cover crop deer research in SD

[phil@thesidehill]

http://phys.org/news/2015-02-luring-deer-livestock-fall-crops.html

saw this come through on the NDA newsletter. pretty interesting read.

 

[shawnv]

Interesting. I was actually watch a cover crop video last night and the researcher and farmer used forage turnips along with oats and AWP. The purpose of the turnips was the timing of their Nitrogen release into the soil which early spring for the most part.

 

[wiscwhip]

http://phys.org/news/2015-02-luring-deer-livestock-fall-crops.html

saw this come through on the NDA newsletter. pretty interesting read.

I saw another link to this last night on a totally different website than what you posted. I think the site I was looking at had more information than this as well, I will have to check my browser history when I get home to see if I can find it to link to that site as well.

 

[ruskbucks]

I'm starting to see a few farmers starting to use radish around me as a cover crop. It was strange to see a 40 acre field planted in radish. I wish it wasn't totally in the open I would like to see some deer in it.

 

[phil@thesidehill]

I saw another link to this last night on a totally different website than what you posted. I think the site I was looking at had more information than this as well, I will have to check my browser history when I get home to see if I can find it to link to that site as well.

yeah this article seemed more like a general press release about the study....not very information dense. When i was involved with a local QDMA branch and we were planting about 20 acres of plots on a state game land unit that was all big woods in the mountains, i also wondered if these plots took any browse pressure off forest regen in the area. I knew it would depend on attractiveness/pallatabilty timing of the plots compared to the same for the woody browse.

 

[dipper]

yeah this article seemed more like a general press release about the study....not very information dense. When i was involved with a local QDMA branch and we were planting about 20 acres of plots on a state game land unit that was all big woods in the mountains, i also wondered if these plots took any browse pressure off forest regen in the area. I knew it would depend on attractiveness/pallatabilty timing of the plots compared to the same for the woody browse.

Phil it really doesn't work this way. Deer are browsers so they will eat your woods no matter what. If anything it makes browse pressure worse cause u are attracting more deer. Ive been there already
This article is intended to have additional food for a high population targeting feed lots where food is being stored.

 

[phil@thesidehill]

Phil it really doesn't work this way. Deer are browsers so they will eat your woods no matter what. If anything it makes browse pressure worse cause u are attracting more deer. Ive been there already
This article is intended to have additional food for a high population targeting feed lots where food is being stored.

I know it was an apples to oranges comparison Dip. That wasn't my point. Both ideas revolve around the same concept....use on food source to take pressure off of another.

In terms of what i was talking about, a conversation with a state forester basically told me the same thing. You will probably find that the areas adjacent to the food plots experience heavier browsing because of the concentrating effect the food plots have in that type of ecosystem.

 

[dipper]

That might have to be a pretty big woods. My experience ranging up to 3/4 mile, is there is no relief in browsing pressure.

 

[phil@thesidehill]

The one section of Game Lands that we worked on is 55,000 acres, it is bordered by another Game Lands that is 49,000 acres, and another Game Lands that is 9000 acres, and a State Park that is 31,000 acres.....nothing but big woods in the mountains...no agriculture, no old fields/pastures reverting back. When the state does timber sales on the land they fence the in the keep the deer out. The food plots we planted were all fire roads that are closed to general vehicular traffic. and post hunting season deer densities of less than 10 dpsm. Thats a whole different ball game than what you are living with. A big chunk of woods by you is what a couple hundred acres at most? and from what you say about your densities....its not even close to what i'm talking about.

 

[dipper]

Depends I'm right at a transition in the state from big woods to ag. The block around my main farm is a couple thousand acres with about 15-20% being ag. My second property farther south is around 800 acres of timber but vast ag bordering the block.

 

[phil@thesidehill]

Those numbers also dont include the 10's of thousands of acres of private land holdings within and around those state tracts. Its probably just shy of 200,000 acres of "big woods".