What Habitat Work Did You Do Today?

[Tangler]

Frost seeded a small food plot and the trail/road leading to it.

 

[Telemark]

I can't do anything outside. We're getting a brutal storm in from the North Sea that is just pounding the whole area. Seems like the wet air hits the mountains and shoots up into cold air above. It's been hours of rain, sleet, snow, and howling winds.

 

[ksJoe]

Deluxe! Would love to hear details on the pump outlet and how the water gets distributed

It is a long term work in progress. I've had ideas in mind for a couple years or so. I'm progressing inrecementally as I prove various ideas as good or bad.

Last year a lighting strike fried some of my cat6 network cable going from the blind to POE cameras I use for trail cameras. While retrenching that I put in 20 yards of 3/4" pex from the creek to the clover. That was my small test to see if how things could work before committing too much time to it.

I do not want to attempt normal high pressure irrigation (like residential sprinklers). High pressure means small orifaces, which requires filtering. I think it'd be a never ending fight cleaning filters and nozzles. So my early plan was to just let water dump on the ground from tubing at various points. Then I saw these wobble sprinklers and thought I'd give them a try. Coverage is suprisingly good (around 15 yard diameter circle with fairly even distribution). I think they will likely work out fine, but dumping water on the ground is forever my plan B if it gets annoying.

I have a 120v sump pump laying in the creek bed (laying on the mud bottom). It has no screen on it (about 1" holes around the base for water inlet). So far I've had the wobble sprinkler plug up with a twig, a minnow, and a crawdad. It seems like the biggest problem is things being at or in the pump when I turn it on (like the crawdad and minnow). Once its running, things stay away from it. So if it doesn't plug up in the first 30 seconds, it will run for hours without plugging.

I am deliberately letting some challenges happen in these early phases to get a sense a of how much challenge I have to deal with. That's why so far I have no filtering. I'm thinking I'll drill some 1-2" holes around the side of a 5 gallon bucket with lid, and get some window screen to the bucket with. Then put the sump pump inside the bucket. That should keep the minnows & crawdads out of it.


The early testing has been good, so I'm ready to expand. I took last week off work for a play week at the land. It was my intention during that time to trench 70 yards or so and lay a lot of 3/4" pipe. I got a 500' roll of 3/4 irrigation tubing (just $85 online for 500' of 3/4"!). But the 30 year old trencher broke. After a few failing non-destructive repair attempts, I'll be welding the chain drive sprocket straight onto the hydraulic motor shaft. if that doesnt work I'll buy a new motor and split/compression hub for a proper repair. Once I get past that I'll have 6-8 water outlets. My plan is high volumen low pressure, which means a sump pump. Low pressure means it has larger orifaces, which means less plugging.
I'll be making a manifold (2-4" steel pipe with a bunch of 3/4" threaded bungs welded to it) to attach all the 3/4" pipe to. When its all working I might do a thread on it with detailed pictures.

The blind has 800w of solar panels, 520ah of LiFePO4 batteries, a Reolink 16 channel POE nvr, and 10 or so cameras. I added a big power inverter last year, which allows me to run a pump off it. Running the pump during full summer sun ought to be about equal to the power coming in from the solar, so running it in the morning or evening will draw the batteries down. But I'm thinking on summer mornings I ought to be able to run 3-4 hours in the morning.

 

[fingers]

It is a long term work in progress. I've had ideas in mind for a couple years or so. I'm progressing inrecementally as I prove various ideas as good or bad.

Last year a lighting strike fried some of my cat6 network cable going from the blind to POE cameras I use for trail cameras. While retrenching that I put in 20 yards of 3/4" pex from the creek to the clover. That was my small test to see if how things could work before committing too much time to it.

I do not want to attempt normal high pressure irrigation (like residential sprinklers). High pressure means small orifaces, which requires filtering. I think it'd be a never ending fight cleaning filters and nozzles. So my early plan was to just let water dump on the ground from tubing at various points. Then I saw these wobble sprinklers and thought I'd give them a try. Coverage is suprisingly good (around 15 yard diameter circle with fairly even distribution). I think they will likely work out fine, but dumping water on the ground is forever my plan B if it gets annoying.

