Buds Enable Pitch and Shortleaf Pines to Recover From Injury

Pitch and shortleaf pines often survive severe damage by fires, cutting, rabbits, or deer. Deer may take all but 2 inches of the 6- to 8-inch shoots of seedlings, and still these seedlings may live and develop new shoots. Fires may kill all the foliage and terminal shoots on sapling or pole-size stems, but still these trees may green up and develop new leaders. Many of the pines in southern New Jersey today have two or more crooks where past fires killed 1 to 3 feet of their leaders.