The Playground

[E_308]

For those new to my ramblings the playground is 120 acres in NE Missouri. The area is known for big deer, this particular property is not. I haven't really found my missing piece to get to big (150"+) deer yet. The property always holds deer and turkeys. Quail and rabbits are coming back nicely. Property boundary outlined in red:



http://caltopo.com/

My property boundary in red.

 

[E_308]

03/28/2016
As a lot of absentee landowners I have to line my habitat plans up with time off. With fire you throw in the extra variable that the weather must cooperate. Wednesday there was about a half inch of rain with snow following Thursday morning. Rain was in the forecast for all day Saturday. I decided to try to burn on Good Friday.

The CRP, a couple of years since the last burn



The NWSG on the southwest chunk. Broomsedge, big blue, and Indian grass with some encroaching CSG.



Old field growth in the south east chunk. A little bit of everything in here.



General burn area is the grey line - completed in three pieces.

 

[E_308]

Burn conditions were plenty damp for a really hot burn.

Humidity started around 65% (not good with damp grass) by 3 pm it was around 45% and burning pretty well. High temp was around 50 which made it pretty nice on the crew. I had a S - SE wind about 10-15 mph. As wet as the leaf litter in the timber was it would put itself out at the trees which made it very easy to control. We did make a lot of SMOKE!





By the time we got to the big patch the humidity was down enough I could get a little heat for some better brush control.

 

[E_308]

The aftermath...

The CRP = good burn through most. Iron weeds, thicker AO patches, and ditches didn't burn. I also backburned around my disk in the top of the pic.



Old field - decent cedar control



The NWSG is always good for some big fire.



Had to light the camping spot too since it was too wet to mow on most trips last year.

 

[E_308]

05/02/2016
Went up to try to shoot a turkey this past weekend. Of course it rained all day Saturday, Sunday cleared off fairly nice. Problem was I only heard two turkeys within a mile! Didn't see one all weekend, weird year.

After a slow day of turkey hunting I decided to load the kid up and go get some groceries out of the pond. I caught about 10 bass and he was working over a top water lure. Hadn't caught anything but he was getting better at casting. All of the sudden I heard a bunch of splashing and he was wallering a three pound catfish up on the bank. Like an idiot I reached down to take the popper out of his mouth and he rolled and stuck one of the treble hooks in my index finger to the bone. Had to pull it out with my pliers, still don't have feeling in about half the finger tip. But the kid got a lesson in hook removal! Fried the fish up last night.



Sunday morning I was setting in a draw calling heard something to my left. At about 15 feet a coyote ran out of the ditch. I started some pup yelps on my mouth call and another one popped out of the ditch. It sometimes better to go first! At about 10 yards the Longbeard XR #6's worked just fine.



With the dreary weather I didn't take many pictures. My rye is about 10 inches tall. Way too muddy to get anything planted yet.



Out of the 4 bluebird boxes I checked, I had two batches of birds. Evicted mice out of the other two. This wet weather will be hard on the turkey nests, wish I could build a box for them.

 

[E_308]

05/31/16
There has been a bunch of rain up at the playground. I mudded in about an acre of sunflowers, milo, and soybeans using a spray, seed, cultipack and pray method. I put about 15 pounds of sunflowers on that I had left from last year. I sprayed this and another plot with 2 qt/acre Roundup (and ran out for a strip in this field). The other plot got about 80 pounds of NWTF ($14) soybeans using the same method.



Broadcast the seed into the weeds then cultipacked it in. If it would have been a little softer it would have been more than the arctic cat could handle.



With all the rain the burned areas have really taken off. I mowed up some trails on the higher spots.



Of course since turkey season is closed............

 

[OkieKubota]

Very Open country - could that be part of the issue with the bigger bucks... Down here the only places we can kill really big deer is in the timber unless you are out in Western Ok where there is no timber but also few people...

 

[E_308]

This place is much brushier than the places I have killed my big deer. In my opinion it probably has to do with a lot of pressure on surrounding properties. I'll have some 120"-130" inch deer using this property but if it's like last fall I'll shoot a 150" buck in a wide open cattle pasture! Big deer or not I will spend most my time in a stand on this place.

