Aldeer.com Forums Alabama Deer Talk Quality Deer Management Let's take a walk around the farm...

Today was mostly about checking on my planted trees, digging around in the food plots and a little bit of hack and squirt. I hope you enjoy the tour.

First things first, get the snake protection on so I’m not paranoid all day:


First stop is to check on the Ozark Chinquapins. I stratified about 40 seeds over the winter and put them in the ground in March. Here’s a line of about 20 and most are turning into seedlings:




One thing about tree tubes, never just poke your face to one for looksee. The majority have wasp nests. Makes cleaning them out interesting:

Next stop is to check on the road screening. 72 Chickasaw Plums on the inside row at a 20ft spacing and the back two rows of oak on a 35ft spacing. Oaks planted were Live Oak, Pin Oak, Water Oak, Southern Red, Swamp Chestnut and a few Nutall. All looked good, 70 of 72 plums were leafed out. 99 of the 105 oaks are leafed out. A few pics:

Sometimes it’s hard to tell if there is a survivor in there due to weeds, but once you open it up there usually are some signs of life:




You can really see the benefits of using a moisture/weed mat by the growth of the weeds around the edges:

Next stop is to check on some bareroot Chickasaw plums. I couldn’t get these in until March and I heavily trimmed the roots in order to plant with a dibble bar. The trimming plus the drought really set them back. Of the 200 I planted, I counted 25-30 that are living. Next year I will find a source that will ship in December or January. A few pics of some living and one dead:





While checking on the plums I come across the cogon patch that I have been hammering every time I’m there. It looks rough:




A few native shrubs popping up here and there in my old fields. Beauty berry in this case:

Last of the trees is an orchard I started last spring with 12 persimmons. They all look good and most are out of tubes:




Also added some mulberries, prairie crab and southern crab this winter. They are all looking very good and will probably be out of tubes this growing season:





Last fall I potted 25 Allegheny chinquapin seeds. This is my only survivor. Not sure what I did wrong, but the effort will continue this fall/winter:

Now I’m ready to go look at a few food plots. The first one is my sandy field and I’ve struggled to get anything to grow there, but I’m determined to build that soil back. I broadcast Alyce clover on it 11 days ago. I don’t see any signs of life yet, but I’ll check back in a couple weeks:



Next stop is a dying clover field that I broadcast vetch into. Still too early to see anything, but there is still a little clover in there and they are using it daily:




Last fall I planted some Biologic in a few odd areas that get afternoon shade. Between the drought last fall and this spring, my stand isn’t great, but it is there and they really seem to like it. I look forward to getting a better stand down the road:

I don’t have many white oaks at all, definitely none that are mature. I did find this little guy and hack and squirted the surrounding trees to see if I can encourage some growth:
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Finished the day hack and squirting a few mimosas that I missed last year and some giant sweet gums that are raining seed down into my old field:
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One word of caution. I killed my only fruiting persimmon last fall by getting too careless with the Craig Harper cocktail. I guess I let some of it get on the ground, but it killed it graveyard dead! I have since dropped the imazapyr from my mix:
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Anyway, I thought I would share a little of what I love doing. This kind of stuff is way more fun than hunting, at least for me. I hope you enjoyed the tour.

Pretty place!

Beautiful place and thanks for sharing! Looks like you have a lot of open ground and can do a lot of experimenting. My chickasaw plums I planted two years ago are really coming on strong this year, and I am hoping some will produce next year. I am happy with everything I have ordered from Nativ Nursery so far. Please keep us updated on how the vetch does, just listened to the gamekeepers podcast on it today while prepping some fields

Last pics are messed up but this is awesome! Love it!

I'm trying to figure that out. Maybe I hit a limit on postimage. It works on my computer but not on my iphone, which is strange.

Nice job and a lot of work ! Anytime you have a soil active herbicide you have to be careful not to allow it to run out of the cut. Gordon RTU is another good herbicide but you have to be careful with it as well.

On that sandy plot, you need to feed it smaller amounts more often, especially N.

Enjoyed the tour!

Nice place. You've done a lot of work

Nice place buddy, how many acres is it

Very cool, thanks for sharing!

Enjoyed the pics, keep adding them

Show us how that vetch and alyceclover is coming along with the recent rains we've been having.

I haven't had a chance to get over there since the original pictures. I'm planning on it this weekend. The game cam pics show some green but can't verify what it is. I will give an update soon.