Many property management activities in March, April and May are geared towards planting crops. Some of these crops provide immediate benefits to wildlife on your property, while some are planted to provide benefit later in the year. With your specific goals and property attributes in mind, it is a good idea to determine your planting needs in late winter so that you are prepared when optimal planting dates arrive in Spring. As you will see, many of the management calendar activities in this issue are directed towards planting or managing food plots to increase the wildlife value of your property which may include providing quality food, cover and security.
Plant summer food plot crops for wildlife
Throughout most of the Southeast, April and May are the desired planting dates for many summer crops such as millets, sorghum, peas, corn, soybeans, etc. Because many of the seed producing grass type crops that benefit birds are summer crops, wingshooters devote a lot of energy and effort into planting during this time of year. Deer hunters are well aware of fall food plots because they are so attractive to deer during hunting season, which helps hunters observe and harvest deer, but often overlook the benefits of summer crops for deer. If you are not fortunate enough to have commercial agriculture on your property or nearby, planting summer crops will benefit your deer herd if adequate acreage is planted. Many nutrient draining biological processes such as fawning, milk production, and antler development are taking place in deer at this time. Most summer plantings for deer are very nutritious and high in much needed protein. Commonly planted summer crops for deer include many varieties of peas, soybeans, corn, lab lab, vetch, and clovers. One of my “go-to” summer blends for deer in the Southeast is a combination of clay-iron peas, lab lab, peredovic sunflowers, and grain sorghum. One mistake I often see is trying to plant these crops on small food plots. Because they are so attractive, plots need to be at least an acre, preferable more. Deer simply put too much grazing pressure on small plots and in many cases eat all plants shortly after germination before the crop has a chance to establish. Regardless of whether you are planting for birds or deer, a successful planting starts with testing the soil and applying required fertilizers and lime to ensure good soil quality. Create a clean, smooth seed bed and plant under favorable conditions. Favorable conditions mean adequate soil moisture and a good chance of rain after planting takes place. As you can imagine, weed control poses more problems in summer plantings because of the warmer growing conditions. Therefore, it is essential to monitor summer food plots for weed encroachment and treat as needed for optimal forage production.
Screen property lines where needed to prevent or reduce poaching.
Most landowners or hunting clubs that are aggressively managing their property for high quality or high-end wildlife have many resources invested into developing, managing, and/or maintaining their property. Regardless of where your property is, efforts should be made to reduce or eliminate poaching. This includes properly posting your property, having secure gates, and fencing if needed. These activities relay the message that you are serious about trespassing. Something that many landowners or hunting clubs often overlook is using crops, shrubs, or other plants to provide natural barriers or screens to keep people from seeing into your property. Obstructing the view of your property from adjacent landowners, hunting clubs, or along highways or roads may not eliminate poaching, but will reduce the temptation. Most properties only have a few key areas along their border that need to be screened. Some of my favorite “natural screens” include evergreen trees such as Leland cypress, cedars, or pines. These species grow well in many soils and climates and because they are evergreen they provide good screen during the winter months. Unless you are planting containerized trees, such as 25 gallon potted trees, most trees should be planted during winter. An alternative, and something I often do, is to plant spring/summer crops or permanent grass strips that will grow tall enough to do the job. Many of these crops or grasses can be planted in April and May depending on your location. Corn, Egyptian wheat, sorghum Sudan, switchgrass, or some of the taller native warm season grasses not only make good screens, but add wildlife value to your property. Most of these plants will grow through the summer, mature near fall, then die. Leaving the standing dead plants (e.g., standing dead corn) will provide a screen through the winter as long as you do not experience an ice or wind storm.
Prepare now to reduce deer hunting pressure this fall.
