I planted pollinators for the first time this year and will buy more seed from American Meadows next year.I was afraid they wouldn't grow in my sandy soil.If you want to stop the mowers I would build a single strand fence on the R/W line. Find the legal road width and then find the true center and measure of that.Put up your fence and send the mower guys a certified letter. Where did you get your seed? I have a neighbor that used the bees and butterfly fund for next year.
My Land Tour...The Big Woods
- Thread starter H20fwler
- Start date
What state are you in? I have wood duck boxes out but they aren't getting used in Kansas, also have mallard tubes out.
H20fwler
5 year old buck +
I got a lot of my seed from American Meadows and from the state...I'm in Ohio. It took about three years before the wildflowers really started to show out, and I didn't mow them those three years. Have mowed once since planting and that was in late March early April last year or year before.
I mow once kind of tall every three years or so in real early spring before anything greens up much.
The road crew guys that mow are just idiots that think everything should look like a lawn along the road out to as far as they can reach.
I have been stupid lucky with the wood duck boxes, they did great right off the bat. I don't really know why? I have a river a few hundred yards to my north and have all my boxes over water, three wood in the ponds and two fiberglass capsules in the vernal pool in woods that holds water in spring. All have predator guards and face the east. Most get used multiple times each year...I need to watch them closer and keep them cleaned out better with fresh wood chips.
H20fwler
5 year old buck +
The two ponds on this farm are both shallower wetland ponds.
Cattail which is OK if just a little and beneficial for water filtration/cover and food if it doesn’t get out of control grows like crazy if unchecked in shallow water and will choke out shallow ponds.
So a couple times every summer I spot spray any I see so that there is never a problem with it.
I use Cattplex with a surfactant in a one gallon sprayer and it knocks them right out. Within a couple days of spraying the cattails turn yellow and die down to the roots. And Cattplex is safe to use over water.
It is important to me that they never grow large enough to head and make seed. Every summer new ones will just pop up and start to spread by root shoots, if left unchecked the harm they cause outweighs any benefit that cattails have to me.
H20fwler
5 year old buck +
Took a quiet walk through the pasture this morning with no dog.
Almost next to the truck by the fire ring I jumped a medium size fawn, then about a minute later I jumped a very small one by the old planter in the orchard.
A single fifth leaf Gala has some apples this year, everything else including the pears seem to only a few after our late frost.
As I came over the hill I noticed a hen woody on top of a nest box. 
There were a few mallards on the front pond too along with a drake woody, the wood ducks must still be interested in nesting?
So I bypassed the pond to leave them alone.
The pasture was literally buzzing with activity a constant low hum the whole time I was out there.
The coneflowers have peaked and pedals are starting to droop
Almost next to the truck by the fire ring I jumped a medium size fawn, then about a minute later I jumped a very small one by the old planter in the orchard.
A single fifth leaf Gala has some apples this year, everything else including the pears seem to only a few after our late frost.
As I came over the hill I noticed a hen woody on top of a nest box. There were a few mallards on the front pond too along with a drake woody, the wood ducks must still be interested in nesting?
So I bypassed the pond to leave them alone.
The pasture was literally buzzing with activity a constant low hum the whole time I was out there.
The coneflowers have peaked and pedals are starting to droop
H20fwler
5 year old buck +
Cont;
the switchgrass has started to bolt (seems early) and is making heads about chest high.
Thousands of partridge pea in the understory
I could see where deer have been nipping tops off of the Queen Anne’s lace/ragweed and birds foot trefoil
A couple pasture shots
Found a couple of these
too
I lost another of the six remaining Dunstans, just went brown for whatever reason.
One of them has lots of burrs
checked the hazelnuts too and looks like the jap beetles weren’t to bad this year.
the ROD are full of berries just turning white
Also had an indigo bunting all cobalt blue land next to me for a couple seconds while I was taking a leak.
Whole time I was walking around tree swallows were catching bugs and landing on the bluebird boxes.
There were some barn swallows mixed in with them don’t know where they came from.
