Ideas to become a better steward of the land?

[oosik]

Couple things out here. I quit using pine needles for mulch. The soil is already quite acidic from all the pine trees. Needles just make it worse. Don't try to grow things that like basic soil conditions. With our acidic soil its, more or less, a loosing cause. Grow things that will do well in acidic soil conditions.

I tried seeding a patch of lawn with normal lawn seed. Soil conditions were just too far off. Got wild grass seed from local seed company. Grows great. All my "lawns" are simply mowed wild field grass. After many years it fills in and looks almost like a normal lawn.

Its a whole lot easier to work WITH Mother Nature rather than trying to fight her.

Ticks - around here they are very cyclical - no idea why. We have only wood ticks. Had an Old English Sheep dog. Ended up shearing him down to about 1/2 inch long hair. Could not find the ticks - Front Line would never get down to his skin - with long hair & such a fuzzy coat. Ticks were getting so bad - causing major infection. With the short hair we solved the problem. He looked rather weird but he was once again healthy.

Twelve years ago I had my property selectively logged. The contractor pushed the limbs, branches, etc into about a dozen piles around the 80 acres. My idea - I would later chip all these piles. I checked several of the piles the following year. The quail, chipmunks and the few squirrels had taken up residence in most all the piles.

I just left them and have never chipped any. I now have more quail than you can shake a stick at. Chipmunk & squirrels - no more than normal.

 

[MossRoad]

I spoke to a Texas State Biologist and he told me that over the last hundred years, the natural state of our forests has been so severely modified that it is no longer healthy for wildlife because of all of the saplings that are chocking out the under story. Turkeys no longer live here and the deer numbers are very low. Perfect for wild hogs, which are invasive and shouldn't exist here. One of the best things that I can do on my land is to thin out the timber and allow the mature trees to develop. Before I started, you couldn't see 20 feet into the woods. Now you can see hundreds of yards and it's been amazing seeing the wildlife take over. Too many trees can be a bad thing.

We think just the opposite. Around here, about 25 years ago, deer were so thick that there was no vegetation from the ground up to about 6 feet off the ground. The deer ate everything. You could look a hundred yards through the woods because there just wasn't any undergrowth anymore. So the DNR got aggressive with deer harvest numbers, and started shooting them in the state parks, too. Finally, after years of aggressive harvest, and annual park hunts, the deer population has gotten low enough for growth to return in the forests. And guess what? The turkey population has taken off. Deer are at manageable levels. The small trees and shrubs that provide shelter and forage for most animals have started growing up and we now can't see through the forest more than 15-20 feet, like it should be. You shouldn't be able to see through a forest. If you can, there's no small trees growing up to take the place of the mature ones that die. And there's no place for wildlife to live or eat.

I can't hardly walk through my woods in most places. It's thick with deer, turkey, and squirrels.

So what's the difference between your situation and ours? For one, we don't have hogs. That would be a bad thing to have to deal with. The other, people's ideas of forest and land differ from region to region. You prefer an open forest. I prefer a dense forest. To each his own. We both manage our land as we see fit, and make it the way we want it. No right or wrong there. Enjoy the place as we want it. :thumbsup:

 

[Steppenwolfe]

I think you have to decide what you want to focus on with your land in terms of being a good steward.......ours is all wooded and we decided that we wanted to concentrate on wildlife habitat.......so everything we do is geared to improving the land for the animals.....if a tree falls I leave it where it falls as it provides a snag for smaller animals to nest in and also protective cover from the deer for the first couple of years as the new saplings emerge......if a tree falls on the drive then I will cut it up and drag it to a snag pile I make throughout the woods which animals will turn into their nest......had a breeding pair of coyotes nest in one pile over the winter......rotting trees provide a place for insects which in turn provides food for woodpeckers so as long as the tree is not in danger of falling on the house, barn or car I leave it where it is......our hemlock population is being decimated by the woolly adelgid disease but what I have noticed is that when a hemlock falls new white pines spring up in its place so the forest will continue on......I have a bat that roosts over the side door to the barn each year that I'm happy to welcome and yeah it means I have to sweep the bat poop off the porch each day but the bat helps control the insect population so I let it continue to nest there.......in general our philosophy is if you don't bother us we won't bother you........seems to work for us........we enjoy seeing the animals and the animals seem to know that they have a safe haven here......and hopefully when its my time to leave I have left the land in a little better shape then when I came.......thats about all you can ask for.....so I hope you are able to choose a direction for your land that will bring a smile to your face each day.........Jack

This is a really good point. Maybe... if we leave Mother Nature alone, she will provide for all the habitat.

