Pheasant Nesting in Winter Wheat

UGUIDE

UGUIDE

Active member
Does anybody have any info or statistics about the nesting success of pheasants in Winter wheat?

I specifically am putting WW in my roation and making sure 1/3 is in the fields on both farms every year for this very reason. Would be nice to put some numbers to the potential productivity benefit.

My operator already thinks I have plenty of nesting acres and I say "NO, need more".
 
After a little google research found this interesting old article.

http://digitalcommons.unl.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1002&context=nebgamewhitepap

Interesting stat is that it clains 87% of nesting occurred in wheat and roadsides and 25% in alfalfa. Supports my concern for declining wheat and alfalfa acres in general due to stronger corn prices.

DU has a strong wheat campaign in ND and SD duck regions and I think PF is going to have to join ranks to prvide incentives to farmers to plant wheat.
 
A man named John Gates did a study in Wisconsin back in the 1960's involving 2,000 pheasant nests. Here is what the study found;

Cereals-30% nests hatched
Peas-0% nests hatched
Hay-18% nest hatched
Ditches or Fence lines-20 to 25% nests hatched
Wider roadside ditches-30% nests hatched
Edges of Wetlands-50% nests hatched

These #'s can vary due to the area. Predator populations, types of predators, surrounding habitats, weather/harvest, etc all play into nesting success. Also, the larger the nesting area the greater success hens had (in this study) due to a decrease in predation efficiency.
 
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Kansas State Univerisity did a study in the 80's or 90's and the thing I remember the most was that the critical factor was the lenght of the cut stubble left. I believe the point at which real nesting success started was 9 or 10 inches--but the longer the better.:)
 
SDJIM said:
Kansas State Univerisity did a study in the 80's or 90's and the thing I remember the most was that the critical factor was the lenght of the cut stubble left. I believe the point at which real nesting success started was 9 or 10 inches--but the longer the better.:)
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Are they talking about carry over stubble from the previous year? Used to be the dry side of Kansas, SW Nebraska, and Eastern Colorado, they used strip farming, left 1/2of the field in stubble, in rows alternated with new wheat, lots of annuals mixed in to hold the soil against wind erosion, and conserve moisture. If anybody does that anymore! When nesting in new crop winter wheat, almost all hens are done nesting and are brooding various sized birds at harvest time. Use of stubble, and success, after harvest would surely be dependent on stubble height, and might well be useful to late or renesting hens. I don't know how much of this is applicable to the methods in use currently.
 
When I was a kid the county I live in in NW OH had the highest pheasant density in the country. You would be hard pressed to find a wild bird today, even in wildlife restoration areas.

I think that one of the major changes to farming practices was smaller farmers keeping some livestock that required hay. Winter wheat was undersown with red clover. After the straw was baled the clover was allowed to grow out the rest of the season. The next year it would be cut and baled. There were quite a few nests destroyed in the first cutting, but there were also other acres in winter wheat that wouldn't be harvested until after the hatch. There was also soil bank and some of the legume cover crops were rotated into that. The next spring the clover would provide traction on wet greasy clay soils so it could be spring plowed and add green manure to the soil. You could get on it sooner in the spring than bean and corn fields. 4WD and better drainage has change that.

Now, with no clover cover crops in the wheat, fall plowing (despite the gvt's best efforts to promote no till), no fall overseeding of corn with rye because modern machinery has enough traction to get through wet fields, there is no nesting or winter cover. Almost all the 5 acre wood lots are gone. Herbicides and pesticides have eliminated the food sources for chicks. Much of what little CRP there is has become so rank that it is a desert for game birds.

When you drive down the road here the landscape looks a lot like SD or IA along I29, but by now most of the corn has been plowed under, the wheat stubble is about 2 inches high and bean fields are bean fields as far as winter cover is concerned. The only grass is along the roads and everybody mows them like they are part of a municipal park.

I think winter wheat with a legume undercrop is the ideal nesting situation for pheasants in addition to well managed CRP.;)
 
SDJIM said:
Kansas State Univerisity did a study in the 80's or 90's and the thing I remember the most was that the critical factor was the lenght of the cut stubble left. I believe the point at which real nesting success started was 9 or 10 inches--but the longer the better.:)
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Find someone with a stripper head to cut your spring wheat. Stubble is a lot higher than when cut with a reel head.
 
moellermd said:
Find someone with a stripper head to cut your spring wheat. Stubble is a lot higher than when cut with a reel head.
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This is the ticket!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Birds can even renest in this , as there is enough cover to do so!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Found several fields of WIA like this and all had birds!!!!!:10sign:
 
Over 70% of the pheasants in western Kansas generally come from nests in winter wheat. Randy Rodgers did research in western Kansas a decade or two ago that you may be quoting. The best stubble was 15 inches tall or more. The microclimate that was created by that height of stubble supported the best weed response and subsequent bird response. That is mostly negated if it is sprayed and not allowed to mature. The increased snow retention replaces the moisture lost to the weeds. This is in either summer fallowed stubble or stubble going to be no-tilled to milo the following year.
 
