, thanks
Great video. Exact tactic I've been running since 2018. Find a thicket in an oak flat in the middle of October and you'll kill any buck in the area. Last 5 years I've killed a 143, 153, 145, and 200" buck.
90% of my sits are 8-12' off the ground. Sometimes higher if I'm hunting a hillside.
I’ve got a patch of it near me. Last summer 17 bucks ranging from 10 pt to fork horn would exit buckthorn to hit nearby bean field. They love it.
Great video dan. thank you for your wisdom
I moved. Started hunting a very small ravenous property, it had what I know now is buckthorn. I had no idea what it was but noticed all the points of what you’re saying in this video. It certainly is super thick, and it can be VERY difficult to get through younger stages of it on the edges of good more open stuff. By More open I mean I can walk normally-ish. It served me well my first season I killed 2 big ones one from the ground one from a tree in it.
Ever watch those MSU Deer lab studies? They also say deer prefer the bottomland hardwoods over any other type of habitat
Appreciate the knowledge Dan. I don’t have much buckthorn in my area but this video opened my eyes to how to attack the thick laurel my area is covered in. The deer don’t leave it in daylight
I’m glad to see this video,I got a state park I hunt with big bucks in it and it’s loaded with buckthorn, they also love the blueberries off them in November on into the winter. I shake the trees and set my cameras on them, there like the apple trees in winter that little berry is magical in winter.
I've always wondered if there was such thing as too thick. Great info as always, Dan.
Love your videos brotherman...Blue collar, average Joe kinda guy, helping hunters by sharing what you have learned over the years...Hunting and scoring on public land with the tips and stratagies your sharing and showing on video has helped countless...l love hearing "looks like i got me another one" its hard earned and well deserved...Keep layin em down n stay safe brotherman...
love the dan rub at the end. "keep it weird"
I always seem to be hard press between my two favorite hunting locations one being buckthorn patches and the other being raspberry patches all of them seem to be found after select harvest cut in the forest give that a few years
Great video Dan. Very useful info as more and more places start to get invaded. There's always been a bunch of buckthorn in some of city herd reduction hunts I've done. You can cut buckthorn for shooting lanes, and very commonly after a substantial trimming, deer would come in and browse the clippings within hours or the next day.
The end of the video is the best!
Your too nice. Have a feeling I'm going to see or hear more hunters in my favorite spots. Lol Getting hard to have secret sauce. Don't believe Dan LOL
When I saw the subtitles, my heart dropped...s.o.a.b. there goes the honey hole. Buckthorn from the ground, up close and personal. Can't beat the rush!
I don't think we have the buckthorn, where I am at. But if you got it, can't be too far away.
As for that bicycle tab, that's mine. That's the exact area I took my sixth wife, on a biking date. She was pretty active. As you can tell by her knocking my sticker off. Just thought I'd let you know😊
1985, next year will be our 40 year . Crazy to think about. Didn’t realize they liked it for food. We don’t have much of it if any that I’ve ever seen. Northern Michigan
Nasty buck thorn added to my search
Great video
Love the content, tips and strategies. I have noticed you keep talking about saddles. I promise you anywhere you put a lock-on....I can put a saddle. I've even put my platform on the front of the tree and stood on it like a lock-on when branches have prevented me from hunting on the back side. I guess you would have to show me what you talking about. From the set ups I've seen you talking about....I could totally hunt out of a saddle
So, you can face forward and sit down under over head limbs? I hunt with a lot of saddle guys and none of them can do that?
@thehuntingbeast yes, and if my platform doesn't work out I also carry a ring of steps. I've been hunting with a saddle for 4 years now. This will be my 5th. I hunt Michigan, Missouri, Kentucky and Tennessee. I can only think of 2 times I had to set up on the front of the tree. Never and I mean never have I thought once about packing in a lock-on since I started saddle hunting.
