bueller
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Welcome, let's update that lurker status to regular poster ;)
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Bowsnbucks
5 year old buck +
Glad you're on board Coop. Pretty good guys on here, and I've learned a TON from them - particularly when it comes to apples & crabs. I now try to share from my experiences ...... which were helped immensely from these fruit tree guys. I'm in their debt as well !!
We're ALL habitat junkies here. Join the crowd.
We're ALL habitat junkies here. Join the crowd.
tinytim
5 year old buck +
Hi, I'm Tim. I found this site a little while ago and joined recently. I am up here in Nova Scotia, Canada. Our camp is on 285 acres, most all of which has been cut over 20-25 years ago. I have been slowly making improvements the best I can. I have learned so much from my reading on here, The fruit tree guys got to me also, to the point I have ordered 100 Bud 118 rootstocks and have 500 persimmon seeds in the fridge due to come out and be planted up in the next 2 weeks. I am also hoping that the snow melts before the end of april this year!
kpj5br
5 year old buck +
Hi all - Bueller sent me over from another site, good to be here, figured I'd add to the intro thread!
My real name is Jon Keller - don't ask about the handle of kpj5br it's an extremely old story and all of my forum handles have been that way for 20 years now (yes I was an early Internet user in the 90s!)
I'm 40 now, married with a 12-year-old daughter who of course is not just the apple of my eye but the whole orchard! :)
I've been hunting and fishing since I can remember, but really got more serious after picking up bowhunting about 10 years ago, have since taken my bow all over the world, been lucky to have been on some cool hunts.
I have close friends who have had cabins in Burnett County, WI for a long time, and have been hanging with them and hunting the public lands around Webster and Danbury for about 15 years now, along being a somewhat-regular at Coyland Creek and a few of the local places. A few years back (2012) we were able to buy a cabin in the area, and last year an 80-acre piece with recent pine harvest on nearly 60 of it came up for sale, 500 yards down a dirt road from my cabin property line, it did hit the MLS but only for 24 hours...
So this year begins my journey in private hunting / habitat land, food plots, and that fun stuff that goes with it. I haven't actually lifted a finger yet, just walked the property a few times, and reading and studying and trying to figure out a plan.
Look forward to getting involved in the site, seems like a great group!
My real name is Jon Keller - don't ask about the handle of kpj5br it's an extremely old story and all of my forum handles have been that way for 20 years now (yes I was an early Internet user in the 90s!)
I'm 40 now, married with a 12-year-old daughter who of course is not just the apple of my eye but the whole orchard! :)
I've been hunting and fishing since I can remember, but really got more serious after picking up bowhunting about 10 years ago, have since taken my bow all over the world, been lucky to have been on some cool hunts.
I have close friends who have had cabins in Burnett County, WI for a long time, and have been hanging with them and hunting the public lands around Webster and Danbury for about 15 years now, along being a somewhat-regular at Coyland Creek and a few of the local places. A few years back (2012) we were able to buy a cabin in the area, and last year an 80-acre piece with recent pine harvest on nearly 60 of it came up for sale, 500 yards down a dirt road from my cabin property line, it did hit the MLS but only for 24 hours...
So this year begins my journey in private hunting / habitat land, food plots, and that fun stuff that goes with it. I haven't actually lifted a finger yet, just walked the property a few times, and reading and studying and trying to figure out a plan.
Look forward to getting involved in the site, seems like a great group!
Spiider
5 year old buck +
Welcome to the forum, KPJ! There is a lot of information and reading to do. Take your time, get information from others, take your time, learn from others experience and then make informed decisions :) No plot of land is the same and one size doesn't fit all. But much of the methods and practices voiced here can be uniquely applied to various layouts. For example, I'm mostly hunting with my 3 young boys. So my focus has not been on management for mature bucks, but on as many "deer" sightings as I can get for them. They want to play and have fun too. I think there is a balance that can be obtained, no matter what your management goals may be. Take a lot of pictures and share your experiences!
scott44
5 year old buck +
Welcome!
