A Soil Test

[shawn cox]

I found a patch of some goldenrod last year on the other side of my property that was hit pretty hard but it was later in the summer. I'll keep on eye on what's growing in the field and see if they eventually browse it. They seem to like some plants at certain stages of growth. The teaweed for example. They won't browse it until later on. Beautyberry is the one I never see used here even though its often listed.

Yes I have never seen the American beauty berry or goldenrod browsed on my place ever. It is strange how they will browse it in different locations but not in others. I think it is a product of what is available at the time. They will naturally seek out the more beneficial to them plants in mho.


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[John Barnes]

Don't forget to mention how pretty a weed plot is. I tried to frost seed red and crimson clover where my brassica plot was last fall. Clovers didn't do anything, so I tried a throw and mow of buckwheat, but didn't have thatch for it, so it came in very sparse. Weeds have come on full force now. Mostly white cockle, and I think alyssum. Neither is browsed by deer, but don't really bother anything either. Will make a good thatch for this fall's planting.

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[Crimson n' Camo]

Don't forget to mention how pretty a weed plot is. I tried to frost seed red and crimson clover where my brassica plot was last fall. Clovers didn't do anything, so I tried a throw and mow of buckwheat, but didn't have thatch for it, so it came in very sparse. Weeds have come on full force now. Mostly white cockle, and I think alyssum. Neither is browsed by deer, but don't really bother anything either. Will make a good thatch for this fall's planting.

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Have you added any fert or lime??? A little shot of N along the way will help you produce more biomass. Make sure to balance your other nutrients as well.

 

[Kabic]

Was checking out some smartweed info and found this and thought of this thread.

http://www.natureswayresources.com/infosheets/shootmessenger.html

 

[Baker]

I found a patch of some goldenrod last year on the other side of my property that was hit pretty hard but it was later in the summer. I'll keep on eye on what's growing in the field and see if they eventually browse it. They seem to like some plants at certain stages of growth. The teaweed for example. They won't browse it until later on. Beautyberry is the one I never see used here even though its often listed.

Interesting because I see fair pressure on the beauty berry though almost exclusively late summer early fall. I have a lot of beauty berry.

 

[Lewi B]

Was checking out some smartweed info and found this and thought of this thread.
http://www.natureswayresources.com/infosheets/shootmessenger.html

Thanks for the link.
Interesting article.

 

[Crimson n' Camo]

Specie #17: Pokeweed

This one gets browsed pretty hard up until it gets tall and tough. I definitely don’t mind having a pokeweed component to my summer mix. It can actually get to be a pretty large plant and produce some decently woody biomass if it has room to grow. I’ve got some growing now in the buffer around my field that are probably 8ft tall. The young, tender ones make the best forage though.

 

[Crimson n' Camo]

Specie #18: Morningglory

Not much in the way of deer use but it’s a very pretty wildflower that’s attractive to hummingbirds and other beneficials. It also adds a vining component to the mix.

 

[Crimson n' Camo]

Specie 19: Carolina False Dandelion??

Another showy flower on this one…..again a very common theme amongst the natural plant community. I recall reading somewhere that dandelion was actually a good nutrient miner too...but not sure about the false dandelion. I would imagine that most all of these plants are playing a nutrient mining role in some form or fashion.

 

[Rempump870]

Specie #18: Morningglory

Not much in the way of deer use but it’s a very pretty wildflower that’s attractive to hummingbirds and other beneficials. It also adds a vining component to the mix.

I had Morning glory invade my clover plot in the woods. It didn't take long and it over crowded the whole plot and shaded out the clover. Mowed it to knock it back last year and then hit it this with mowing and butryac. Stuff might be pretty but it is really good at growing!

 

[Crimson n' Camo]

I had Morning glory invade my clover plot in the woods. It didn't take long and it over crowded the whole plot and shaded out the clover. Mowed it to knock it back last year and then hit it this with mowing and butryac. Stuff might be pretty but it is really good at growing!

Where I’m located in the deep south, clover isn’t really something I can realistically grow all summer. Most of it is eventually gonna go dormant in late July or August due to our extreme heat. Exposing the clover to direct midday sunlight only makes it go dormant that much quicker. About the best I can do is to grow clover from March-July………knowing that eventually the clover is gonna go dormant and be taken over by the other plants for a time period…..Hopefully though, I can still get some clover that lingers in the shade of the other plants for as long as possible. I’m good with it because clover alone just won’t produce the kind of biomass I’m wanting to get out of my summer crop. The clover is only one component of the "mix".

 

[dgallow]

For >30" rainfall zones:

Broadleaf herbaceous plants...aka forbs....aka weeds.....aka primary colonizers are natural 'primers' for plant succession on bare or poor soil. They thrive in bacterial dominant soil. Receeding glaciers are an extreme example of bacterial dominant soil. If you eliminate your soil primers, what do you think is going to happen to soil organisms?

