Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 61

Fishing guides have a saying: don't
leave fish to find fish. It's a reminder to
take advantage of the opportunities in
front of you before looking for something
else.
Whitetails live by that advice, in a
sense.
Winter, and even more so early spring,
are tough times for deer. Cold weather
requires them to burn lots of calories
just to stay alive, at the very time food is
scarcest.
They've got to do more than just
endure those lean times, though. Does,
for example, need to emerge on the other
side of winter healthy enough to birth and
raise fawns.
They do that by packing on the pounds
when the living is easier. Whitetails build
up their fuel reserves in fall by eating
enough to add 20 to 30% to their total
body weight in fat. A 110-pound doe, for
example, will gain 22 to 33 pounds before
winter arrives.
The primary driver of that autumn
weight gain is mast - the fruits, berries
and nuts of trees.
Here in Pennsylvania, deer - and other
wildlife, from black bears and turkeys
to ruffed grouse and squirrels - feed on
a variety of such foods. They do it in a
progression, too, dining on each offering
as it becomes available.
They stick with their fish, so to speak,
before going on to the next.
In our northern hardwood forests
especially, deer target black cherries first,
as they're usually the first to fall, in early
NOVEMBER 2022
September. As the year's supply of those
is consumed, deer move on to beechnuts,
which are less common nowadays since
many trees have fallen victim to beech
bark disease, especially across Pennsylvania's
northern tier.
But where beechnuts are available,
all wildlife, including deer, devour them.
After that, deer switch to what is Pennsylvania's
absolute No. 1 mast crop, on a
pounds per acre basis, the all-important
acorn.
Oaks didn't always occupy the top
spot. Once, the American chestnut put
more food on the ground for more wildlife
in more places more consistently than
anything. Chestnut blight ruined that
decades ago, though.
So oaks, while not as reliable - they
generally produce a bumper crop of
acorns once every 10 years or so, with
really good years occurring every three
to five - fill that role today.
They dominate deer diets when available.
One feeding experiment found that
deer ate about 1½ pounds of acorns per
day per hundred pounds of body weight.
There's no overestimating how valuable
that is.
Other research revealed deer - limited
to a starvation ration of browse - could
survive 90 days in winter if provided
even half a pound of acorns per hundred
BY DAVE GUSTAFSON
Game Commission Habitat Management Director
61

Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022

Contents
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - Cover1
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - Cover2
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - Contents
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 2
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 3
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 4
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 5
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 6
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 7
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 8
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 9
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 10
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 11
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 12
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 13
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 14
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 15
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 16
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 17
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 18
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 19
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 20
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 21
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 22
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 23
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 24
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 25
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 26
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 27
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 28
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 29
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 30
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 31
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 32
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 33
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 34
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 35
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 36
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 37
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 38
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Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 40
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 41
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 42
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Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 45
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 46
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 47
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 48
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 49
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Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 51
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Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 54
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 55
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 56
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 57
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 58
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Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 60
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 61
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Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 63
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - 64
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - Cover3
Pennsylvania Game News - November 2022 - Cover4
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