Hunting pressure plays a significant role in the hunting quality (number and quality of deer seen while hunting) of your property. Hunting pressure does not necessarily mean a lot of shooting that is spooking deer. The most hunting pressure is often applied when hunters do not shoot at all. Examples of this include making full-scale scouting trips through a property during the season, spooking deer while entering or exiting a hunting stand, and hunting stands during unfavorable wind conditions. Most Westervelt hunting clubs and clients collect hunter observation data where they record the number and quality of deer they see while hunting. This helps us assess hunting quality which plays a role in our deer harvest decisions and hunting strategy recommendations. Years of hunter observation data from our clients shows that deer sightings, particularly mature buck sightings, decrease as hunting pressure increases. Therefore, you should make efforts to keep hunting pressure to a minimum. One way to decrease hunting pressure is to screen hunting stands and hunter access areas with evergreen trees or other plantings to allow hunters to enter or exit the stand without impacting deer in the area. While evergreen trees work well for this application, we often plant tall standing crops such as corn or Egyptian wheat where needed to hide hunters. Because these are spring/summer plantings, you need to think ahead. That is, identify hunting stands that need screening next fall. Strips of corn or Egyptian wheat need to be at least 10 yards wide to be effective since some of the crop plants will fall over after heavy frosts. Obviously wider strips will better conceal hunters. Another trick is to cut/create access trails for hunters to get to the stands quietly and undetected. Although you will need to recheck trails in early fall, cutting/creating them in spring will be easier than waiting until late summer or early fall after vegetation has had a full summer of growth. Lastly, determine the best wind directions for each of your stands. Do NOT hunt the stand unless the wind is right. We keep a stand/wind list at our hunting camp. It is against our rules to hunt the stand under unfavorable winds. You will be quite surprised at how many more deer, particularly bucks, you will see by managing your hunting pressure.
Allow annual clovers planted in your fall food plots to seed out.
If you included fall annual clovers such as crimson, arrowleaf or other red clovers in your fall food plots, you will notice a strong burst of growth during spring and early summer. These clovers will provide excellent wildlife value through early-mid summer. Deer, turkeys, and other wildlife will eat the nutritious foliage of these clovers until the clovers die in summer. Another benefit of annual clovers is that insects are attracted to the flowers produced as the clover produces seed. Insects are an important source of protein for turkey poults and quail chicks. If properly managed, these clovers will produce seed that will germinate next fall and produce another good stand of clover. To ensure this happens, do NOT mow your food plots before the clover produces seed. We generally leave these fields alone and let them go fallow through late summer. After the clovers die, many weeds will begin to take their place. On many properties, these weeds provide some wildlife value. The next management we apply is early fall when we mow the plots as low as possible, allowing the existing weeds a week or so to start growing again, then apply a glyphosate herbicide (RoundUp type herbicide) to prepare the ground for fall. When fall planting time arrives, apply needed fertilizer, lightly disk, then broadcast or drill cereal grains such as winter wheat and/or oats. So, if you want to regenerate annual clovers and take advantage of the free seed produced by the crop you planted last fall, do not mow your food plots before the clover seeds out.
Plant food strips for turkeys and quail.
Food strips are “food plots” for turkey and quail that wind through fields, quail courses, along fire breaks, or wooded habitat. Most supplemental food plantings for quail are established during spring and summer. Food strips are particularly beneficial in years of low native food availability. Plantings of Egyptian wheat, Sorghum-Sudan, grain sorghum, brown-top millet, fox tail millet, and pearl millet are great crops to plant in food strips and will do well in most soil types in the Southeast. Food strips should be planted in a rotational fashion. That is, in successive years place new plots adjacent to previous years plots to create a mosaic of current year plot and stubble/annual weed community from previous years plots. Leaving the food plot stubble (not disking and replanting in the fall) will provide quality cover during fall and winter for game birds.
Drain hardwood areas (aka – greentree reservoirs or GTR’s) that are being intentionally flooded and managed for waterfowl.
