The report is a comparative study between spruce plantations where 4 plants are treated with deer repellents and 4 plantations are untreated. The study aims to provide a base for the Forest Society's future decisions regarding the use of wildlife-repellents.  The report indicates that wildlife-repellents work reasonably well for its purpose, the treated stocks were virtually untouched during the planting year and next year while the untreated stocks have been heavily grazed during these years.  Growth difference between grazed plants and ungrazed plants found to be virtually non-existent (0, 01 m) of the treated stocks and 0, 07 m in the untreated plants. Because of the growth differences are so small between grazed and no grazed plants, it seems like the treatment of deer-repellent are unnecessary. Unless you know in particularly that the area has a specific problem whit severe deer-grazing..

In the Kolmården area, northeast of Norrköping in south-central Sweden, it was discovered that shoots of spruce Picea abies, plants to a seemingly large extent had been browsed by deer. The area inhabits a dense red deer population, alongside with moose and roe deer, and red deer is thus suspected to cause the damage. The main purposes of this study are, however, to estimate the extent of the shoot-damage and to investigate what factors that may affect the browsing of shoots. For each stand information was recorded about the age of the plants, area for the stand, height over the sea for the stand, site productivity, type of plants and stand-history. The study was done in three areas: Simonstorp, Stavsjö and Valinge. At Simonstorp and Stavsjö, respectively, 10 stands were chosen for study and on Valinge six stands. In each stand, 10 plots were sampled.

Gotland is an island in the Baltic Sea where man has introduced roe deer. The last successful reintroduction was in the 1980s and is the base of the viable roe deer population of today.The aim of this study was to estimate the roe deer population density in 2012 and the species population dynamic since the time when studies on the population started. The result indicates a population size of 850 roe deer in 2012. There was no significant population dynamic, which may be due to insufficient data. The population occurs basically over the whole island but have not yet been established in all suitable areas.

Bark-stripping by red deer (Cervus elaphus) cause extensive damage to economically valuable spruce trees (Picea abies) in Swedish forests. The underlying causes for bark-stripping are not fully understood, and the frequency and severity of damage unpredictably differ between regions. In this study, I investigated if landscape structure (e.g. agricultural dominated landscape opposed to forest dominated landscape), forage availability, population density and disturbance (e.g. roads and settlements) affect bark-stripping frequency.

The purpose of this study was to show how the Hybrid Larch (Larix eurolepis x) are used by large herbivores in terms of grazing and fraying. More specifically I studied how impact on the seedlings was affected by forest stand area, tree height and stem density (stems/ha).The survey was done in Jönköpings county in southern Sweden. About 50 % of all stems that are measured are damaged by grazing and 5,8 % was damaged from fraying. The conclusion of the study is that the biggest influencing factor is the height of the seedlings. The size of the stands and number off seedlings per hectare have almost no impact on the injuries on the seedlings. Fraying are common on trees smaller than 3 meters, and doesn?t occur on trees above that height.

The objective of this paper is to estimate monetary and non-monetary costs for the huntercaused by deer-vehicle collisions in Sweden. These costs include losses in hunting value as wellas time and money efforts related to the handling of wildlife casualties. The calculations arebased on available statistics from 2004 on deer-vehicle collisions involving moose, deer, roedeerand wild boar and on telephone interviews with hunters involved in the tracking of injuredanimals. Altogether, the annual loss in hunting value for moose was assessed to approximately30 million SEK based on the 2004 accident statistics. For roe-deer and fallow deer, thecorresponding figure was approximately 56 million SEK and 1.2 million SEK, while wild boaraccounted for 1.3 million SEK, respectively.

Information regarding cows grazing behaviour and time spent grazing can be of great interest to dairy farmers, since this information can indicate how well suited the pasture is to the cows. Feed intake at pasture is however challenging to measure. Automated systems for monitoring the behaviour of cows within dairy production have become increasingly important and relatively common. The aim of this study was to validate an activity measuring device (HOBO® G Logger Pendant Data Logger, USA), a triaxial accelerometer that registers the cow?s head positions during grazing, in order to see if cows? grazing behaviour on pasture could be distinguished from their non grazing behaviour.

