The Little Woods

[Lee Haakenson]

I love those small wood lot islands. We have afew around here that owners think are to small so I've been able to gain hunting permission. Especially productive in years of standing corn for discrete access.

What's the short 2x2 stakes in apple cages all about? Necessary due to winds across open field or just preventive insurance? Just caught my eye being lower support than I'm used to seeing in most guys orchards

I like the pond, you ever look into a solar aerator for winter? Curious if it would keep up with cold Temps

Ive shot some big bucks in a 1/4 acre island of trees surrounded by 500 acres of corn (SE WI). Lots of pass thru deer, never seen before. A few years ago we missed a very wide 10 pt kicked out by a combine. Only saw him once. Neighbor killed him gun opener 2 miles away - 28" inside spread.

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[H20fwler]

Took a look around the place yesterday to see how things were doing and reseeded a bunch of chicory/ladino/birdsfoot tre-foil into CRP strip.

The clover has come in really good around the koi pond


Checked the conifer plantings along east side from a couple years ago hiding in the switch...the ones I could find!

Only spotted one lonely little white pine


There are a few scotch pines the bunnies didn't completely rape


and a couple dozen Norway spruce...Norway's seem to be the way to go here





the hazelnuts were starting to break bud



Fruit trees are starting to wake up from winter too;

A Golden Hornet planted last spring


Keiffer pear


A Cherry Bomb crab I grafted onto a Yellow Delicious last spring leafing out.


The woods is about as open as it's going to get until next spring, starting to green up and will be growing in quick.


One of a few big old white oaks in the woods, they produce loads of acorns every two or three years


My wife was with me and commented on all the heavy deer trails and how there were deer tracks everywhere she looked. When I pulled the cards it was easy to see why...herds of deer moving through the place and hanging out.

 

[Telemark]

Awesome. Good work.

 

[Davewp]

enjoyed reading thread and what can be done no matter the size of acreage.

 

[Bowsnbucks]

Good stuff there H20. Good food supply + good cover = deer will find it. Try throwing some 10-10-10 or 15-15-15 around those evergreens and watch the growth by this time next year. The deer hang around our spruce, pines and hemlocks here. Watch your traffic increase as they grow.

 

[Davewp]

Any concern with fruit trees, or any trees so close to an ag field, and farmer overspray from the crop fields?

 

[H20fwler]

Good stuff there H20. Good food supply + good cover = deer will find it. Try throwing some 10-10-10 or 15-15-15 around those evergreens and watch the growth by this time next year. The deer hang around our spruce, pines and hemlocks here. Watch your traffic increase as they grow.

Will do...I should have done it last year.

 

[H20fwler]

Any concern with fruit trees, or any trees so close to an ag field, and farmer overspray from the crop fields?

I did, but I talked with guy that rents the field and I put up a couple "No Spray" signs on edge in cases he hires it out.

 

[H20fwler]

Found around seventy yesterday.

A couple small grays and the rest pepper tops...some were huge.

 

[H20fwler]

We got the bee hives put in last week and the wildflowers are starting to bloom to keep them busy.
Hopefully by end of summer they will be stacked tall full of honey.

 

[Bill]

Will they add more boxes to those hives as the summer goes on?

Seems any I see are always more than one box stacked up.

 

[H20fwler]

Yes, as the bees make honey and more bees more sections will be added.
The goal is to eventually have four hives at this farm and six to eight at the Big Woods.

We checked inside the hives a few days ago and added top feeders.

My bee mentor was very happy with the progress on the newest hives and how far along they are for only being out a couple of weeks.


The fruit trees are growing well but I need to do some serious weeding inside and around the cages.
Also need to hack&squirt a bunch of unwanted small volunteer trees trying to get a foothold in the little orchard.
My goal in the next week is to get a lot of it cleaned up so I can back off this area and let the deer have the woods to do their thing the rest of summer.

couple keiffers

cortland

little golden hornet wanting to set fruit

I preordered six more good DR apples for fall planting on the north corners of CRP strips and I might put in a few more pears on the east side.

 

[H20fwler]

Was trimming some of the volunteer scrub trees in the little orchard Friday morning and took a few pics.

Have a few of these somehow staying ahead of the raccoons in the koi pond, I think they are called green frogs...a little bigger than leopard frogs but smaller than bullfrogs.

The birdsfoot tre-foil planted in the CRP strips is doing really good. I like it because it is native, keeps coming back for years, is a great pollinator for bees, bunnies love it, and the deer and turkeys browse on it a little as they pass through.

And I really like seeing this growing strong on the place!
I'm going to plant a milkweed pollinator mix on both farms early next spring with four types of native milkweed.

Swapped out the cards and the woods is a summer bachelor pad again, had at least six different bucks hanging around, a couple show some promise.

 

[Bowsnbucks]

Milkweed is a good idea. We saved a couple patches from the mower at camp just for the monarch butterflies and whatever other pollinators drift by. We also have birdsfoot trefoil hanging around in several spots. Diversity.
Deer look good.

 

[H20fwler]

Swapped cards out yesterday.
The Little Woods is a bachelor pad again this summer, couple nice ones that I recognize from last year. These bucks hang out in this spot all summer then drift off in Sept checking back in through rut and then move back in early January...been that way for five years now. Had a bunch of small bucks in here too.

 

[Bowsnbucks]

Boy, H20 - things are really looking bad in the little woods ...……… I'd be depressed.

No reason to think your hunting season won't be really good around there. Lots of good pickings. Nice evidence in the pix.

 

[H20fwler]

Stopped by to swap card out just to see if the nicer buck was still hanging close and took a few pics to bring the place up to speed.

First, the raccoons are completely out of control pulling the corn stalks down to shred the ears. It is as bad as I have ever seen it, over an acre of corn flattened on one side of the woods...some damage on the other three sides of woods but not as bad as this. There are so many hollow hickory den trees in this woods, we run the dogs in it a few times every winter and take out over a dozen but it doesn't even seem to make a dent. I would trap it hard but I hate disturbing the deer.

 

[H20fwler]

The bees are doing well, the one hive is doing great we just added a super to it last week the other started to fizzle so we split a hive and restated it and now it is coming along much better.

Plenty to keep the bees busy.....

CRP strip with plenty of wildflowers growing in it.

Purple cone flowers are starting to go to seed

Lots of berries along edge of woods

and a few hawthorns with little apples

 

[H20fwler]

And the bucks are still living happily in the woods, all kinds of day and night time pics of them. Plenty of pics of the nice buck showing him at about every angle.

 

[H20fwler]

A few pics from the other day as I was swapping out cards.

Hawthorne's and Gray Dogwood have had a good year, they are full of fruit all around the woods.

Partridge pea pods are full...I'm going to plant a bunch more of this at both farms.

Bees seemed busy, hive on the right is still iffy.

Still have plenty of flowers blooming in the CRP strip.

Bucks will be shedding velvet soon I would say they are pretty much done growing.

Looks like this guy put on another little kicker on his G2