Best Method in planting NWSG in KY?

[Racer 99]

I had the KFW and Forest Service come out to my property last year and they did their Stewardship plan. They advised me to eradicate the fescue on the 8 acres of open ground that i have and to plant the NSWG. Now the only catch is that u have to rent the drill. Im just looking to improve the habitat for deer, turkey, quail. What would be the best method of creating good cover and bedding areas. I did a soil test and limed the 8 acres with about 23 tons of ag lime in november.
Now should i spray the fescue in the spring and just let regrow naturally or should rent the drill from southern states along with the sowing Big, Little Bluestem, Indiangrass, Switchgrass. This farm is located in northern christian county and has road frontage which is another reason why im wanting thicker open areas. I need some experienced advice here please......:confused:

[swamper]

You could try a few rows of white pine & wild plum along the road as a screen. The natives will provide what you're looking for (although be careful to not overseed....minimal amounts of switchgrass & Indiangrass can really dominate a stand in a short amount of time). Spraying & walking away is the cheapest, and usually one of the best practices there is. If you're not getting cost-share, this would be my suggestion based on not seeing it. It could take a couple years, but it will fill in (weeds can look thick in summer and then thin in winter)...of course if it's bottom ground, the grasses may be needed to help control woody species.

[tex]

and weeds are what they eat, so a few weeds are desirable, just no fescue.

[Valley Station]

Do you have a total of 8 acres fields, no food plots or other food sources??
Any woods to manage? Indian and switch grass good for bedding, but, not as a food source.

[Multidigits]

I had the KFW and Forest Service come out to my property last year and they did their Stewardship plan. They advised me to eradicate the fescue on the 8 acres of open ground that i have and to plant the NSWG. Now the only catch is that u have to rent the drill. Im just looking to improve the habitat for deer, turkey, quail. What would be the best method of creating good cover and bedding areas. I did a soil test and limed the 8 acres with about 23 tons of ag lime in november.
Now should i spray the fescue in the spring and just let regrow naturally or should rent the drill from southern states along with the sowing Big, Little Bluestem, Indiangrass, Switchgrass. This farm is located in northern christian county and has road frontage which is another reason why im wanting thicker open areas. I need some experienced advice here please......:confused:


There is no fee to use the drills owned by KYDFWR. Check with your PLB.

One approach may be to just install fire breaks and set it up for a burn. Contact your PLB to see if there is any natural grasses in the field to work with. For the road frontage, you might also plant a no-see-em line of trees, probably pines.

[Racer 99]

Do you have a total of 8 acres fields, no food plots or other food sources??
Any woods to manage? Indian and switch grass good for bedding, but, not as a food source.

I have 8 acres total in open field. There are three total plots totaling 1 acre that is seperate and is on/or near the edges of the timber. I have 1 half-acre plot and two quarter acre food plots. There is roughly 26 acres of woods that adjoins the pennyrile forest. However, the woods only have a couple of thick spots for deer to bed/rest in and i'm looking to enhance the cover area.

The state forest is mainly open mature timber with a few cutovers that the deer like spread throughout the area close to my farm.

If i just spray roundup on the old hayfields minus the foodplots and let return naturally what should i expect to see this fall if i just let it grow back???

[Valley Station]

Number #1, get rid of the fescue. Study deer sign to determine how deer are currently traveling on you AND on Pennyrile and other farms. Don't know how the fields and land lays. Create additional cover in travel zones.Maybe break it up into multi edge covers expand on food and cover to maimize small acreage. Maybe at "isolated end" or corners of field create a "refuge area" with tall Indian grass. Create some korean lespedeza, milo, red cane for quail and turkey. Your woods been logged? Good number of oaks? You can really do a lot to improve your woods for wildlife, create browse with the Ol' chainsaw.
If you use Roundup only, let grow up, the weeds and forbes wil provide browse/food, but, will not provide "deer bedding hideaway" like Indian/Big Bluestem/switch grasses.

