We’re all familiar with the lore surrounding buck beds and bedding habits. Many hunters have elaborate theories that factor in weather and landscape features to predict where a specific buck will choose to bed at…
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The Right and Wrong of Hinge Cutting for Deer Habitat
Feb 22, 2023Zack Vucurevich
As I travel the country working with landowners to improve deer herds and habitat, the one management technique I see overused, mismanaged and misunderstood the most is hinge cutting. There is a time and a…
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The Three Most Dangerous Hinge Cut Safety Mistakes
Feb 13, 2023NDA Staff
Hinge cutting is a popular and useful tool for improving deer habitat. It can also involve significant risk of injury since chainsaws and trees are involved. Luckily there are some very simple rules that can…
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5 Clues You Might Be Hinge-Cutting Too Much
Mar 2, 2017Lindsay Thomas Jr.
Hinge-cutting has exploded in popularity in recent years, and as with anything that explodes in popularity, some people take it too far, focusing too much on the technique while missing the bigger picture. It has…
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How to Hunt Native Warm-Season Grasses
Sep 25, 2012Jennifer Pudenz
Just 170 years ago, a seemingly boundless prairie blanketed the Midwest, one of the largest ecosystems in the world, and it provided natural cover for whitetails and many other wildlife species. Today, only one tenth…
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Don’t Fear the Reaper: Timber Harvest is Good for Deer
Jul 6, 2012Lindsay Thomas Jr.
The reaper is coming to my family’s farm in Southeast Georgia, and I couldn’t be happier. It’s a tree reaper, also known as a feller-buncher. It will be joined by skidders, loaders, log trucks and…
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Sanctuaries: Attract, Protect, Hold, Hunt
Jun 22, 2012Lindsay Thomas Jr.
As the Quality Deer Management philosophy becomes further anchored as the dominant mindset among whitetail hunters, achieving greater numbers of mature bucks is not the hurdle it once was. Instead, there’s another hurdle: Killing them….
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Create Living Thicket Cover by Hinge-Cutting
Mar 21, 2012Jeff Jackson
Timber stand improvement (TSI) involves removing unwanted trees that are competing with desirable trees. What is the best thing to do with the unwanted trees? Cutting them off at the ground line is a standard…