Every-time I think I should be mowing the pasture more often I walk through and see what nature has going on and think…..nah!
the switchgrass has started to bolt (seems early) and is making heads about chest high.
Thousands of partridge pea in the understory
I could see where deer have been nipping tops off of the Queen Anne’s lace/ragweed and birds foot trefoil
A couple pasture shots
Found a couple of these
too
I lost another of the six remaining Dunstans, just went brown for whatever reason.
One of them has lots of burrs
checked the hazelnuts too and looks like the jap beetles weren’t to bad this year.
the ROD are full of berries just turning white
Also had an indigo bunting all cobalt blue land next to me for a couple seconds while I was taking a leak.
Whole time I was walking around tree swallows were catching bugs and landing on the bluebird boxes.
There were some barn swallows mixed in with them don’t know where they came from.
Every-time I think I should be mowing the pasture more often I walk through and see what nature has going on and think…..nah!
Troubles Trees
5 year old buck +
Looks great H2O! Love seeing the successes bud and you got a lot of good things going on there bud.
My Dunstans struggle too, not sure why but 2 of the 4 turned brown and died in the middle of summer and we have had a lot of rain this year. They already grew new shoots from the roots but I lost a lot of progress.
My Dunstans struggle too, not sure why but 2 of the 4 turned brown and died in the middle of summer and we have had a lot of rain this year. They already grew new shoots from the roots but I lost a lot of progress.
H20fwler
5 year old buck +
Thanks!
I originally had around sixteen Duntsans planted and had dreams of big old chestnut trees drawing in deer from my whole neighborhood.
They just do not like wet feet at all or my heavy clay, mine have not thrived and they were babied like apple trees.
Now Chinese chestnuts seem to like me better, although mine are planted in loamier ground in full sun. I have still had a couple of the Chinese just go brown almost overnight…for me there are “other” trees that will grow good for me like oaks&fruit trees or anything not Dustan.
My buddy planted eight or ten on a sand spit in partial shade and his are doing great.
H20fwler
5 year old buck +
My buddies Dunstan chestnuts a few miles from me that he planted a year before mine.
His are down along the river on a slope that never floods planted on a loamy sand spit left over from the river thousands of years ago. He dozed a nice spot for an orchard out into the woods in his river bottom property, a few of mine are same height as his but mine are spindly and the bulk of mine have died. I don't think he lost any in this spot. I have maybe one that looks like his but not as thick.
His are down along the river on a slope that never floods planted on a loamy sand spit left over from the river thousands of years ago. He dozed a nice spot for an orchard out into the woods in his river bottom property, a few of mine are same height as his but mine are spindly and the bulk of mine have died. I don't think he lost any in this spot. I have maybe one that looks like his but not as thick.
Troubles Trees
5 year old buck +
Yea I would love it if my Dunstans looked like that lol Even my Chinese Chestnuts are slow growers, most of that is due to my crappy soil. I do fertilize everything multiple times every year and that helps but it is a lot more work than what your friend does lol
Knehrke
5 year old buck +
Every one of my Dunstan has died back on a nearly yearly basis, then root sprouted and died back again. i feel like I'm right on the edge of their range.
I'm batting ~.300 on Chinese Chestnut, but some of the ones that have survived are now > 15 feet and producing lots of catkins. Still looking for my first fruit though. Maybe this year.
I'm batting ~.300 on Chinese Chestnut, but some of the ones that have survived are now > 15 feet and producing lots of catkins. Still looking for my first fruit though. Maybe this year.
H20fwler
5 year old buck +
Took Darcy out to work her with some quail this morning and snapped a few pics to update this thread.
Goldenrod is in bloom along woods, seems a couple weeks early…everything seems early.
The goldenrod along orchard is just about to break bloom.
Bluestem has bolted and heads are making pollen
Whole pasture of bluestem is 6’-7’ tall. Pheasants are going to love it!
Couple of the apple trees are a little “showy”
Gala
Arkasas Black
Golden Hornet starting to turn orange
A lone HoneyCrisp looking beautiful
First Virginia/Hewes crab we have gotten. I really like the vigor and look of this crab will be planting more.
