Briars vs deer

People have told me deer like briars. I was also a bit skeptical, but this year the deer are hammering the briars in my woods. I still don't like briars, but it's nice to know/see the deer seem to be enjoying them. If only deer enjoyed buckthorn.

I know my goats like them.

Poison Ivy also

A couple days ago after 3 inches of rain, I was walking down to a low field of beans to see if the water had got on them. I wasn't
50 yds from the house when I walked out past an edge of brush and saw a doe standing there picking blackberries. I watched her for a bit, then said "what are you doing ". She was so scared she almost ran into my house. I suspect they also pick the tender new growth off the briars.
I've witnessed coyotes standing on their back legs picking black berries many times.

Deer also are feeding on waterhemp (just the tender tops). Waterhemp is almost impossible to kill in beans except for Liberty. So I don't know if deer are helping to control it but they are for sure making it lower down and bushier.

One of the highest nutrional value next to honey suckle a deer can eat.

That is usually the last thing in winter, they eat here.

MFR and blackberries both provide food and cover for deer.

MFR and Autumn Olive do here in a lot of places.......jk

Deer can live anywhere but I think they are like big rabbits, prefer heavy cover mfr and jager patches like rabbits.

Whitetails are by nature browsers, so most woody material that is young and tender is preferred food. Their evolution for northern deer has given them a gut and digestive system that slows down and allows more passage time for fiber type foods. They also have the ability to put on a lot of body fat with high quality forage type feeds and don't need grain to do that however grain is available and is a very dense energy source.

Bryce

Deer do nibble buckthorn. Usually its the smaller ones, 1 foot to two ft tall. But don't count on deer keeping buckthorn at bay.

They also eat various berry plants. They eat the tops off my raspberries and the blackberries that are everywhere in the woods too. They eat the young new growth.

Again, they don't really damage them enough to make a dent in anything.

Now young oaks trees, they eventually will kill them thru their constant pruning them to the ground.

You'd think those briars would be tough for them, but they are eating the leaf primarily, not the vine.

They eat the leaves and new growth of raspberries and blackberries around here. Some mf rose too

Shoot, the deer have decimated my potato vines this year. Plenty of other stuff for them to eat.

Here in MD, I see them eating greenbriar leaves and vines mainly in the late winter as well. They also use the low patches of greenbriar as winter ground cover to lay up when all of the regular foliage is gone. Hunting very late season (ours goes into January), honeysuckle or greenbriar patches are a pretty good bet to find deer feeding or bedded.

Awesome.

I seen deer eating wild rise. Dunking for it