Bill
Administrator
Life will never be the same. Can't say if that's good or bad :)
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Merle Hawggard
5 year old buck +
Hi all, my name is Scott, I live in northeast Arkansas, I'm 51 and have been married 33 years. I have 3 son's, a granddaughter, and grandson. I've worked the past 28 years for a rather large steel company. We, neahawg and I, have 151 acres that we either work on, hunt, or fish in our 4 acre pond. I've read a lot of what you all have done to improve your property on this forum and the other one as well. We've planted lots of chestnuts and my fruit orchard is starting to come along thanks to the ideas I've picked up here. I also raise beagles ,ellison ridge redman bloodline and my avatar shows last year's pups. I still listen to merle haggard and go to most home razorback games, hence my forum name Merle Hawggard.. I also restore old chevrolet' s when I find the time, on any forum except this and the other one, I'm mingoman.
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wiscwhip
5 year old buck +
I'm glad my wife doesn't like "deer porn", if she saw your avatar photo, we might just be making a trip to AR...:eek::D We have a 5 year old male tri-color. Before him we had a female tri-color.
Merle Hawggard
5 year old buck +
Great to find a fellow beagler. I kept 4 out of the litter and my deer hunting probably suffered do to my training time with them this past year. Love to deer hunt and work on improving our place, but I really like to hear the pups get after rabbits on a frosty morning too!
wiscwhip
5 year old buck +
I don't actually "hunt" over mine, but we "hunt" every time we walk out at the county park. It is on a large island in the middle of the Mississippi River and it is covered up in rabbits. Funny thing though, we have a "house" bunny as well and he rarely chases it when we let it out of it's cage. We taught him to leave the "bunny" alone but that it was ok to chase "rabbits".:D
4wanderingeyes
5 year old buck +
Hi my name is Scott I am in my mid 40's, I live in southern MN, but own a small piece of land in NW Wisconsin in Washburn county. I bought the land about 15 years ago, and initially used it as a camping site in the summers, and another place to deer hunt. Now I am looking into the future more, and wanting to make improvements on the land for wildlife, and also planning my retiring spot. Before I found habitat sites I "knew" all I needed to know about deer, and wildlife. But as I found some of the habitat sites, I have figured out, I dont know nearly as much as I thought I did. I grew up as a farmer, so it is in my blood, but trying to apply it to food plots, with little, or no equipment is challenging. My land is mostly wooded, in the middle of big forest.
Last spring was my first real land improvement, I cut down a couple 3/4 acre plots, and converted an old campsite into foodplots. So I now have 3 food plots approximately 3/4 acre each now. I have started some hinge cutting, and opening up the canopy area in and around oak trees. I still have a lot more to do, but last winter I figured out I start second guessing myself with tree identification, and rather then cutting down oaks, I will stop, and mark them this summer, for next season. I have a small apple orchard started with 10-15 apple trees in it, none have produced yet. It seems that every year I get flowers, it freezes. I had a couple last year with great potential, and fully loaded with flowers, but between late frosts, deer pushing into the fence and eating them, and myself spraying gly around the trees, we managed to set them back enough not to produce. I also started planting pockets of white pines in thin areas around my land, and also added some for screening, but my plantings havent quite been as successful as I hoped. They look kinda brown right now, so I have my doubts many, if any are alive. I have a lot of bear around my land, with an over abundance of wolves as well, so they tend to keep deer numbers in check, or below check most years. DPSM differs a lot, on where the wolf packs hang out. I can go from years of seeing 20 deer a day, to years of seeing 2 deer an entire season.
