Walked around yesterday
- Thread starter McFarmer
- Start date
Goosemaster
Well-known member
Damm that looks deep. I hope that isn't Northern South Dakota!!
GladHunter
Active member
As posted in a different thread, different parts of the state have different weather/temps. I'm pretty McFarmer is up in the NW part of the state, they got more snow and are colder in general. The central and southern areas got very warm yesterday. Des Moines reached 47 and where I am south of the metro the snow is basically gone.
My favorite saying about Iowa weather, "If you don't like the weather wait for tomorrow, it'll change."
My favorite saying about Iowa weather, "If you don't like the weather wait for tomorrow, it'll change."
Well the mapping program said 2.1 miles all told.
We talk about hunting in the snow and cattails, some on here may not be familiar. Other folks may have different experiences. Here are mine.
The day got warmer, up to 38° so the snow settled some and now has a crust. There was probably 8” on the open fields and 2+ feet in the cover, much more on the edges.
Lots of tracks on the edges of the cover, not hardly any in the cover until you got to the cattails and thickets. Any birds I got up were long, long range, certainly not my type of shot. A couple hens stayed and there were probably some a dog would have flushed closer. I didn’t carry my shotgun not knowing how much work it would be.
Any birds that got up from the fields or edges went to the thickets, they just drop straight down, and if you can hunt that you are a better man than I. Not even any deer trails. Crust on cattails is worse than none at all. You still go through the crust, with nothing to support it, and then you have to pull your foot out.
I couldn’t have been in the cattails without snow shoes. What deer trails there were had ice in them so you know it was thin. I broke through once and went down flat. Glad no one had a camera to document an out of shape 71 yo thrashing around in cattails, 2 feet of snow and water below that. By the time I got myself on two legs it looked like a battle had been fought there. Snow shoes aren’t like skis, they don’t just come off. You have get the shoes under you, put your hand on the tips of the shoes and push your self up.
I have about 8 different CRP and EQUIP seedings, the one shown is one of two solid switchgrass stands. The other is the old cave-in-rock from Iowa. The Docotah is a northern variety that is much shorter than the Iowa one. And, it seems the Docotah isn’t uniform between sources, the seed for this stand came from two companies. The one is about 4 foot tall and the other is a foot taller. The short one doesn’t hold the seeds at all while the other had maybe half its seeds still attached.
The big bluestem had lost all its seeds. The pollinator patch had some coneflowers with seeds but that was about it, nearly all the forbs were buried.
The birds were feeding in the corners, the combine does a lot of backing up there, along with running some over. Amazing how smart they are.
Anyway, I was glad to get back, snow shoes are hard on the hips, you have to walk with the feet wider apart than you are used to. It was a long morning.
We talk about hunting in the snow and cattails, some on here may not be familiar. Other folks may have different experiences. Here are mine.
The day got warmer, up to 38° so the snow settled some and now has a crust. There was probably 8” on the open fields and 2+ feet in the cover, much more on the edges.
Lots of tracks on the edges of the cover, not hardly any in the cover until you got to the cattails and thickets. Any birds I got up were long, long range, certainly not my type of shot. A couple hens stayed and there were probably some a dog would have flushed closer. I didn’t carry my shotgun not knowing how much work it would be.
Any birds that got up from the fields or edges went to the thickets, they just drop straight down, and if you can hunt that you are a better man than I. Not even any deer trails. Crust on cattails is worse than none at all. You still go through the crust, with nothing to support it, and then you have to pull your foot out.
I couldn’t have been in the cattails without snow shoes. What deer trails there were had ice in them so you know it was thin. I broke through once and went down flat. Glad no one had a camera to document an out of shape 71 yo thrashing around in cattails, 2 feet of snow and water below that. By the time I got myself on two legs it looked like a battle had been fought there. Snow shoes aren’t like skis, they don’t just come off. You have get the shoes under you, put your hand on the tips of the shoes and push your self up.
I have about 8 different CRP and EQUIP seedings, the one shown is one of two solid switchgrass stands. The other is the old cave-in-rock from Iowa. The Docotah is a northern variety that is much shorter than the Iowa one. And, it seems the Docotah isn’t uniform between sources, the seed for this stand came from two companies. The one is about 4 foot tall and the other is a foot taller. The short one doesn’t hold the seeds at all while the other had maybe half its seeds still attached.
The big bluestem had lost all its seeds. The pollinator patch had some coneflowers with seeds but that was about it, nearly all the forbs were buried.
The birds were feeding in the corners, the combine does a lot of backing up there, along with running some over. Amazing how smart they are.
Anyway, I was glad to get back, snow shoes are hard on the hips, you have to walk with the feet wider apart than you are used to. It was a long morning.
Wind River
Well-known member
Thank you for your personal survey. All wildlife will be challenged. Way too early this year. God bless.
dustin mudd
Well-known member
Good habitat is wildlife’s winter survival tool. Looks terrific . GREAT work!