After the storm Gudrun in 2005, the Swedish Transport Administration started clear-cutting of railroad corridors to reduce the risk of trees falling down on the tracks. Simultaneously, train accidents with moose and roe deer have become more frequent and the costs for consequent delays and repairs of engines are of growing concern. There is reason to assume that tree-clearance of railroad corridors may have contributed to an increase in number of accidents with moose and roe deer because the cleared areas provide attractive forage and thus may attract wildlife. The objective of my study was to investigate how clearing of trees affected the number of accidents with moose and roe deer. I compared deer-train collision frequencies before and after clearance of the selected railroads and compared these with uncleared control railroads in a BACI (before-after control-impact) approach.

Bark-stripping by red deer (Cervus elaphus) cause extensive damage to economically valuable spruce trees (Picea abies) in Swedish forests. The underlying causes for bark-stripping are not fully understood, and the frequency and severity of damage unpredictably differ between regions. In this study, I investigated if landscape structure (e.g. agricultural dominated landscape opposed to forest dominated landscape), forage availability, population density and disturbance (e.g. roads and settlements) affect bark-stripping frequency.

The return of large predators to regions where they were previously extirpated has created a need for knowledge about their effect on prey species, not only their lethal but also their behavioural or risk effects. In this study the behavioural risk effects of brown bear (Ursus arctos) were tested on fallow deer (Dama dama), roe deer (Capreolus capreolus), red deer (Cervus elaphus), moose (Alces alces) and wild boar (Sus scrofa). This was done by using patches of fur to simulate the presence of the novel predator (brown bear), a novel nonpredator (reindeer (Rangifer tarandus) and no fur as control. These three treatments were then compared. The response variables measured were increased vigilance, decreased feeding time and change in patch use.

In southern Sweden, beech (Fagus silvatica) and spruce (Picea abies) are two species with similar demands on soil properties. With increased global warming and high acid deposition the future may bring larger areas were the two species are overlapping, competing for the same soil. The aim of this study was to compare spruce and beech concerning distribution, cultivation and soil properties. From available data comparisons were made between spruce and beech forests in Sweden. Soil analyses were made on samples from beech forest in southern Sweden, with and without natural regeneration of spruce.

The main purpose of this report is a first step to cover the scarcely investigated subject of interspecific competition between roe deer, Capreolus capreolus, and fallow deer, Dama dama. The report focuses on the distance between individuals of roe and fallow in the study area as well as which factors that is affecting the variation in distance depending on fallow deer group size and changing population density over time and in two areas. For additional information the history of the populations, such as harvest and distribution, is also investigated. The report came to the conclusion that interspecific competition between the species do occur. The elevated distance between individuals of the two species is clearly significant. The most important factor affecting the distance seemed to be the size of the fallow groups.

The aim of the study was to investigate if the Grazemore Decision Support System (DSS) is able to provide a grazing management strategy that gives a high utilisation of grazed grass in milk production in the north of Scandinavia. To do this, a grazing experiment was planed and performed during the summer 2005. Simulations in the DSS were run to get a suggestion of how the cows should graze, grazing calendar 1. Deviations and updates during the season resulted in the simulated grazing calendar 2. During the experiment, the actual milk yield was recorded twice weekly. The difference between actual and predicted milk yield by Grazemore DSS was analysed statistically with regression analysis and the mean square prediction error (MSPE) was estimated.

Sitka spruce (Picea sitchensis) is not considered to be a native species to Swedish forests. It´s origin is the pacific coast of Northern America, an area that is dominated by a coastal climate which makes it likely to believe that it would be well suited for growing in the south-west of Sweden. This study aims to investigate the gain in production that can be reached by growing sitka spruce instead of Norway spruce (Picea abies) in the county of Halland. A regression model based on data from forest experiments was produced to explain the gain in production. This model was based on elevation and annual precipitation. The model was then used to create a map layer in arcGIS that shows the gain of volume in comparison to Norway spruce in percent. An analysis was carried out to find what share of the forestland in Halland county that fell into four different classes of production gain.

When I began my studies at Gammelkroppa forest school I started to think about an appropriate thesis. There was much discussion about the wild grazing damage during that period. I was at that time a part of Boo property and helped at their great hunts. They had the dual uses of wildlife and forest. I decided that I want to study how big the wild grazing damages are and if we can reduce them.