Identifying Oak Trees for Whitetail Deer Hunting

hey everyone it's cameron with exodus trail cameras and today i am with chris creed from afflicted broadheads chris has been self-sustaining for over 25 years so the greater majority of his life and he is my go-to when it comes to tree identification and plant identification and today we are going to talk all about oaks as they pertain to whitetail deer hunting so let's hear from chris so i first got interested in trees really as a young kid my family had always been a family of hunters but i had a grandfather that was a true woodsman and he really inspired me to we we tapped our own trees make our own maple syrup we still do that today we use bark from certain trees to make certain things medicinally or even like hickory bark to make hickory bark syrup so i started to get fascinated with oaks over 25 years ago for a couple different reasons the first one was tanning levels tanning our own hides and the second one was trying to use acorns to utilize for flour which is a long crazy process and is hardly worth it but if you can't go buy flour at the store it is a great way to get flour so that's what really started me you know which acorns were the biggest which had the most tannin and that developed into which ones the deer preferred most and then that ultimately uh allowed me to position my stands and my hunting locations better because i knew which trees the deer were going to go to first and why which they were going to go to second and why and it really helped our hunting success so today the main goal is just to share some of that with you explain the main difference between red oaks and white oaks and why it's important and very important for deer forage so the first oak we're going to talk about real briefly is a species of red oak it's called the shingle oak this oak was used by the early settlers the wood to make shingles for their houses one thing that sets this oak apart from the rest is that it is the only non-lobed oak that we have in ohio so in some of the southern states you'll see some oak trees especially the smaller versions that don't have any lobes on the outside of the leaf at all this one is the only one in ohio that does not have any lobes but it has at the very tip the tiny bristle and that gives it away as a red oak so one of the distinguishing features between reds and white and all of their leaves is the same all red oaks will have bristle tips end of story all white oaks have round lobes end of story there's that's the easiest way to separate everything and as we go through and look at some of the reds and whites you'll be able to distinguish and identify quickly the difference between red oaks and white oaks now why is that really important well it's important because the red oaks are typically higher in tannin and usually a secondary source of acorns for deer also the red oaks don't produce every year like typical white oaks do now there's lots of variations soil types area region that contribute to this but the overall rule of thumb is a white oak will produce every year and usually drop first and then a red oak produces every second year and usually drops second again there's all kinds of different factors that inform that including the how the frosts are and storms and everything else to how those red oaks are producing but that is a good general rule of thumb so this monster is really common in ohio you'll find it everywhere this is a pin oak it's very similar to our scarlet oak the bark is pretty similar the leaves are pretty similar the differentiation that you're going to see between this and this garlic scarlet oak is there's a little bit of a deeper indentation in this garlic scarlet oak leaf but they have basically the same shape so it's really tough to go by the leaves now one thing about the scarlet oak is it likes hilltops it likes to be on north facing slopes east slopes and those leaves will turn a nice bright red so when you're traveling in the fall and you see those big beautiful oaks that are bright red it's usually the scarlet oak and not the pin oak as you can see when the pin oak starts to turn it keeps this nice beautiful brown color and kind of tends to hold onto its leaves for a long time both of the the pin oak and the red oak are very similar the acorns can be distinguished as on the scarlet oak at the very tip you'll see a couple little concentric circles like three little bullseye and that's basically the only way they're really tough to tell apart but they're still an important food source for turkeys and deer even though they're not highly preferred over the white oaks they definitely get eaten and cleaned up by the end of fall okay so this is a good spot to talk about two totally different trees now even though they have a similar trunk diameter you can look at the bark and you can see that there are some differences got this little dark brown heavily fissured and you come over here and you kind of got this grayer bark that uh has these transition lines through it kind of looks like big rectangles so just by bark alone you can look on the right here this would be a white oak and on the left this would be a northern red oak now bark can get very confusing you can look at a base of a lot of trees and especially a mature swamp white oak and say boy that looks just like a red oak and you can't really distinguish the bark until you start to look up higher on the tree you'll see the bark actually