Managing and flooding hardwoods is a common management practice to attract and provide quality food for waterfowl. To be effective, the manager must have the ability to control water levels within the area. Most GTR’s are created by building a small dam or levee around the hardwood area being managed that allows you to hold water on the area. Water control structures are used to allow the area to flood, control the depth of flooding, and to release water or drain the area. The timing of the flooding or flooding regime/strategy is very important and, over time, will affect the species of trees that will exist in the area. Ideally, the goal is to have quality oak species that will produce acorns for ducks to eat; along with quality vegetative and aquatic food sources. Most of the desired oak species such as water oak, cherrybark oak, pin oak, laurel oak, and others, are flood tolerant during the winter because they are dormant then, but are not flood tolerant during the growing season. Thus, areas that contain desirable oaks need to be drained before spring green up (which obviously varies throughout the Southeast) to ensure their survival. Areas that are allowed to remain flooded into the growing season will slowly convert to flood tolerant tree species such as tupelo and cypress or other less desirable tree species. Without management, Mother Nature dictates the tree species in an area that floods. Think about areas on your property that remain flooded or only flood during the winter. Areas that remain flooded through summer or year around will be primarily composed of undesirable tree species for waterfowl. Having said this, many of these areas are still attractive to waterfowl due to the aquatic plants and associated invertebrates that colonize in the water. If you do not have a GTR on your property, but have area(s) that would lend themselves well to this type of management, spring and summer is the best time to create them. Depending on the situation, constructing a GTR can be relatively easy and inexpensive and will add additional recreational opportunity for you to enjoy. One word of advice that will save you time and money – consulting with a professional is money well spent during the planning stages.
Conduct timber harvests.
If any of your timber is scheduled for thinning or harvest this year, early summer is a good time to conduct these activities. Harvesting timber during the winter, if your property is dry enough, or during early summer will give these areas the entire growing season to re-vegetate resulting in better wildlife habitat. Timber harvest areas recover the quickest if activities are completed before spring green up. Woods that are harvested late in the growing season, say July, do not have much growing season left to recover or re-vegetate resulting in poorer quality wildlife habitat until the next growing season when plants begin to reestablish. On the same, but different note, when you replant an area in trees consider wildlife friendly site preparation methods. Many industrial timber companies, where the primary goal is growing trees, use herbicide applications that are very efficient in eliminating vegetative competition for the newly planted trees. Unfortunately, the resulting lack of food and cover significantly reduces the wildlife value of these areas for a couple years. Where increasing wildlife value is a goal, options exist that offers a balance between reducing vegetative competition with trees and good wildlife food and cover.
Control feral hog populations
Feral hogs are very destructive and a nuisance on many properties throughout the southeast. While hogs add additional hunting opportunities for landowners, they are difficult to control. I often hear “I’d like to have a few hogs on my property to hunt”. I agree. I’d like to have a few hogs to hunt. However, if you’ve ever had hogs, you know this is not possible…you can not have a “few” hogs. You normally have no hogs or an over-abundance of them. The reproductive potential of hogs is extremely high in good habitats. With pregnancies lasting only 115 days, hogs generally produce 2 litters of 1-13 piglets per year, with the potential to have 3 litters! So needless to say, extreme/aggressive control is needed to simply keep up with or stabilize a hog population. There are many ways to remove hogs. Some of the most common methods include trapping, recreational hunting, and professional hunting/trapping or a combination of all. Hog control should be applied throughout the year or when needed. However, many landowners increase efforts during the summer to reduce disturbance and “hunting pressure” during hunting season. Besides their destructive nature on wildlife habitat, hogs can destroy roads, food plots, pond dams and many other structures on your property. They can do several thousand dollars worth of damage in a short period of time. Controlling hogs will save you time, money, and frustration.
Establish photo points.
Early summer is a great time to begin assessing habitat response from management strategies you have employed over the past year. Pictures are a great way to monitor and document the progress of these habitat enhancements. Examples of areas to monitor include areas that you have burned, harvested timber, applied herbicide, strip disked, fruit tree orchards, and food plots. Several photo points should be located throughout your property. Make sure to take notes or mark on a map where each photo point is located so that you can take the same picture over time. Many landowners take a picture from each location every 6 months. Pictures taken over time from these locations will reveal habitat changes and progress made. To ensure you take the same picture each time it is helpful to mark these locations on a map for future reference.
