I’ll start off. In my area, the most common native trees are Cottonwoods and Hackberrys. It’s tough to find water around here that doesn’t have cottonwoods nearby, and it’s tough to find any upland ground without a Hackberry tree. Neither of them are very beneficial to deer for providing food though, but both provide good cover.
I have a large 6ft Diameter Cottonwood that came in as a close 2nd, but my favorite would have to be a Hackberry that is on the back corner of my yard, between a couple barns. I’ve never saw a Hackberry with such a good shape.
16 months ago, we received a destructive ice storm, where nearly every tree on the property experienced severe limb loss. Luckily this Hackberry didn’t lose a branch.
For those unfamiliar with a Hackberry, I wouldn’t recommend planting one in your yard. Even though they’re very hardy, pretty strong, and grow fairly fast, they have a problem with tree rot when they reach maturity. But a lot of it has to do with pruning it correctly throughout it’s life too..
Here’s a picture of another one on the edge of my property. It has a roughly 3 ft diameter truck, and had 3 main branches. The ice storm 16 months ago took 1 of them. Then over the winter, another broke. And just this week, the last one broke down. You can somewhat see from the picture, the rotten area in the middle that caused the weak spot. It provided 2-3 months of heat though!
