Pa Hillbilly Farming

Enjoying the dialogue on carrying capacity of your property. The diversity of location, climate and habitat across all of the property tours on this forum is what keeps it interesting.
 
Fun read on the topic, Double L. I will say, no matter how we choose to supply food and habitat in any amounts, wild populations will tend to still follow a sigmoid/S curve in population densities. As the food and environment allows, there can be exponential growth to a point a carrying capacity is reached. But then limiting factors such as weather, predation, disease, and resources will tend to cause a drop in the numbers until those factors once again favor repopulation to or above carrying capacities. This is true with plants, prey, or predators all to some extent. So no matter what we do, there will be these fluctuations tho our efforts may help to minimize the peaks and valleys of the curve.
So in reality, we truly have limited control regardless of our thinking , at least in my opinion. The caveat with the whitetail, is that they are one of the few animals than can supercede carrying capacity and maintain it for quite a while before nature takes charge and brings it under control by starvation, disease, predation, etc. A oversimplified formula you may use is N/T=B-D. N=change in number, T change in time, B birth, D death. Of course using some type of educated guess on survival and births. The questions you ask of yourself are the same we all wrestle with if we are trying to manage habitat. Thanks for the discussion.
 
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sunday after I got home from the drag races I hurried up and scrubbed off the mess on top of this area and just hand seeded area and ran my little cultipacker over it. This spring I had a bear get into my little shed and tore open bags of seed, so I planted a variety of food for them, it’s a little bit of everything. This bottom access I opened up into this plot I feel should be an awesome bow stand. It sits atop of a large bowl which I did some hinge cutting in February that the deer like to bed in. Hopefully with the warm weather something will still grow.


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here is a view of this project.



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the far away fields in top right view are the closest ag fields


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here is my newest addition. “The sawmill plot”. The logging is getting close to being done. I just started to clear stumps and brush.


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This happened purely by accident. Last year since that was first planting, I just planted a variety of stuff which had clover in it. This spring I used my land leveler on the field and all looked dead and clear. I drilled corn and beans into it this spring and the clover sprouted up. Glad it did since now I’ll have that after corn is done. I find it ironic that most of my good stuff I just stumble across by accident


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Interesting corn/clover picture. Never thought of it as a pair but it does make sense. The corn looks to be doing just fine. Great "accident".
 
Really enjoying your updates. I love mountain plots—really draws the deer in. I don’t have a drill so I can’t duplicate your clover/corn. I do plant beans with my corn then broadcast rutabagas around the perimeter to take advantage of the fertilizer.
 
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well I was making some progress with the clearing but didn’t see a small limb that was up against the top of the front glass as I was watching the stump / brush pile I was pushing with the excavator. Another one of those days I guess. Atleast this plot may have dirt in it instead of all rocks.


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Love looking at your property. Very nice job you've been doing with it.

BTW, when I was younger and we were Farming we always mixed seeds when we planted. For example Oats and Clover. The Oats would spring up and provide a "cover crop" for the Clover. Once the Oats were harvested the Clover would take over the Field and provide a 2nd Crop.

I kind of did the same thing when I did my Food Plots on my Lease Properties. I mixed the Clover Seed with another Late Season Seed for the diversity it will provide as the Season progresses.
 
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I think with the size of his body and no bigger head gear this one might need to be a call buck. What do you think?


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not a big buck but I thought he has neat rack beams almost touching. One of many JV players I have waiting to go to varsity team one day.


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Hope he gets through the season. These cudelinks are like watching hillbilly Tv. Lol



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I think with the size of his body and no bigger head gear this one might need to be a call buck. What do you think?


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It can be seen that the tines are shortish definitely; But for a deer to survive to maturity such as this one he does have qualities that are great to have -survival know how. I'd take him here but not as a cull buck but as a great deer that has survived many seasons in a heavily hunted state. Any of us be proud to see deer on his/her property reach that age. He is shootable for sure but not as a cull but a special deer. Best of luck to you in harvesting him.
 
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