Chris, I read through this study. http://digitalcommons.unl.edu/cgi/vi...ebgamewhitepap

The thing is, in this study there is almost no grassland. Road ditches and some old farmsteads. 1st nesting the hens where concentrated in these areas and almost all nests lost to predation, we have to think that the abandoned nests were do to interruption also.
Alfalfa is cut early to get quality and several cuttings, likely all nests are lost.

At the time of the first nesting the Winter Wheat is to short to attract nesting pheasants. After the first nesting fails the WW is knee high or taller offering good cover. With the much larger areas of the wheat fields hens are less concentrated less predation. Harvest is six week or so away so these WW field are a good place for nesting and brood raising.

In areas with more grassland there will be a much better first hatch. You may not see the results of nesting in WW like you would in the areas of these studies where there is more intensive farming and very little grassland.

I think Winter Wheat is a good choice. There will always be late nesting, WW is good cover and a good food source for growing pheasants. Harvest with the Stripper and let the stems go through Winter. Game birds will use the area until heavy snowfalls.
 
I agree with your logic MNMT. there are just a ton of variables when these little buggers nest. For example like the one where if there was a lot of little chicks making noise around nesting hens they equated that with the hens leaving the nests as a population control factor when pheasant numbers were really high. Go figure!
 
UGUIDE said:
Yeah but if you bale it aren't you taking out $10-$15 in organic matter and Fert?:p
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Not to mention the cost of fuel to harvest and the wear and tear on equipment, and time and labor, which farm folk always seem to discount. At 10-15 dollars per acre, you'd do better time/risk vs. reward, as a Walmart greeter.
 
UGUIDE said:
Yeah but if you bale it aren't you taking out $10-$15 in organic matter and Fert?:p
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oldandnew said:
Not to mention the cost of fuel to harvest and the wear and tear on equipment, and time and labor, which farm folk always seem to discount. At 10-15 dollars per acre, you'd do better time/risk vs. reward, as a Walmart greeter.
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You guys must think this is my first rodeo.

The value in fertilizer is about $25 a ton.
Cost to bale is about $25 a ton (fuel, labor, netwrap, cost of equipment ect) .
About 1.5 tons of straw per acre.
Cost per acre about $75
Value of straw is $70 a ton or $105 an acre.

Probably can make for than 10-15 and acre but I left a little wiggle room for delivery to market ect.

On a side note if you stack your wheat bales and corn stalk bales every other one in a row it looks really pretty.
 
moellermd said:
You guys must think this is my first rodeo.

The value in fertilizer is about $25 a ton.
Cost to bale is about $25 a ton (fuel, labor, netwrap, cost of equipment ect) .
About 1.5 tons of straw per acre.
Cost per acre about $75
Value of straw is $70 a ton or $105 an acre.

Probably can make for than 10-15 and acre but I left a little wiggle room for delivery to market ect.

On a side note if you stack your wheat bales and corn stalk bales every other one in a row it looks really pretty.
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Not my first rodeo either, been cutting and baling hay and straw for years. Even if I concede the fertilizer value as accurate, and there is plenty of studies which claim higher value, pasture grass fertilizer here can be as high as 45.00 per acre if you hire it done by the elevator. I dispute your lump sum figures for labor, fuel, netwrap, cost of equipment, as optimistic. Value of that straw crop, or even hay is highly variable, right up to including years where it's carried over, and isn't sold at all. It's all high now. Last year, year before, and year before that, ordinary pasture hay, (fescue mix), sold for $40 per ton and went wanting, wheat straw sold for about the same, except small squares for the townies, it went for about $75.00 per ton, so the retailers could sell it for $6.00 a bale @ Ace hardware. Maybe instead of cutting your own you should come down to Missouri and truck it home. I agree it looks pretty. Makes money? You use your own,have a need for it,and would have to replace it, so it works for you, in your operation. Selling as an absentee landlord,paying to cut and bale, Idoubt there's any value at all besides some heartache and excercise, both mental and physical.
 
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