How is everyone's spring habitat projects going?

[remy3424]

No burning this year. For me, I transplanted 5 ditch cedars into an existing shelterbelt that had lost them. Also lost 3 fruit trees so I put 4 back in, a peach, 2 cherries and an apricot...everything likes fruit. The fruit frees are all fenced to protect them from deer. Planted about 5.5 acres of grain sorghum food plots and put a dose of Prowl over them...now would really be a good time to have a bit of rain (for the herbicide and the seed). We were getting some rains (much better that the past 2 years), but nothing now for about 10 days, so it is getting a bit dry again. Those spring rains have given everyone a bit of confidence that more will be coming. Would like to get some more soon, probably have a couple weeks before the hatch starts...they will do better dry than wet. Looks to be a good bird carry-over in my area.

 

[gimruis]

We were getting some rains (much better that the past 2 years), but nothing now for about 10 days, so it is getting a bit dry again. Those spring rains have given everyone a bit of confidence that more will be coming. Would like to get some more soon, probably have a couple weeks before the hatch starts...they will do better dry than wet. Looks to be a good bird carry-over in my area.

The rain quit here too now. Those heavy 6+ inch rains about 10 days ago in southern MN completely missed me.

Not a whole lot in the forecast either. I could see us going right back into another drought for the third summer in a row. Not a fan.

 

[Weimdogman]

I am afraid my area is in for another dry year also. Went into winter so dry that all the snow was just absorbed. Little run off to refill ponds and sloughs.

Friend and I broadcast some sweet clover on his ground. Way over seeded but we haven't had the rain to help it out. I am afraid it won't take.

 

[matto]

So I spent yesterday morning and early afternoon inspecting our family ground and looking at the results of some of my habitat work. I bumped both a hen and a quail off their nests, saw another pheasant slinking into someone else's wheat field, and heard quail at a different spot. Here's what I saw in my habitat work:

Of the 40 shrubs I planted in the spring of 2022, right before this nasty drought set in, 4 leafed out this year. 25 of them had some protection from competition from landscape fabric. Only two of those 25 leafed out. The other two that made it were simply planted in spots that didn't have any existing vegetation. I used a moisture-attracting root slurry on all of them. The 40 were a mix of chokecherry and fragrant sumac. All 4 of the survivors are fragrant sumac.

Three different 1-2 acre areas that I am attempting to get back to NWSG all look a little disappointing. 2 of them were seeded in March of 2022, right about when it stopped raining. I attempted to frost seed the 3rd area this past winter--lots of competition from bindweed in this third area. I'm going to give them this year and maybe next before deciding about replanting. I guess the positive side of this is that one of these areas seems to have a nice stand of kochia developing.

I've gained some ground in my war against against a stand black locust. There was a major offensive in March with chainsaws and Tordon that seems to have helped a lot. There will be some on-going low-intensity warfare with basal-bark treatments of Remedy and diesel fuel for many years.

Last fall we disked three strips in some expired CRP grass to set back the grasses and encourage forb growth. I think the lack of rain in winter and early spring caused some die-off of my good grasses. Regardless, 2 of those strips look pretty good as far as forbs go. The third strip has a lot of cheat grass in it. It almost looks like it was planted in rows along the tracks of the disc blades.

My cheat grass pasture needs grazed again next year, and probably several years after that. Rains in the last month have really produced a "nice" crop.

Big parts of Kansas have had decent rains in the last 30 days. While we have had some rains, my stuff is in the areas that weren't so blessed.

 

[Prairie Drifter]

We've been mostly at a complete standstill here. The severe fire danger this spring prevented me from burning anything. I did get 130-160 acres burned by a wildfire that started on the highway and ran 4 miles north in 50 mph winds before running into wheat ground and dying. We spent a good portion of the winter pulling old miserable fence off of the new acres. Have a contractor in now putting up new. I did have a tree cutting contractor in removing elms, locust, Russian Olives, and cedars for over 200 hours using a skid steer and high-speed saw. We cut part of those trees ourselves as well. May finally have a trio of seasonal help coming so we can get gregarious with a number of projects. We did stock cattle late due to the drought and lack of fresh growth. The rain today will help stave off early destocking I hope. Should start building 3 new marshes in the coming months. Also have been draining the lake to rehabilitate the fish population. Fighting siltation right now. Hope we get enough rain to do summer burns. I'm way out of rotation with our burns and we are needing to get back into burns in both the spring and summer seasons.

 

[lonejackfool]

P.D. can you tell more about cattle stocking when the goal is more quail? how many acres of what kind of forage are you grazing? how many grazing days/head? do you have a formula, or is it by what average grazing height you are comfortable with for the time of year and conditions? how many times a year do you allow grazing? is this more than just spring flash grazing? thanks