Here...legumes of various types often follow broadleaf plants the following year or two. Then perennial grasses come in and start the 'field stabilization' effect of late early succession to mid succession. Native perennial grasses have coarse root systems so they rely heavily upon soil fungi for root proliferation and growth. IT is at this time where soil function is becoming optimal. By the same token, a food plotting system must always have a grass (annuals are fine), if improvements in soil health are to be made in terms of soil microbial population and balance and soil level beneficial insects.

As more of the decadent grass material returns to the soil recycling process, the soil favors growth of woody species which require high soil fungi numbers relative to bacterial numbers to thrive. Take out the brush...bare the soil...and guess what returns?...and guess what was lost? Mature full canopy forest is the extreme example of soil fungal dominance.

My point is this.....Initially some seeds you plant will fail to establish as the soil fungal:bacterial ratio is not favorable for their growth. Over time as diverse plant materials are returned to soil OM, the fungal:bacterial ratio become favorable for a broader range of plants. IF you maintain the practice of planting diverse mixes and following other soil health guidelines, what you should see is a proliferation of some species which struggled initially and some encroachment of woody species. Required inputs at this point should be nil with forage growth curves extended over more of the growing season. Plant resilience to environmental stress is built into the soil and often bred out of the plant by well intentioned plant breeding!

Dr Johnson is doing research in this area. He is finding low correlations between NPK and seedling growth....low to moderate correlations for SOM....and high correlations for soil fungal:bacterial ratios and plant growth.
https://peerj.com/preprints/789v1.pdf

 

[dgallow]

The #1 metric for high quality deer habitat and carrying capacity is simply the number of active growing points available for deer use per unit area of land. Watch the plant parts deer or other herbivores eat...then watch the plant growth response to being bitten. Are many more new growing points on preferred plants available throughout the growing season? How soon do non-bitten plants mature relative to bitten plants? When should management intervene to 'reset plant clocks' or 'setback non-use plant prevalence'?

 

[Crimson n' Camo]

Good stuff D….My field has apparently made a big jump toward more fungal activity.

 

[Crimson n' Camo]

Specie #20: Dog Fennel



Dog fennel is beginning to show up pretty prolifically now. It’s amazing at the change from just last year. I may mow the field with the mower raised up really high if the dog fennel begins suppressing the rest of the plant community. For now I’m gonna let it go ahead and grow though because its gonna bring in some good woody biomass….#1 goal for me in the summer right now is soil building….continue to keep that in mind.…...I think the dog fennel could provide a good midday shade for the durana clover if I could keep it thin enough. Its seems pretty easy to deal with just by mowing.

 

[DocHolladay]

Specie #17: Pokeweed

This one gets browsed pretty hard up until it gets tall and tough. I definitely don’t mind having a pokeweed component to my summer mix. It can actually get to be a pretty large plant and produce some decently woody biomass if it has room to grow. I’ve got some growing now in the buffer around my field that are probably 8ft tall. The young, tender ones make the best forage though.

Goes well with scramble eggs too.

 

[Crimson n' Camo]

Something else I should have added about the dog fennel is that it makes the best screen of anything I’ve seen. I think what I may try with my field is to mow some east/west strips across it and leave some strips of the dog fennel to grow tall…..serving two purposes…….1) midday shade for the other plants while still allowing light into the understory……and 2) Screening that I may leave standing all winter. I’m thinking I may leave a strip somewhere in the middle of the field to really make the back end feel more secluded.

 

[shawn cox]

Something else I should have added about the dog fennel is that it makes the best screen of anything I’ve seen. I think what I may try with my field is to mow some east/west strips across it and leave some strips of the dog fennel to grow tall…..serving two purposes…….1) midday shade for the other plants while still allowing light into the understory……and 2) Screening that I may leave standing all winter. I’m thinking I may leave a strip somewhere in the middle of the field to really make the back end feel more secluded.

sounds like a great idea.

 

[shawn cox]

Specie # 14: Ragweed

A good bit of ragweed is coming in. I’ve got a buffer around the edge of my field that’s full of it so I’m sure that’s helped it to encroach. I forget the exact numbers but if you’ll look back in that link on the nutritive value of field weeds I think you’ll find it to be one that’s pretty high on the list from a protein and digestible matter perspective.

Check this one out that’s growing near a common entry trail. This part of my field really gets hammered hard and makes it even that much tougher to get things growing in this particular part of the plot.

this ragweed by my feeder is getting ate on pretty good. Some places they eat it and some they don't.

 

[Crimson n' Camo]

sounds like a great idea.

That's dog fennel in the background of this pic still standing strong in mid-Feb, I mow it before spring green up and it comes right back. Mowing during the growing season suppresses it though and allows for more grass and broadleaf growth. Now that's it's growing in my bigger plot more....I think I'm gonna use it to my advantage and carve out a food plot using it as my screening. Making the back end of the field more secluded should make for an outstanding bow plot.