@thehuntingbeast so picture this, your set up in a saddle behind the tree. Your expecting deer to come from in front of you or left or right. Say a deer comes in from over your left or right shoulder. You pivot and shoot. It's the exact same if your on the front of the tree except I'm facing sideways in the direction I most likely think the deer are coming. The guys you saddle hunt with can't make those kind of shots?
I have hunted with guys who own saddle platform companies and they cant do it... a lot of it is buckthorn trees which has a wall of close branches so its like hunting in a cluster of trees to thick to shoot thru or around. Limbs so thick you cant even stand in some and the ones you can stand in you are locked tight ti the tree... I can think of 3 trees I hunted out of in the last few years that the top was broke off and you could not teather above your waste. Hiw about cedar bushes? what about the situations where I strap three or four buckthorn together to have a strong enough structure to get the stand in? i think you just dont hunt the type of terrain and trees I hunt, I get that, thats why I have the success i do...
@thehuntingbeast it could be the difference in terrain. I have also strapped trees together and tied branches back (seen on RUclips) lol. I myself have not seen a situation where a lock-on could go but a saddle couldn't. Love the beast style of hunting!
10-13 feet up is a magical height. For some reason the deer look straight through you . I been picked off more at 15 and up.
In my experience the same concept works well in the south west mesquite bosques. Short gnarly hardwoods that can produce good feed. I see very few hunt this way out here.
It's funny you say deer love the leaves. Google says deer avoid buckthorn. I've witnessed them last 3 years, ( doe/fawn groups, basket rack bucks) eating the buckthorn outside our foodplots. Plots have recently been put in, buckthorn took over excess sunlight where we made out plot edge and must be out competing any native early succenntial growth? Get excited for every video because you always teach me something new, and sure glad I did your workshop this spring.
Never knew in my 60 years did I know deer love thickets. Hmm
They "like" thickets... They "love" buckthorn
Unfortunately we have glossy leaf buckthorn. You cut it and it comes back twice as thick. They will eat the tips ,only after the regrowth is about 3ft tall.
Long day, relax and enjoy
❤❤
On buckthorn and browse preference, deer do not prefer buckthorn and you want basically any other shrub if you have the choice.
The reason you have observed deer walking through clover to eat buckthorn is that deer are browsers, they balance out their diet to keep their gut microbes happy, every ruminant does this to some extent. Buckthorn rates down their with ironwood and beech as bottom of the barrel browse quality.
As to hunting in buckthorn it's security cover and its hard to walk though and in alot of southern wi where there is no pulp market and high herd numbers its the only security cover available.
Where I am in NE WI the same dynamics play out in glossy buckthorn thickets by the bay and aspen and red maple coppice cuts and if you go down south the same concepts work in pine thickets after cutovers.
Deer are keying on the structure, not the plant.
Interesting, but I can say that I see deer feed on it a lot. To the point that in areas with few buckthorn the leaves are often eaten off as high as I can reach. I appreciate your input and would like to find more info on this. As far as the food plot scenario, it was on a regular basis over several years not just once. They ate the clover, but more often they went to the buckthorn trees 1st or spent more time there. and usually not within the cover, but eating smaller tree leaves in the open woods.
@@thehuntingbeast from USDA Plants database;
IMPORTANCE TO WILDLIFE AND LIVESTOCK:
Common buckthorn is not a preferred browse species for wildlife and livestock, partly because of its spine-tipped branches [175], but it may be heavily browsed in some plant communities (e.g., [236]). Obvious avoidance of common buckthorn by native wildlife was noted at Sutherland Beach in Saskatoon. Although common buckthorn stems greatly outnumbered native stems, they remained untouched while 32 chokecherry stems and 2 Saskatoon serviceberry stems had been girdled over the winter [45].
Mammals:
Food: Common buckthorn does not appear to be a major food source for mammalian herbivores [116], but it may be used in some plant communities. Common buckthorn was not used by white-tailed deer in a deer yard in southwestern Quebec from 1985 to 1986, when several other deciduous hardwood shrubs were available for browse [28]. Common buckthorn occurred in browsed, but not in fenced areas in Sharon Woods Metro Park, Ohio [8]. However, observations in Wisconsin suggest that white-tailed deer, and probably cattle, preferred common buckthorn over eastern redcedar [236] (see Old-field succession for details).