And my new fetish with redflesh..one of four Firecracker crabs planted this spring along with a few other RF varieties.
Goldenrod is in bloom along woods, seems a couple weeks early…everything seems early.
The goldenrod along orchard is just about to break bloom.
Bluestem has bolted and heads are making pollen
Whole pasture of bluestem is 6’-7’ tall. Pheasants are going to love it!
Couple of the apple trees are a little “showy”
Gala
Arkasas Black
Golden Hornet starting to turn orange
A lone HoneyCrisp looking beautiful
First Virginia/Hewes crab we have gotten. I really like the vigor and look of this crab will be planting more.
And my new fetish with redflesh..one of four Firecracker crabs planted this spring along with a few other RF varieties.
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H20fwler
5 year old buck +
Cont;
What there is this year of pears look good.
Gate pear
Keiffer
Moonglow
And our prize this year…first peaches!
Chinese chestnuts
Dunstan chestnuts
Deer poop and beds all over the orchard, Darcy also jumped two big turkeys in the pasture. I’m sure they were feeding on the bazillion grasshoppers jumping around, I almost started taking grasshopper pics after I started noticing different kinds…coolest were mid size green with yellow stripes
What there is this year of pears look good.
Gate pear
Keiffer
Moonglow
And our prize this year…first peaches!
Chinese chestnuts
Dunstan chestnuts
Deer poop and beds all over the orchard, Darcy also jumped two big turkeys in the pasture. I’m sure they were feeding on the bazillion grasshoppers jumping around, I almost started taking grasshopper pics after I started noticing different kinds…coolest were mid size green with yellow stripes
H20fwler
5 year old buck +
Cont;
My favorite shrub, hazelnuts!
Easy to grow, they grow fast and deer don’t bother them much. I’ve found that they grow best along edge of woods in little groves. Some of the nuts on mine hold into December…I’ve never seen a nut on the ground, absolutely everything eats them.
Button Bush along the ponds, ducks love to eat it.
And the reason I was out there in the first place….to work baby girl!
She did great, quail are her kryptonite she can’t resist them!
My favorite shrub, hazelnuts!
Easy to grow, they grow fast and deer don’t bother them much. I’ve found that they grow best along edge of woods in little groves. Some of the nuts on mine hold into December…I’ve never seen a nut on the ground, absolutely everything eats them.
Button Bush along the ponds, ducks love to eat it.
And the reason I was out there in the first place….to work baby girl!
She did great, quail are her kryptonite she can’t resist them!
H20fwler
5 year old buck +
Have spent a lot of time out at the farm up in trees this fall, not as much with a bow as I would have liked do to a covid outbreak at our house.
The pasture has finally gotten really crazy thick from front to back and it is almost unbelievable the amount of deer that bed and hide in it now. Last week was our first gun season and I bet I saw over 100 deer during the week, I’m sure some were repeats...most were really close and very relaxed! Just didn't see many bucks, lots of does and fawns.
A few pics from this fall;
Even had a flock of turkeys fly up to roost around my tree stand one evening
Youngest boy shot a nice one his first sit;
Walking in and out along the shrub strips I noticed some of the pinoaks have really jumped in growth kind of nice at 5'-6', the majority of them are around 3' due to browsing and buck beat downs.
The ROD is a little patchy in the strips some crazy bushy 7' tall with others places 2' tall and browsed down bad but thriving.
The crabs that I totally about ignore in the shrub strips are really looking good, a young DropTine that I would have bet was going to die because of mice girdling came out of it and even has a little fruit hanging.
Here is my crazy deer gun week story;
Last Thursday wind was really hard out of the west, only stand that would really work is the one my wife had me put up for her in the orchard about thirty yards from the road.
I felt like an idiot up there where everyone one could see me right along the road in orange twenty yards from my truck, and traffic was kind of busy...but the view was great. I could see half way across the block in front of me, see my pasture good and watch a few mallards on the front pond. Also was able to really check out the fruit trees to see what still had a little fruit left hanging. Had a rooster pheasant that must have been worked up from the wind thrashing the tall grass keep cackling then flying up for about twenty yards and landing, that was fun to watch.
