What Habitat Work Did You Do Today?

[rocksnstumps]

Cleaning out and tending last year's tube planting is so important the first couple years and why others fail. I see that happen a bunch with tubes on public land plantings. Some contractor is hired to plant em and that's the only money allocated and no followup. A few years later and not many are doing well.

Folks get all excited planting their new stuff and neglect or have limited time to get to maintenance on previous tube plantings.

Like your fencing corral for keeping the wind from the blowing them around when left at the land.

 

[Newbie]

PSA for my fellow cheapskates:

I use a lot of rods and stakes. 5' T-posts would be great, but they add up quick during prlanting season. So I use a lot of the 48" fiberglass "driveway marker rods". They have reflective tape on them and the idea is you can see headlights reflecting off the tape to identify where the driveway is at night (in snow, etc).

Menards sells 5/16" marker rods for around $1.89 regular price. I've never paid that. They occasionally put them on sale free after rebate (limit 20) or $0.50 after rebate, and I load up then.

On amazon, there's 1/4" diameter rods (1/16 thinner than Menards) for quite a bit less. Last fall I bought 100 for $55. When used as stakes, they're noticeably inferior to the ones from Menards, but for the price I was satisfied.

But right now there's one vendor selling them extremely cheap. I just got 250 marker rods for $60.90. That's slightly under 24 cents each. They're thin & weaker than I'd prefer. But they're still great for some things, like staking short tubes, and rodent cages.

I made a "grounding rod driver bit" for my cordless SDS+ hammer drill, so they're very easy to put in too.


Currently priced at $60.90 for 250 stakes, free shipping:

Amazon.com: Relaxweex 250 Pcs Snow Plow Markers 48 Inch Fiberglass Driveway Markers, 1/4 Inch Dia Reflective Snow Stakes with Reflective Tape for Plowing Visibility : Patio, Lawn & Garden

Buy Relaxweex 250 Pcs Snow Plow Markers 48 Inch Fiberglass Driveway Markers, 1/4 Inch Dia Reflective Snow Stakes with Reflective Tape for Plowing Visibility: Garden Stakes - Amazon.com ✓ FREE DELIVERY possible on eligible purchases

www.amazon.com

Do you use these for tree tubes? Mesh wire fencing?

 

[ksJoe]

Do you use these for tree tubes? Mesh wire fencing?

They're far too week for 5' tree tubes. I've got terrible rodent problems on my land. Pack rats strip bark off trees. I think the rats are a worse problem for me than the rabbits and deer.

My protection strategy right now is:
- anything that will tolerate a 5' tree tube gets one (with a T-Post).
- trees that need serious protection but don't like 5' tubes get a fence cage and a short tube (18-24" of 4" black drain pipe).
- things that need only moderate protection may get a 24" high (4" diameter) drain pipe tube.

These are excellent for short tubes up to 24" in length. Actually on the shorter tubes I usually cut these in half.
I'm also using them on some wire cages. I don't expect them to be great at that, but 4 of these stakes is probably adequate for a fence cage around 3' in diameter. Smaller diameter fence cages they're great on.

BTW, I also quit using weed mat because it draws rodents who like to live underneath it. I either use no weed suppression, or use mulch. A couple years ago we had a tornado in the town we live in (we weren't affected), and there is still a massive pile of chipped osage orange from the city's cleanup. The city lets residents come get it for free. I back a truck into the pile, clime the pile, and kick/shovel/whatever the pile down into my truck.

 

[ksJoe]

Today we planted:
10 pitch/loblolly pines (replacing dead ones in existing cages; its a 2' hardware cloth rodent cage + 4' fence wire deer cage)
50 eastern red cedar (no protection, for screening property lines)
25 sandhill plum (1.5' drain pipe tubes + cages)
25 smooth sumac (2' tubes, no cages)
25 golden currant (1.5 - 2' tall hardware cloth cages)
10 black cherry (5' tubes)
6 elderberry (short tubes + cages)
4 American Beautyberry (2' tubes)

I was supposed to get 10 hazelnut and 10 buttonbush too, but Misouri Conservation Dept. left them out of the order. They were allocated and paid for. Online it looks like they think they shippped them...