[Racer 99]

VS,
Appreciate your advice....The farm has 23 acres on one side of the road that adjoins the pennyrile forest with a 4 acre field the runs down the front length of property adjacent to the dead end blacktop road.
On the other side of the blacktop road is approximately 12 acres with about 8 acres of woods and a 4 acre field that surrounds it on two sides. There is the same road frontage on the front side of this 12 acres but it also has a dead end gravel road running down the length of the other side. The tornadoes knocked alot of the timber down on this 12 acre side which has created a thick cover area. Natures Chainsaw...lol:D:D

[Al]

If i just spray roundup on the old hayfields minus the foodplots and let return naturally what should i expect to see this fall if i just let it grow back???
Like VS said be sure you get a good kill on the fescue. Im respraying a bunch this spring because I didnt last yr. I sprayed on a windy day and never went back a second time, but Ill do it right this time.
I found that it makes a difference of what comes up and how fast, by wether you break the ground or not and disturb the dormant seed. Dead fescue can keep alot of stuff in the ground for a while.
Also it can vary from one part of your field to another part.
Where I havnt broke the ground Ive gotten alot of broomesedge.
Where Ive broken the ground Ive gotten a ton of ragweed, blackberry, honeysuckle, multiflora rose, greenbriar, saplings of trees I cant identify, and a few cedar. In three yrs I doubt Ill be able to walk through it.
I would have more than a total of 1 ac of food plots and I would plant a grouping of 5 to 10 crabapple trees.

[tex]

There is a Native Grass "slick" handout that I got from the extension agent. I tried to do the instructions pretty much like they were written. I planted wildflowers in mine. I burnd my fescue first, in the fall, then waited till spring until the fescue was up good, and then sprayed Roundup. Then I tilled the surface, and then planted Big bluestem, little bluestem, etc. After a couple of weeks I then planted wildflowers. I think pretty much everything came up. It takes a while for the grasses to really get going because for 2 or 3 years they focus on root development. Turkeys love it, rabbits love it. Squirrels love it for some reason. Deer eat the weeds in it. I allow the broadleaf weeds to grow for diversity.

A pure grass field doesn't get much action from deer if better cover is nearby, with food sources. I used to hunt on a ranch in Texas that had established stands of Big bluestem, with some other grasses. There were plenty of post oaks, and briars nearby. There was also a wheat field near. Most of the deer were traveling through, although on cold days, some would bed in the grasses to "sun" themselves. The edges of the fields were productive however. This field was at least 200 acres, so the dynamics may not be the same as for your land. Smaller divisions of land, that are more cut up will probably be utilised more than the large fields.

I also used to hunt the Commanche Grasslands and I noticed the same there. (For deer, that is, quail seemed to love it, and so did rabbits).

I got native seed from Stockmans in Nebraska. They seemed competitive with most other places.

Oh, I cheated also, and planted some marigolds in mine from the previous year's. It was a nice grass meadow, but now the grasses will get too tall for a lot of the flowers to get sunlight.

[Al]

Tex, how did you plant your seed? Can it be treated like clover, broadcast on top of tilled ground then cultipacked in?

[tex]

Yes. I used a broadcast tow-behind, to seed after I had tilled the ground. Then I used a section of chain link fence about 10 feet wide to cover the seed. I then used a roller to "redneck cultipack". Some of the seeds in various mixes are small, and some aren't. Some need to be mixed with sand, or some other type of medium in order to be sewn. I mixed my seed with some builders sand, and some play sand. I can't remember the exact ratio, but if you know how much pls is in each hopper, and how much you are going to cover, then the setting on the broadcaster can be fine-tuned to assure good coverage.

Tilling was tough, but I had no drill, so I improvised. The downfall to my method is a lower germination rate (I didn't notice however), and it takes just the right soil moisture content in order to be able to till the soil to the friability (sp?) needed.

I plan on doing another small field this spring. I have wheat in it now, with some annual rye. The turkeys get into the native grass early in the morning and late in the evening. But it also attacts doves too.

Good Luck!

[Al]

Did you plant this last spring, and it did well through that drought?
Do does have their fawns in those grasses?

[tex]

Yes, I planted it last spring. The drought did not hurt it a bit, that I can tell, and maybe it even suppressed what fescue I missed, and allowed the natives to out-compete it. Fawns came to the field after late spring, till early winter. They can eat most of the weeds out of it by then. I didn't plant mine for deer, I mostly put it in for quail habitat, and for turkeys to have a place to take poults in the first few critical days.

I have a lot of plants in it so there is usually a lot of insects. These supply the protein that poults need. I avoid using pesticide on my garden also, because the poults will come in and clean out the insects. By July or so, the poults are big enough and they don't come into my garden near as much, thankfully. They do still get into a clover field. I quit fighting the weeds in the clover field also. I mow it high as I can and that discourages some things, and it also pushes the clover to get better. (I don't know what it is technically called). Eventually I will turn the clover field back into natives, but it is just a matter of time constraints right now.

Oh, yeah, I planted apple trees into the stand also, but the deer ate the ends, then rubbed them till they died. I am going to replant them, with wire fencing.

Good luck.