My goals are to make my land thicker, and create an area that deer want to be, or to at least want to go to. My plans are to continue with the food plots, improve the soil, and increase the screening around perimeters of my plots, and walk ways to and from stands. I also need to figure out how to hunt my land a little better. As of right now, my best hunting spots are in the back of my land, and in the middle of my land. Being it is small acreage, I dont have to many quality options to choose from. I can sit up towards the front of my land, so I dont have to walk through it to get to the stands, but there arent very many deer in the front part. I am also in the middle of building a couple enclose stands to cut down on being busted in stand, as that was a big problem last fall bow hunting. A couple other things I want to do is, build a couple small drinking areas, small 10'x10' water holes. Then in a couple years, I plan on digging a 50'x50' pond. Which brings me to one other goal, I plan on building a cabin/my retirement home on the front of the property in about 3 years. I know this may set back deer hunting some, but the deer arent nearly as important as my enjoyment of being in the woods.
I have found that this habitat improvement is way more addicting then I would have ever thought. I use to be a die hard fishermen, and spent all my free time on the water, and all my thoughts on where, and how to catch my next biggest fish. Now I cant stop thinking about being at my hunting land, whether it be just for fun, or to work. But I find, even when I go to just have fun, I try to do as much work as possible, or at least until my wife yells at me to "stop, we came here to relax, and all you do is over work yourself", but she is very understanding, and there is no way I could do this without her.
I hope to learn a few things, and try to apply them to my addiction. I read, and follow some of your threads on other sites, and am envious of how well you guys have done, and I try to pick up as much as I can from some of your posts.
Scott
Last spring was my first real land improvement, I cut down a couple 3/4 acre plots, and converted an old campsite into foodplots. So I now have 3 food plots approximately 3/4 acre each now. I have started some hinge cutting, and opening up the canopy area in and around oak trees. I still have a lot more to do, but last winter I figured out I start second guessing myself with tree identification, and rather then cutting down oaks, I will stop, and mark them this summer, for next season. I have a small apple orchard started with 10-15 apple trees in it, none have produced yet. It seems that every year I get flowers, it freezes. I had a couple last year with great potential, and fully loaded with flowers, but between late frosts, deer pushing into the fence and eating them, and myself spraying gly around the trees, we managed to set them back enough not to produce. I also started planting pockets of white pines in thin areas around my land, and also added some for screening, but my plantings havent quite been as successful as I hoped. They look kinda brown right now, so I have my doubts many, if any are alive. I have a lot of bear around my land, with an over abundance of wolves as well, so they tend to keep deer numbers in check, or below check most years. DPSM differs a lot, on where the wolf packs hang out. I can go from years of seeing 20 deer a day, to years of seeing 2 deer an entire season.
My goals are to make my land thicker, and create an area that deer want to be, or to at least want to go to. My plans are to continue with the food plots, improve the soil, and increase the screening around perimeters of my plots, and walk ways to and from stands. I also need to figure out how to hunt my land a little better. As of right now, my best hunting spots are in the back of my land, and in the middle of my land. Being it is small acreage, I dont have to many quality options to choose from. I can sit up towards the front of my land, so I dont have to walk through it to get to the stands, but there arent very many deer in the front part. I am also in the middle of building a couple enclose stands to cut down on being busted in stand, as that was a big problem last fall bow hunting. A couple other things I want to do is, build a couple small drinking areas, small 10'x10' water holes. Then in a couple years, I plan on digging a 50'x50' pond. Which brings me to one other goal, I plan on building a cabin/my retirement home on the front of the property in about 3 years. I know this may set back deer hunting some, but the deer arent nearly as important as my enjoyment of being in the woods.
I have found that this habitat improvement is way more addicting then I would have ever thought. I use to be a die hard fishermen, and spent all my free time on the water, and all my thoughts on where, and how to catch my next biggest fish. Now I cant stop thinking about being at my hunting land, whether it be just for fun, or to work. But I find, even when I go to just have fun, I try to do as much work as possible, or at least until my wife yells at me to "stop, we came here to relax, and all you do is over work yourself", but she is very understanding, and there is no way I could do this without her.
I hope to learn a few things, and try to apply them to my addiction. I read, and follow some of your threads on other sites, and am envious of how well you guys have done, and I try to pick up as much as I can from some of your posts.
Scott
