Now I have a stand in the old ratchet strap tree marked "S" on my map on pg 3
Discussion below - Refer to my map on pg 3 of this thread....and see how the best laid plans change in a year :eek:
The "B" stand I was talking about there didn't pan out because 1. the farmer didn't plant the field last year and 2. it's too close to the bedding (I was kind of afraid of that).
Subsequently the farmer bailed on his contract (all talk, no action there) and I'm doing the food myself - 3 acres + about an acre on the other side of the farm - and let the other 15 or so he was farming go back to weeds/brush and nastiness (ie deer cover). I mudded some beans into that field finger in may (2 acres), and the finger across the drainage (1 acre). They didn't do much between the deer and may/june drought. I broadcast 400 lbs of oats on those 3 acres in early September and they took off, so I've got good feed in there now
I also changed things with respect to the old logging road coming in from the southeast....last spring I did some chainsaw work and now the whole area from the S end of that finger in the map around to "S" stand is 6-8 acres of thick hinge cut and felled trees - its a real mess in there. I cut off the old logging road where it came up the hill from the SE and made it come out 15 yards south of the "S" stand. Then I drove my quad with the sprayer on the back all the way from the new "old logging road" entry south of "S" down to the bottom of the main drainage (not shown) to the southeast...like 400 yards in. I turned around there, and sprayed hot roundup all the way back up the logging road to the new exit south of "S". This was in May, I was in there snooping around a couple weeks ago and that logging road is still clear and open from the herbicide (the only opening thru much of the blackberry regrowth from the timber stand improvement) - and a heavily used deer trail. The "new trail" behind my stand and down the hill - this is a deer trail, not logging road - is also heavily used and my primary stand on the whole farm is a new ladder stand I put up on that trail where it crosses a nasty drainage down in there that really pinches the deer movement.
This timber stand work, and moving the logging road changed the whole deal - now with the undergrowth and new growth the "S" stand tree is doable from a cover perspective, and I can shoot both the "new trail" and the moved logging road without having to be as close to the bedding as the "B" stand.
And this is just one situation of about a dozen on the place I'm trying to work out (this might be the easiest/shortest to describe)
I know the landowner real well and he and lets me pretty much do what I want in there.
Love the chess game!
R
Topic: Scouting a "header" and dreaming of November (Read 3928 times)