 

[ksJoe]

Do you use these for tree tubes? Mesh wire fencing?

Here's these cheap fiberglass rods cut in half (24") to support short tubes, and full length to support a fence wire cage. If the deer want to remove the cage they can. Each year I have 1-3 lifted off the stakes and tossed around when the bucks are rubbing. Other than that, they leave them alone. And when a cage is removed by a rubbing buck they usually leave what's inside it alone because their motivation for fighting the cage was not the tree/shrub. So I just put them back in place and go on with life.

These also have upsides. In soft ground (mine is), I can install them with a cordless SDS+ hammer drill with a ground rod driving bit in it. It zipps them right down. If I grip tightly I can usually pull them out if I need to. So its much easier than T-posts on install and removal (not to mention compared to the price of T-Posts these are basically free). They won't be the best choice for many people, it just depends on your situation and your priorities.

 

[Turkey Creek]

Must have been a tree/shrub planting day. Temps were in the mid 90s, but I will start getting a terrible backlog on planting if I don't get started. I have a few hundred shrubs to put in before we start on work planting. I planted a few different shrubs a couple of years ago and the Fragrant Sumac has done the best so far, the damn deer won't leave the American Plum alone long enough for them to get any real growth. I will probably try spraying some "repellant" in my shrub plantings this year to see if it makes a difference.

Put a few Arborvitae around the enclosed blind and planted some Fragrant Sumac and Roughleaf Dogwood today. I do like using a dibble bar for shrubs much less physical toll on me and less ground disturbance so hopefully hold the soil moisture a little better. I dibble a few holes, pour them full of water from a bucket and then drop in the shrubs and dibble the planting hole shut.

 

[KY wild]

Must have been a tree/shrub planting day. Temps were in the mid 90s, but I will start getting a terrible backlog on planting if I don't get started. I have a few hundred shrubs to put in before we start on work planting. I planted a few different shrubs a couple of years ago and the Fragrant Sumac has done the best so far, the damn deer won't leave the American Plum alone long enough for them to get any real growth. I will probably try spraying some "repellant" in my shrub plantings this year to see if it makes a difference.

Put a few Arborvitae around the enclosed blind and planted some Fragrant Sumac and Roughleaf Dogwood today. I do like using a dibble bar for shrubs much less physical toll on me and less ground disturbance so hopefully hold the soil moisture a little better. I dibble a few holes, pour them full of water from a bucket and then drop in the shrubs and dibble the planting hole shut.View attachment 90927


View attachment 90926

nice hunting hut

 

[KY wild]

Today......
*kiilled coon in yard trap for stealing bird seed every night for 2 weeks
*checked on loggers finishing up and installing water diversions on roads
* treated bees for mites
*watered grafts in 5 gallon buckets and pulled leaves below grafts
* WATCHED A COVEY OF QUAIL CROSS THE ROAD AT MY FARM.......BIG DEAL.......FIRST TIME IN YEARS I HAVE SEEN THE GAME BIRDS

 

[sandbur]

Set the first gopher traps of the season in the alfalfa field.

 

[PatinPA]

No pics but got up last weekend and trimmed all the fruit trees, grabbed some pear scion to graft over some bradfords at my parents. Frost seeded clover, took a couple treestands down I was too lazy to grab over winter, and threw out some fertilizer on the fruit trees. Pretty productive. Grabbed trail camera cards. Still have a few buck holding as of a week ago. More interested to see if there are any turkeys around. Two jakes was all. Couldn't even see a beard on either of them.

 

[jsasker007]

View attachment 90934Set the first gopher traps of the season in the alfalfa field.

My in-laws have gophers galore over by Bulldog lake. My dad has them everywhere on his property in Brainerd which is the sandiest ground I've seen other than the beach.