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Thursday 03/17/05 The St. Patty's deer yard check.
Old man winter has tested me this year and today even
forced me to strap on my snowshoes to do a winter deer
yard check. I usually wait until near the end of winter
as it is the accumulation of winter deer yard use that
is of most value when we submit reports to our deer
biologist Kent Gustafson.
I spent the morning at HQ in Concord but managed to have
some spare time by mid afternoon to strap on the shoes
for about an hour and a half cruise of a local deer yard
I have intermittently checked for close to two decades.
In fact part of the yard is on a town's conservation
land that I helped finagle during the LCIP state funded
land protection in the early 90's.
Since then over a dozen houses have built-out the
proposed development that enabled the conservation deal.
I started into the woods with my snowshoes in hand, but
didn't get very far before donning them. Deer had
ventured right up to the houses from the 10 acre or so
hemlock stand I was entering. Any stand of hemlocks with
overhead branches touching is typically a deer yard in
this part of the state. This one pitches down a slope
from the development to a lovely deeply shaded brook.
I only found 5 deer beds and my hour and a half
wandering suggested that was all the deer wintering
there right now. This is less than half the number I
found here a decade ago or so. Until the last couple of
significant snow storms I don't think the deer were
yarded at all in this part of New Hampshire. There were
only a couple of "deer trails" through the thickest of
the hemocks.
The deer had only lightly barked the hemlock trees and
browsing was minimal suggesting that the deer had spent
little time here this winter. At the bottom of the slope
I headed across a snow bride over the burbling brook
beneath my feet. I sort of walked the edge of the brook
until the sound was pretty muffled suggesting a good
snow bride to get across the brook. While the brook is
only 10 or 12 feet wide and not very deep, the snow had
piled into the ravene and was 4 or 5 feet deep. Breaking
through the snow while crossing would likely get me
somewhat wet, but I would end up in a huge snow hole.
It's can be hard to get out of them.
Across the brook there was no deer sign at all. This
late in the winter the deer were staying on the East
side of the brook and on the southwesterly facing slope
where the sun has reduced the snow amount significantly.
In fact I measured 25 inches of snow on the West side
and only 15 on the East.
Pitching back up the hill towards my truck I followed a
porcupine trail to it's den in a rocky outcrop. The
woods were so still this afternoon. The hushed burbling
brook was pretty much the only sound except for an
occasional crow call. I stood for a while and listen to
the few pines towering about the hemlocks barely
whispering. Individual trees and not the whole forest.
It was a very peaceful hike.
When I got home about 4:30 I quickly took my dogs out
for a walk down into the meadow. I traversed the slight
bit of field edge barely showing any bare ground. I did
see a barred owl on the ground at the far end of the
corn field. I spun on my heels and called the dogs away
to leave him to his doings. It's tough enough for an owl
to make a living this winter without me and my dogs
messing things up for him. Still it is very light at
6:00 PM. Hooray for more sun light.
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