So about 45 minutes till dark behind me on my asshole neighbor across the road...out comes a decent buck and two does. They are around 150 yards away going away from my with the wind. It is kind of strange because there is a truck and car parked in neighbors turn in 35 yards away from someone that was hunting back there. Deer didn't really seem to mind all the vehicles or the goof up in the tree in the orchard.
I go back to watching east, after a minute I look over my shoulder and the buck and does are trotting my way! They get to about fifty yards from the road and I am starting to wonder how far I'm going to let this buck get onto my property before I shoot him to keep him from running wrong way at the shot.
Then the buck turns and heads to the river bottom and does follow.
I turn back around look along the edge of my pasture and there is another decent buck standing like a statue right on the edge 300 yards away looking my way. He just stands there...I glance back over my shoulder and now a doe with fawn are standing twenty yards in front of truck and car over on my neighbor! It is getting very exciting fast...I check back on the buck and now he is out in the field with four does with him slowly heading towards river. It is too windy and a little far to try the 45/70 in that light with evening sun in my face.
Then back on the far corner of pasture four more deer walk out followed by seven or eight... then another five! A couple were huge bodied but too far to tell if nice bucks...all headed towards river slow.
All in all I saw maybe 25-30 last 45 minutes of light...sitting thirty yards from the road twenty yards from my truck!
Cool thing is most of them came out of our pasture, they were in there like ticks. Would like to think at least some of it was due to my habitat work and not just the hunting pressure.
The smug look on my wife’s face as I told her about all the deer I saw out of her goofy stand almost ruined the experience for me......
The pasture has finally gotten really crazy thick from front to back and it is almost unbelievable the amount of deer that bed and hide in it now. Last week was our first gun season and I bet I saw over 100 deer during the week, I’m sure some were repeats...most were really close and very relaxed! Just didn't see many bucks, lots of does and fawns.
A few pics from this fall;
Even had a flock of turkeys fly up to roost around my tree stand one evening
Youngest boy shot a nice one his first sit;
Walking in and out along the shrub strips I noticed some of the pinoaks have really jumped in growth kind of nice at 5'-6', the majority of them are around 3' due to browsing and buck beat downs.
The ROD is a little patchy in the strips some crazy bushy 7' tall with others places 2' tall and browsed down bad but thriving.
The crabs that I totally about ignore in the shrub strips are really looking good, a young DropTine that I would have bet was going to die because of mice girdling came out of it and even has a little fruit hanging.
Here is my crazy deer gun week story;
Last Thursday wind was really hard out of the west, only stand that would really work is the one my wife had me put up for her in the orchard about thirty yards from the road.
I felt like an idiot up there where everyone one could see me right along the road in orange twenty yards from my truck, and traffic was kind of busy...but the view was great. I could see half way across the block in front of me, see my pasture good and watch a few mallards on the front pond. Also was able to really check out the fruit trees to see what still had a little fruit left hanging. Had a rooster pheasant that must have been worked up from the wind thrashing the tall grass keep cackling then flying up for about twenty yards and landing, that was fun to watch.
So about 45 minutes till dark behind me on my asshole neighbor across the road...out comes a decent buck and two does. They are around 150 yards away going away from my with the wind. It is kind of strange because there is a truck and car parked in neighbors turn in 35 yards away from someone that was hunting back there. Deer didn't really seem to mind all the vehicles or the goof up in the tree in the orchard.
I go back to watching east, after a minute I look over my shoulder and the buck and does are trotting my way! They get to about fifty yards from the road and I am starting to wonder how far I'm going to let this buck get onto my property before I shoot him to keep him from running wrong way at the shot.
Then the buck turns and heads to the river bottom and does follow.
I turn back around look along the edge of my pasture and there is another decent buck standing like a statue right on the edge 300 yards away looking my way. He just stands there...I glance back over my shoulder and now a doe with fawn are standing twenty yards in front of truck and car over on my neighbor! It is getting very exciting fast...I check back on the buck and now he is out in the field with four does with him slowly heading towards river. It is too windy and a little far to try the 45/70 in that light with evening sun in my face.
