Is there any way to act on this knowledge? Maybe fund small fenced off "islands" where cattle and fire are excluded every 1,000 acres or so?
QF and PF do not care about anything other than padding corporates pockets. They are poorly run.
Great read and you obviously have vast knowledge of the topic. Can this be translated into action? e.g., any merit in attempting to structure a reward system for ranchers willing to create "quail ponds" or small fenced off habitat islands among the vast areas of cow dining rooms?
Tend to agree but I'm probably biased by the bad taste left by QU and the turkey criminals (both out of Edgefield SC). It does seem that their primary activities are asking for your money directly and indirectly (by lobbying for taxpayer funded "programs"). Is DU any better? Seems like they've had some success in helping protect and nurture nesting areas but that could be illusory. Also, just a nit, but FWIW I think PF is actually headquartered in Minnesota of all places.
Yes they are in MN -- I dont even need to look up annual pheasant harvest figures to see how successful PF has been in creating pheasant habitat in the state their HQ'd in
On the private side, a landowner has to "want" to work for wildlife in order to invest in practices that benefit wildlife that may well cut into his bottom line. Not all landowners have that interest. In the advent of "precision agriculture", I would hope that more landowners find out exactly what land is not providing them profit and they take those acres out of production. Read an article once that spoke about a farmer finding via the GPS harvest monitor on his combine that an island of soil in a particular field eliminated the profit of the entire field. He put those acres into CRP and farmed the profitable acres with the added CRP acres, which returned all the acres into productive income producers. It is this mentality that we need to get into a system through the farm program, putting those non-productive acres into permanent habitat that provides both income for the owner and useable space to the farmer. Changing CRP from a maximum of 25 million acres to a minimum of 50 million acres would go a long way to satisfying that ideology. Pressure to get CRP guidelines that only include "native" covers would also make sure that the modified acres were conducive to supporting wildlife populations. There are many ideas out there. We, as voters need to make the government aware of what we want to see in those programs.
Good stuff - but don't see expanded government programs as a realistic solution in the era of the national debt accumulating at the rate of trillions per milli-second. And a primarily urban/suburban political constituency, to boot. You hit on a good point, in particular, that good farming practices and good wildlife habitat are NOT competing interests, or shouldn't be. Personally - it beats the hell out of me why I get paid not to till unproductive and/or easily eroded soils. I'd do that for nothing and believe many, make that most, would do the same.
I didn't know you could kill cedars that easily, but that's a good thing - right? Wouldn't want to be the guy that re-routed a creek, we got threatening letters from The Man for just clearing the brush out of a creek bed to reduce the amount of soil erosion and attendant water pollution.
Just so it's out there for folks who, like you, may not understand the difference between deciduous trees and evergreens, there are a few differences. First, evergreens do not go dormant come winter or drop their leaves. Second, deciduous trees store their reserves in their roots where evergreens store theirs above ground. Hence, when you kill the above ground portion of an evergreen, they are dead! Whether that is by fire, heat, or cutting them below the lowest green limbs, they are done. Deciduous trees vary in the strength of their resprouting capabilities, but most all of them can resprout when the top is damaged, removed, or killed.
Thanks, good to know. In my experience, much more limited than yours I am certain, once you got 'em - they always come back but from your excellent information above, I surmise the "replacements" are transports from, maybe, seeds in bird poop from other cedars in the general neighborhood. Now for the $64 question - how do you make a honey locust go away and never come back without the application of world-class carcinogens to the "stumps"!
The answer to the Locust question is, have another drought like we had in 2012! That killed a lot of my locust on the area. Otherwise it is Pathway herbicide. Thanks for the compliment on my work. Have almost 36 years in with KDWPT and am getting more done that ever. Helps to be a scrounge. Helps to have folks adding to the accomplishment list. I've hired nearly 100 seasonal employees over the years and one of my favorite stats are how many of them have gotten full time jobs with this department or others. Probably several more than I know about.