A review by Knight and others [116] notes cases where common buckthorn saplings were avoided by eastern cottontail and American beavers. On a 3-acre (1.2 ha) site in western Massachusetts, common buckthorn received only a trace amount of feeding injury from eastern cottontail during the winter of 1947 to 1948 [211]. Common buckthorn seedlings were damaged or killed by unknown herbivores in old fields in New York [65] and by spring browsing by rabbits in England; few common buckthorn individuals were damaged in summer and fall [79]. Mice and other rodents may consume common buckthorn seeds in some locations (see Seed predation).
Cover: Common buckthorn thickets in wetlands at the University of Wisconsin Arboretum appear to be favored places for white-tailed deer [74]. Apparently, buckthorn thickets are favored places for deer herding in Europe, too. It is thought that the name buckthorn may have arisen in Europe, where it provides shelter for the male deer or bucks (USDA Forest Service 1937 as cited by [74]).
@@thehuntingbeast browse preferences can be very local and seasonal and most of our observational data is coming during October and November. Right now oak maple ash seedlings are germinated and available, dogwood is regrown and there is just a ton of browse available. I would not expect buckthorn to be being browsed at all right now, but by Nov when all those other higher preference sources are exhausted buckthorn might be the only thing left in the kitchen as far as browse goes.
It's counterintuitive but the more deer hate something the more they have to eat it because over generations of deer and shrubs they shifted the plant communities composition towards the species they hate.
I've been on property in Shawano Co with hedged ironwood under sugar maple and I've been on property in Brown Co where the landowner had issues with concolor fir and Norway Spruce browse just because of the lack of winter food sources. The dairies like to do fall tillage on the heavy clay so there isn't much for ag available late in the year for the critters. Deer are absolutely going to be eating buckthorn in that setting.
I thought that the last comment about the name on the big quote I posted was interesting. European estates do a lot of drive hunting with beaters moving game. It makes sense that roe bucks would be hiding out in dense security cover to avoid that style pressure. Pretty similar to the public we hunt.
@@danhoff4401 They for sure are not eating the buds or stems much if at all, its just the leaves... But its a pretty heavy rate here where im at. and stays a browse longer than other plants cause it keeps its green leaves much longer than most native plants.... Local? maybe, can't say I have really looked much outside of S/E Wisconsin, but if they like it here its hard to believe thats not happening in other locality's.
@@thehuntingbeast yeah we should expect the same thing in other places with dominant buckthorn communities right?
I think they are eating it because it's the only halfway decent browse available though not necessarily because they like it. And that's really important info if you are hunting where buckthorn isn't dominant.
Great video, but some things you have to keep secret. I struggle finding actual buck sign in buckthorn. No need for cameras, tracks tell the story! Shot 2 bucks and a doe, all under 10 yards, never saw another hunter all year.
How is a platform differnet from a stand it just doesnt have a seat
In some cases the platform works great, but in a lot if the scenarios you cant even stand up and have to be in a sitting position. To each there own, my point was to not limit yourself to less opertunity with your choice of equipment.
@@thehuntingbeast totally get it I've never even been around a platform that's y I asked I didn't know if they were like twice the size or something
@@thehuntingbeast you sir are awesome
Do you know if buck thorn grows in Michigan?
Im sure it does...
Be thankful if you don't have it. It's an invasive species and as Dan mentioned, chokes out the native trees. You don't want it on your property.
Hey Dan you doing your podcast tomorrow 🤔
Yep
Dan how was your access in relation to the first buck you shot? Was there anything other than the set up that would keep other hunters out?
I think its mainly the fact its hard to navigate and very hard to set up in.
Where did you get your T-shirt? I what one.
I picked that up from a vendor at a craft show...
How the hell are you allowing Tammy Baldwin ads on your channel???? lol
Not up to me...
@@thehuntingbeast I know. I thought you would find it funny.
lol