I have a 120v sump pump laying in the creek bed (laying on the mud bottom). It has no screen on it (about 1" holes around the base for water inlet). So far I've had the wobble sprinkler plug up with a twig, a minnow, and a crawdad. It seems like the biggest problem is things being at or in the pump when I turn it on (like the crawdad and minnow). Once its running, things stay away from it. So if it doesn't plug up in the first 30 seconds, it will run for hours without plugging.

I am deliberately letting some challenges happen in these early phases to get a sense a of how much challenge I have to deal with. That's why so far I have no filtering. I'm thinking I'll drill some 1-2" holes around the side of a 5 gallon bucket with lid, and get some window screen to the bucket with. Then put the sump pump inside the bucket. That should keep the minnows & crawdads out of it.


The early testing has been good, so I'm ready to expand. I took last week off work for a play week at the land. It was my intention during that time to trench 70 yards or so and lay a lot of 3/4" pipe. I got a 500' roll of 3/4 irrigation tubing (just $85 online for 500' of 3/4"!). But the 30 year old trencher broke. After a few failing non-destructive repair attempts, I'll be welding the chain drive sprocket straight onto the hydraulic motor shaft. if that doesnt work I'll buy a new motor and split/compression hub for a proper repair. Once I get past that I'll have 6-8 water outlets. My plan is high volumen low pressure, which means a sump pump. Low pressure means it has larger orifaces, which means less plugging.
I'll be making a manifold (2-4" steel pipe with a bunch of 3/4" threaded bungs welded to it) to attach all the 3/4" pipe to. When its all working I might do a thread on it with detailed pictures.

The blind has 800w of solar panels, 520ah of LiFePO4 batteries, a Reolink 16 channel POE nvr, and 10 or so cameras. I added a big power inverter last year, which allows me to run a pump off it. Running the pump during full summer sun ought to be about equal to the power coming in from the solar, so running it in the morning or evening will draw the batteries down. But I'm thinking on summer mornings I ought to be able to run 3-4 hours in the morning.

My hats off to you...I've considered something similar but it just seems like too much work and Id have to rent the trencher.

 

[fishin coyote]

Top worked a bradford pear and cleaned up some blow downs blocking my trail from last weekend’s storms.

 

[Turkey Creek]

Got some frost seeding done today! We haven't had frost in a couple of weeks and none in the forecast. Oh well, we will see what happens. We have multiple CHANCES of rain this week, I will believe it when I see it. I figured it was now or never on the clover and chicory that I had wanted to frost seed. The new plot got tilled and seeded with a clover blend. It was pasture and there are almost zero forbs in the pasture, so even if the clover doesn't take well I dont think it is going to get over run with weeds this year. I can keep hammering the grass as it tries to reestablish and then overseed early next Fall if the weather looks decent. The small plot in front of the tower blind got seeded into clover and chicory. Same story, we will see if the weather can give me any kind of a break. lt was beans last year so the weeds should be manageable if the take is poor on the clover and chicory. Overseeded a bit of one of my clover trails as well.

 

[somich]

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.

I saw the fenced in tile and thought; I've got a lot of wasted dug out 4" tile, I could fence the into a bundle and drop a couple in the pond for fish habitat.

No cost, easy, helps my pond and gets rid of scrap tile

 

[somich]

I went out with Freyja to confirm where we're putting 10 tamaracks and 20 paw paws.

Well, I got us on the pontoon on the pond and while we achieved our goal, we mostly sat there and listened to pheasant roosters pre courting.

The geese are pretty much nightly visitors.

I was also making sure that the the pond was ready for the possible 5" of rain over the next week. The pond is about 4" below overflow and the overflow drain is flowing pretty well, now that I got a chunk of wood and a dead possum clog of weeds out of the tile.

Monday I'll need to make sure flow is good. Don't want the back of the pond to blow out.

 

[Derek Reese 29]

Top worked a bradford pear and cleaned up some blow downs blocking my trail from last weekend’s storms.