 

[plowhog]

I think you have to decide what you want to focus on with your land in terms of being a good steward.......ours is all wooded and we decided that we wanted to concentrate on wildlife habitat.......so everything we do is geared to improving the land for the animals.....

That's the direction we want to head, plus add some things to the property for personal enjoyment. My apple orchard is extremely old and isn't far from finished, so I will be planting new apple trees soon to ensure a continuing supply. The bears eat them in the fall, and we greatly enjoy watching them do that. Mama bear climbed into the trees and shook them which dislodged apples-- then the cubs scampered in and started feasting.

My forested areas are badly "overstocked" and I really need to do a timber harvest for forest health-- but in CA that is not a simple task. If we removed maybe 50% of the trees in some areas I am told the forest would be much healthier than it is now. Although right now it *looks* fine to me.

I just spent a lot of $$$$ having our 200-year old oak trees trimmed. Hard to spend that much money but I'm glad I did it. These were left to "Mother Nature" with no care for too many years-- and I was afraid we would lose them or have buildings get crashed into. One of the former trees that was badly in need of trimming filled up with wet snow a few winters ago, then a wind storm blew it over. On the way down it crashed into a nearby healthy 200 year old oak tree and took it out also. So the lesson was "Mother Nature" need some help here and there. The trimmers found a squirrel nest full of baby squirrels in one of the dead limbs-- so they left that one alone.

One thing I am unsure about is what to do about invasive plants that I don't want. For starters, we have Scotch Broom. It is highly invasive-- and the only thing I know to do is pull them out manually as I come across them. And we have yellow thistle-- which has taken over a lower pasture I would like to use for more apple trees. I've recently heard there is a herbicide that affects yellow thistle only, but I need to look into that further.

I also have two pastures that need some attention. One is lumpy and it is not much fun to mow. Somehow I need to smooth it out if I can, without damaging it. There is a healthy grass that grows, along with weeds, and I'd like to not kill off that grass by trying to smooth the pasture out. And the remaining pasture is badly compacted-- from past cattle grazing. It's also lumpy and hard-- that one will need some more aggressive treatment to straighten out. It is also a bumpy ride to mow that one.

There is a Resource Conservation District here. I have attended many of their seminars and collected many of their handouts. On a rural property with forest, pasture, pond, creek, etc. there is a lot of maintenance and I am always trying to figure out what I might be doing wrong, or what things I *should* be doing to improve the property.

 

[Jstpssng]

Here's a resource for controlling yellow thistle; Yellow Starthistle Management Guidelines--UC IPM Especially note that it will kill horses, if that's an animal which you have or consider getting.

From the link:

Yellow starthistle begins emergence with fall rains and continues to germinate throughout the rainy season. A single cultivation after the rainy season when soils are dry effectively controls yellow starthistle seedlings and rosettes. This treatment must be made after the last rains but before seeds are produced. If cultivation is carried out too early (e.g., before the last rains) seed will continue to germinate and another cultivation will be needed to control each new flush of seedlings that results from a spring rain.

Mowing can be used to manage yellow starthistle, provided it is well timed and used on plants with a high branching pattern. Mowing early growth stages results in increased light penetration and rapid regrowth of the weed. If plants branch from near the base, regrowth will occur from recovering branches. Repeated mowing of plants too early in their life cycles (rosette or bolting stages) or when branches are below the mowing height will not prevent seed production, as flowers will develop below the mower cutting height. Plants with a high branching pattern are easier to control, as recovery will be greatly reduced. Even plants with this growth pattern must be mowed in the late spiny or early flowering stage to be successful. An additional mowing may be necessary in some cases.

To encourage growth of desirable vegetation, let these species set seed before mowing, but be sure to mow well before starthistle is in full flower. In general, mowing is most effective when soil moisture is low and no irrigation or rainfall follows mowing.