 

[OkieKubota]

This place is much brushier than the places I have killed my big deer. In my opinion it probably has to do with a lot of pressure on surrounding properties. I'll have some 120"-130" inch deer using this property but if it's like last fall I'll shoot a 150" buck in a wide open cattle pasture! Big deer or not I will spend most my time in a stand on this place.

I got you...Pressure can be a huge problem!

It's a different world in our area. Big deer come from timber PERIOD here. A big deer that gets in an opening is killed regardless of season or not so they have evolved into forest dwellers. I see photo's of bucks from the western part of our state and from other states with bleached white antlers from the sun and ours are so dark they are hard to make out in low light even though we are only 10-50 yards from them in order to see them...

 

[dogdoc]

Beautiful place--layout looks very similar to my place. Great burn pics---wish I had the guts to do some burning.

 

[dogghr]

Good thread of your place. As i've said before, love the vice grip fish.

 

[OkieKubota]

I need to get some bluebird boxes built...Love the pics of the little birds in yours...

 

[E_308]

I need to get some bluebird boxes built...Love the pics of the little birds in yours...

I think these are the plans we used on our last batch.

http://www.noble.org/ag/wildlife/ebluebirdnestboxes/

The swing out side makes them easy to check.

 

[lakngolf]

All right. Glad to see the catfish in the vice grips again. Glad you have your thread going over here. Look forward to your updates.

 

[E_308]

My biggest chestnut looks like it died back a little but is still making progress



This one is almost out competing some Sercia that found it way in the tube.



First trip up since Memorial Day, had to borrow the brother inlaws machine to save a little time



The fire last spring really flushed the partridge pea, unfortunately it does the same for the Sercia Les.

 

[E_308]

Last falls rye.


Mowed it close


Horn seeder and five pounds of purple tops



This old seeder is an antique, my Grandpa used to overseed clover in pastures with it. The settings aren't to complicated!



After seeding I went over the whole patch with a little gly. Decent chances for rain all week.

If all else fails I have about 30 acres of this.

 

[E_308]

Over in my little oak orchard....

My DCO is about 7 foot tall



Might have some acorns


Concordia Oaks did well this summer



Thought I got this one a little warm in my prescribed fire but it looks like it came back from the roots



Set up the two trophy cams so hopefully I will have some pics in a month or so. Didn't see a deer all weekend on this place, will be interesting to see how the count is compared to previous years. Also didn't completely miss the black raspberries this year, I was able to wade in to the center of a few and got enough for the kids to have a cobbler tonight. Better go divvy that out before they try to do it themselves!

Thanks for looking

 

[OkieKubota]

Did you plant the soybeans or do you have a farmer leasing?

Your trees look great! Here on our hollow I have to cut trees down to plant another kind of tree but over on our other place I am turning our old cattle pasture into a forest

How do you use that seeder?
I bet that cobbler was great! Nothing beats a good cobbler

 

[E_308]

My brother in law farms the bottoms, this is the first year for quite a few we have been able to get them in. He doesn't like it when I refer to it as my "big food plot".

The seeder is pretty easy. You put the bag around your neck and swing the horn back and forth. Just like throwing grass seed by hand the horn just gives a little more even distribution. It would wear a guy out if you had too many acres to do!

The cobbler was worth the scratches!
http://www.myrecipes.com/recipe/easy-blackberry-cobbler

 

[OkieKubota]

My brother in law farms the bottoms, this is the first year for quite a few we have been able to get them in. He doesn't like it when I refer to it as my "big food plot".

The seeder is pretty easy. You put the bag around your neck and swing the horn back and forth. Just like throwing grass seed by hand the horn just gives a little more even distribution. It would ware a guy out if you had to many acres to do!

The cobbler was worth the scratches!
http://www.myrecipes.com/recipe/easy-blackberry-cobbler

LOL on the "Big Food Plot".

My old spreader my buddy got from the dump that was already really rusted finally completely rusted out. I am looking at getting a new one right now. I usually hand spread all of my seed but used the spreader for lime and a little fertilizer...I think this year I am mixing my lime, fertilizer, and seed all together in the spreader.

I am going to have to try that cobbler recipe out. Looks simple enough!