What did you graft it over to? Or did you just cut it off in preparation for grafting? I want to get started on grafting but my pears are just starting to break their leaves out..weather looks promising though

 

[Westwind]

Finished up our 100+ yard fence tear out. It actually started last fall with tractor work but the rubber really hit the road late winter. Involved cleaning up brush on both sides of the fence, everything from saplings to trees that needed notched and cut and then cleaning out all the wire. All on a side hill that spooked me to run the tractor on. It was a bear! I upped my joint care supplements, fish oil, turmeric and took way too much alieve the last few weeks! Seems like I have wore a trail tho Costco for medicinal bourbon too, lol. What kinda sucks is while I want to transition this patch to switch but it was actually great deer habitat. Rubs everywhere on the trees I tore out. Massive brush pile stacked with the grapple. Only thing left is to hunt stumps with Tordon.

Used the tractor with grapple, couple chainsaws, Stihl clearing saw, pole saw. Someone asked for a review on the clearing saw I bought last spring, still gotta do that.

 

[fishin coyote]

What did you graft it over to? Or did you just cut it off in preparation for grafting? I want to get started on grafting but my pears are just starting to break their leaves out..weather looks promising though

It had 2 main trunks about 4”. I put Kieffer on one and Ayers on the other. I never grafted anything before so we’ll see what happens. I did leave a nurse branch in case it doesn’t work out.

 

[PatinPA]

It had 2 main trunks about 4”. I put Kieffer on one and Ayers on the other. I never grafted anything before so we’ll see what happens. I did leave a nurse branch in case it doesn’t work out.

I was wondering when to graft for us PA folks. Not too worried if I kill some Bradford's but I'd like them to take. I've heard people talk about when the barks slipping but I'm not sure what that means. Maybe I'll try to graft on Saturday if it's not raining.

 

[jsasker007]

Got 1/1. Moved one trap and we are ordering two more traps for us and 5 for the renter.

They are a constant battle over here. Far less common headed your way.

I'm lucky on my own property it's too much clay for gophers. Maybe about the only good thing about clay unless you want a hole to hold water, it'll hold water.

 

[jsasker007]

Finished up our 100+ yard fence tear out. It actually started last fall with tractor work but the rubber really hit the road late winter. Involved cleaning up brush on both sides of the fence, everything from saplings to trees that needed notched and cut and then cleaning out all the wire. All on a side hill that spooked me to run the tractor on. It was a bear! I upped my joint care supplements, fish oil, turmeric and took way too much alieve the last few weeks! Seems like I have wore a trail tho Costco for medicinal bourbon too, lol. What kinda sucks is while I want to transition this patch to switch but it was actually great deer habitat. Rubs everywhere on the trees I tore out. Massive brush pile stacked with the grapple. Only thing left is to hunt stumps with Tordon.

Used the tractor with grapple, couple chainsaws, Stihl clearing saw, pole saw. Someone asked for a review on the clearing saw I bought last spring, still gotta do that.

Sense of accomplishment when you get projects like yours finished. I hate trying to work on hills. You must be nervous with the grapple on the hillside? Anytime I'm on slanted ground I keep everything just barely off the ground and ready to lower it quickly when it feels tippy.

 

[sandbur]

I'm lucky on my own property it's too much clay for gophers. Maybe about the only good thing about clay unless you want a hole to hold water, it'll hold water.

I am on the edge of the Anoka Sand Plain.

 

[jsasker007]

I am on the edge of the Anoka Sand Plain.

Pretty much opposite soils and only 40 minutes apart. I don't need much moisture and you probably can hardly keep enough. My well for my house is only about 35' down.

 

[Westwind]

Sense of accomplishment when you get projects like yours finished. I hate trying to work on hills. You must be nervous with the grapple on the hillside? Anytime I'm on slanted ground I keep everything just barely off the ground and ready to lower it quickly when it feels tippy.

Definitely satisfying!

Grapple does make me nervous. It's really heavy- I think it is primarily built for skid loaders. Then you pick up something heavy...

I also really try to keep in mind how I turn the front wheels. That can feel really unsettling sometimes.

 

[Derek Reese 29]

I was wondering when to graft for us PA folks. Not too worried if I kill some Bradford's but I'd like them to take. I've heard people talk about when the barks slipping but I'm not sure what that means. Maybe I'll try to graft on Saturday if it's not raining.

I’m in the same boat got lots of Scion just waiting to be used but don’t want to do it too early or late…