Grazing is effective in reducing yellow starthistle seed production. Sheep, goats, or cattle eat yellow starthistle before spines form on the plant. Goats will eat starthistle even in the spiny stage. The plant’s crude protein concentration is variable, but ranges from 28% at the rosette stage down to 11% at the bud stage and should be sufficient to meet the general maintenance requirements for most ruminants. When it is abundant, yellow starthistle appears to have the ability to sustain animals several weeks beyond annual grass “dry down.” Intensive grazing in late May and June using large numbers of animals for short duration can reduce plant height, canopy size, and seed production. Avoid overgrazing, however; do not allow more than half the grass forage to be removed. Grazing more than this will reduce the grasses’ recovery rate and ability to shade out yellow starthistle.

Burning is best performed at the end of the rainy season when flowers first appear. Yellow starthistle should be green at this time and will require desiccated vegetation to burn. Most annual vegetation other than yellow starthistle, particularly grasses, should have dried and shed their seeds by this time. The foliage of these plants serves as a fuel source to allow a more complete burn. Burning for 2 or more consecutive years helps suppress yellow starthistle and deplete the soil seedbank. Burning can also increase the recovery and density of perennial grasses. Burning can damage biological control agents, but insects from adjacent areas will readily move back into the site the following year.

 

[ericm979]

It's probably going to be tough to do private controlled burns in California due to the chance of getting out of control. The outgoing state wildland fire chief said that we should be doing more (and most land managers would agree) but if your burn gets out, you'd be the person who burnt out your neighbors and could be liable for the suppression costs.

Many of our properties have been farmed/ranched etc for a long time. We have an old barn with the main timbers held together with square nails. When we moved in some of the old timer local residents told us some of the history. We've since done a lot of research and found ownership records back to the 1880s. (you all in New England will think that's recent but in California it's not). We found ads from the 1910s and 20s when the larger parcel that our place was the center of was a vacation resort (a common thing then in this area, they ran trains down from the city for vacationers). That's all interesting but it didn't tell me what they did to the land.

What was really useful for understanding what was done to the land was looking up old air photos. They only go back to the late 1930s at best and aren't that good until the late 40s or 50s. It's so useful to see what the vegetation looked like 70 years ago. Our place looks pretty wild now but back then half was pasture. Looking at a succession of air photos over the years shows the shrubs and then trees invading the pastures.

 

[dodge man]

It has been brought up but we have some invasive species in our area. Honey suckle and Russian Olive are bushes that can just about choke out everything and Multiflora Rose is a thorny bush. I have been in a constant battle with this stuff over the years. Any thing you can do to kill this stuff is good in my opinion.

 

[plowhog]

The Scotch Broom was originally *imported* as a desirable plant. Nice looking yellow flowers, very hardy. But it has two downsides: it spreads rapidly and the seeds it releases can last 80 years in the dirt, and it has an internal oily composition that makes it an extreme fire risk.

Nevada County, CA has a "Scotch Broom Challenge" every year with teams of people out working to eradicate it. But it still rings many of the rural roads-- even if the adjacent landowners are working to eradicate it. Previously sold at Home Depot, its sale is now outlawed.

I believe we have honeysuckle here as well-- I need to look into that. I'm told it will choke out trees that it wraps around.

 

[plowhog]

Here's a resource for controlling yellow thistle;

Thanks for the information. Interesting to learn that mowing has to be timed correctly, and if not it can promote growth instead of the other way around. This is exactly the type of information I am hoping to learn ....

 

[JamesHW]

I don't knowingly do anything to harm the property. About the worst habit I knowingly do is starting winter burn piles with a mixture of diesel and motor oil. I know this is frowned on but I use a small amount and only on the things getting burned-- not the ground.

I liked turning (undesirable) branches and clippings into (desirable) mulch. I'm hoping to find more things like that.

Interesting thread plowhog. Wanted to tip you off to a foolproof method of starting burn piles using chunk charcoal and one of those chimney style charcoal starters. A few pieces of newspaper and a few minutes you have red hot coals. Placing them under the burn pile, even wet and green, will in my experience get a good fire going quickly. Sometimes a second batch added will speed things up. I have an old rusty shovel I found buried that has no handle that I use to place the hot coals under the pile (coals work best if on a dry board or metal so they are not on damp ground).