transition mid-level and as you get into the branches towards the top that's when it really starts looking like a white oak so bark sometimes is a pretty tough thing and so then we go to leaves which can also be just as confusing so if we look at some leaves here and at first glance we look at this swamp oak leaf where we have these small little lobes there are no bristles on any of these lobes they're just nice and smooth but if we look at this immature northern red oak they're kind of similar but at the very tip of each one of these is a really fine bristle that's how you determine this red oak from the white oak if we transition over to these two giant trees right here where we have this northern red oak you can see how it has lots of bristles the lobes are not as small they don't go all the way down towards the middle of the vein and they're also wide along the whole main stem so when we looked at the pin oak earlier you saw how those fissures went all the way in and they were really deep grooved here well then the red oaks are not so they're more of a broad leaf and that will also change as you go up the tree now one of the distinguishing factors for all red oaks and especially the northern red oak since it's such a big acorn is its cap what will help you do to determine if you look at the cap and it only comes to the very top not even the first third of the acorn and it looks like scales like snake skin if you will or shingles then that's a good indication that you're looking at a red oak when you switch over to a white oak and you look at the cap the first thing you're going to see is lots of bumps okay it's a very very bumpy and it will actually extend a little farther over the nut than the northern red oak does and you'll see that the acorns are longer they're a little bit longer where you get those squatty big fat northern red oaks and when you look at the white oak leaves which is from this tree grown right here you can see the main difference again we have these really deep fissures these really nice round lobes and if we compare that to the northern red oak there's really a stark difference there so it does make it a lot easier to identify and because this oak has more tannins in the acorn the deer will prefer this white oak also in most circumstances this white oak acorn is going to drop early season a lot of them have been dropping for a long time even before october and the red oak usually takes end of october but it is right behind this white oak but since this is sweeter it's preferred no matter what time it falls so if you can find a good patch of white oaks or swamp white oaks you're gonna find the acorn that's preferred by whitetail okay so chris wants me to taste the difference between a red oak acorn and a white oak acorns you're going to be the deer i want you to try the white oak first just bite into it just let it get on the side and the tip of your tongue it won't kill you we eat these things all the time but we usually boil them first because they're full of millions of parasites so i'm just kidding you can taste the bitter right okay spit it out all right now try the red oak okay now i have to eat a red oak i'm not responsible for your dental bills either immediate difference oh yeah that's exactly what the deer are saying it's like night and day yeah night and day white oaks take taste much better than red oaks if you were wondering so this nice deep v barked tree right here is a swamp white oak swamp white oaks get huge and they're very prolific in our area they really like high mineral soils and you can find them anywhere this is an excellent excellent tree if you find some swamp white oaks you're going to find some whitetails they're usually really good producers a big tree like this is going to produce a lot of nuts and it's going to be a really good source for you to find some deer so one of the key features of the swamp white oak as you can see they have this nice lobe around them again there's no bristles they're nice and round white oak family but also there's no deep fissures so when you look at the regular white oak you saw that those leaves had these really deep grooves these really deep fissures where on the swamp white oak they do not it's a nice wide leaf and then the acorns typically grow on a stem usually more than one at a time but one of the distinguishing features of the cap is not only does it have the typical bumps of the white oak but on the swamp white oak they typically grow in a pipe like fashion where they actually look like a pipe on the end of a stem this acorn will also be elongated as well so this is a swamp white oak this is a lot more immature tree than the one we showed you before in the middle of the woods this one sits in the corner of a field next to a highway at a pinch point by a crick and this is what we call a magic oak so you hear people talk about that every once in a while what's a magic oak magic oak is usually a white oak and it's in a spot that it produces every year and that the deer are just naturally drawn to now getting over the highway noise here is always a problem when i hunt but this oak is so popular with the whitetails that year after year we harvest here it's an easy place to set up a climber right in the wood line the deer come out to feed here uh this is a really excellent spot so the white oak here you can see the bark is gray it's thinner it has these nice rectangular shapes it's usually pretty easy to identify when you