Then back on the far corner of pasture four more deer walk out followed by seven or eight... then another five! A couple were huge bodied but too far to tell if nice bucks...all headed towards river slow.
All in all I saw maybe 25-30 last 45 minutes of light...sitting thirty yards from the road twenty yards from my truck!
Cool thing is most of them came out of our pasture, they were in there like ticks. Would like to think at least some of it was due to my habitat work and not just the hunting pressure.
The smug look on my wife’s face as I told her about all the deer I saw out of her goofy stand almost ruined the experience for me......
Bowsnbucks
5 year old buck +
^ ^ ^ Looks and sounds like critters like your place, H20!! Nice buck your son shot!!! The late summer pics of your pasture look great. Something in there for any critter - bees to deer. Lots of diversity.
No doubt the things you've planted and improved have had BIG positive effects on your wildlife populations. Nice work!!! Darcy has to love the playground you have there. She looks sharp in the pics!!
No doubt the things you've planted and improved have had BIG positive effects on your wildlife populations. Nice work!!! Darcy has to love the playground you have there. She looks sharp in the pics!!
Brian662
5 year old buck +
I'll be doing some shrub planting in my NWSG field and was wondering how long it took you to get those ROD established as well as any other shrubs you have in there. Obviously some depends on the deer browse, but I'm planning to start mine in a cage with a weed mat and hope they get a good jump in the first few years. Yours look great!Have spent a lot of time out at the farm the last couple of weeks.
Planted screened&caged more apple/crab trees, pruned all the fruit trees, cleaned out all the wood duck boxes, planted some more ROD along road from cuttings, cleaned up the trash along road in ditch and caged more of the white pines that are being molested by deer. I found a nice big roll of old farm fence while bunny hunting a couple months ago and the landowner I was on let me have it, was able to cage over a dozen more pines with it.
The whole time I've been messing around out there ducks and geese were coming and going from the ponds, in the last two weeks I've seen mallards/wood ducks/gadwalls/blue wing teal/ringnecks/hooded mergansers and canada geese on the pond this spring...lots of ringnecks. Yesterday a small flock of 30-40 snow geese flew down the river tree top high west to east, they were all white phase which was kind of strange.
There also hasn't been one day that I have been out there that I haven't see bald eagles... adult ones, juveniles and dirty headed/tailed younger ones. They are VERY talkative this time of year screeching and making that broken cackled cawing screaming noise, they are so cool to see and hear. There has been a nesting pair about a mile from me along the river for at least the past six or seven years, I have seen them pluck fish out of the front pond a couple times in the summer.
I've usually been out there from a couple hours to half a day and of course Darcy has to go along to worry the bunnies and mice, she is like a pinball bouncing around the brush piles and running rabbits past me. She will point rabbits while we are walking around and I will kick them up for her, the other day she was on point for about ten minutes as I watched her in the spruce along road. I couldn't believe she would hold it that long and got to thinking maybe it was a pheasant, I did see where a hawk killed one within the last two weeks in orchard. I walked over to her and at the flush....it was a bunny!
I'm going to have to start leaving her at home because the ground birds will be nesting soon along with the turkeys and I don't want her catching any baby rabbits.
I bought some silky dogwood cuttings from John-W-WI in 2019 to plant for road screen in the real wet spot along road. The other day as I was pushing in some ROD cuttings I almost stepped on one! I looked around and saw another and another. They are suckering great and a few were around 3' and budding/blossoming with kind of purple'ish pink catkins or pods on them...others were really browsed down by the deer but still thriving and suckering.
Spring 2019
Now
With some deer luvin
Some of the ROD in shrub strips is pretty bushy now, the deer keep it well pruned...some is 4’ some 2’ depending on how wet the ground and how much the deer bother it.
About the same with everything in shrub strips all depends on how wet and how much deer browes and beat on them, pin oaks look like bushes, cranberry looks great but still 3’ tall bushes along with the rest except for the hazelnuts…they look great around 7’ tall and suckering like crazy, we have a nice grove of them going by the back pond along woods.