look at the leave again we have multiple lobes that are round with no bristle and they have smaller fissures when we look at that acorn it's that pipe style and you've got all these little knobbies here now a lot of people will look at these at certain stages and even on a real mature tree you'll see this cap it's over a third down over the acorn it'll start producing some bristles and people look at this and say oh that's a burr oak it's not i'll show you a bur oak here in just a minute it'll blow your mind compared to what a swamp white oak is so and there's some other key distinguishing features to help you determine oak from white oak but again white oak family excellent low tannin preferred by white tails so one thing to keep in mind about white tails when it comes to any brows but especially acorn is they have multi-chambered stomach so what they'll do is they'll eat big for an hour to pack that first stomach which is the rumen and then they're gonna go bed down and then they're gonna allow that to ferment a little bit they're gonna regurgitate it and then they're gonna really chew it up small and swallow it so it can be processed through the rest of the digestive system so keep in mind when the deer coming to the oaks you know they're going to feed for an hour or two really heavy they're going to fill up and then generally they're going to go bed down especially this time of year so just for a recap here on white oaks and red oaks solid roll of thumb white oaks round lobes with no bristles red oaks mostly have sharp pointy lobes and they definitely have bristles good distinguishing feature even though some of the leaves may be similar especially on immature trees they'll always have bristles if they're a red oak now we talked a little bit earlier about the bur oak and in comparison to the white oak where the white oak cap is nice and bumpy like a typical white oak and it may even have some little filaments coming from it and people may think that's a bur oak but a true bur oak acorn looks like this the cap will come three quarters over the nut and in some cases it will encapsulate the nut almost completely especially if they're immature or they get a worm in them at some stage they don't fully develop you'll see them like this but this is a true baroque and when you look at the baroque leaf you know it's in the white oak family because of these nice round lobes they don't have very big fissures and typically on the bur oak the leaves will have a wider flare at the tip than they do at the base and they'll narrow down nice and tight so it's another distinguishing feature the bark is very similar to the white oak bark on the white oak you see these nice deep fissures again the rounded lobes the acorns here will have the nice bumpy caps and they will be elongated swamp white oak you have these leaves they're still multi-lobed the fissures are small the lobes are completely round and you'll see caps that have nice little bumps on them again with a slightly elongated uh acorn but you'll see this pipe structure on on a lot of the swamp white oak this one here is a good example as well when you move into the red oaks you look at the red oak first distinguishing feature on the cap is it's more like shingles or snake scales instead of being really bumpy and raised ridges and the cap does not go down over the very top of the acorn they're very loosely attached you'll see that uh on this northern red oak here it's a nice broad leaf the fishers are small but there are the bristles at each one of the tips on the pin oak you see that the fissures are deeper but you still have all these other bristles the acorn is much smaller the cap is tiny and the acorn is very small and often on these red oaks you'll see that they have some striping on the scarlet oaks again if you look you may see a bullseye down here at the very tip as we summarize this if you know your oaks you'll have a higher percentage of maybe finding some white tail where they're feeding when they're feeding you now know that the red oaks are higher in tannin they're more bitter cameron did a really good taste test for you to show that there's a stark difference and when we utilize these for food uh the red oak we have to leech and boil over and over and throw out that water to leech out all those tannins before we can grind it into flour and the deer don't prefer that very much as well if you consider that when they are eating it sits in that room and it starts to ferment it's only enhancing that bitterness and they got to regurgitate it back up to chew it again and they will and they are still going to prefer that as a higher source of fat over corn and over soybean this time of year you'll see that your deer are going to flock to your acorns even if they're reds however the whites are definitely preferred they definitely have less tannin and they are a much higher concentrated source for you to be able to find those oaks and see where the deer are moving hopefully that helps you out moral of the story early october get on the white oaks you'll find the deer so thanks for tuning in if you have any questions drop them in the comments below if you have any tips yourself leave us a comment and smash that subscribe button for us

Channel: Exodus Trail Cameras

Views: 15,999

Rating: 4.982379 out of 5

Keywords: WHITE OAKS, RED OAKS, ACORNS, DEER HUNTING, TREE IDENTIFICATION

Id: zZcGCO1ennI

Length: 16min 32sec (992 seconds)

Published: Sat Oct 10 2020