Blue Collar Farm Project, April Update.

Well guys, David and I finally got a chance to go for a walk about on the farm. There was still lots of snow but we where able to walk on top, making things a little easier on both us cripples (David has a bad ankle, I've got a bum knee).

First impressions on the farm are good. Most of the pre determined locations I had map scouted turned out to be keepers with great trees to hang stands. The north side of the farm was lacking in buck sign from last year, but there's already deer moving through there, plus the land owner mentioned that he often sees deer come out of the north east block of timber, so there's deer there.

 I'm assuming that it's most likely a doe group, the ultimate buck bait in November. The south side of the farm showed a lot more sign from last fall, including a couple of rubs that looked decent. I'm sure there's a good reason with the new alfalfa field on that side of the farm and the fact that the cover oats was harvested late last fall.

I get a sense that the majority of the deer are actually bedding off the farm on the timber both to the north and south. We'll be able to tell better once the snow all melts. If this is the case I may do some hinge cuts where the timber is the deepest to help define the movement a little better. This will give us more cover to access stands in the evenings.

David and I were able to predetermine seven different potential stand locations that offer both safe access and exit along with scent management zones (see stars on picture).

There's four that are particularly strong that we'll key on this year. Three of these spots are going to need substantial timber cutting, both harvest and hinge, to make the locations both more desirable browse wise and to create staging area's, and open up filming and shooting opportunities. There's also some burdock that I will be mowing and spraying out this year.

The back alfalfa field looks like a great location to improve on the already existing ag. There was really well defined transitional edges on both the north and south sides of the field, and a land bridge across the boggy type creek. The alfalfa that's in there is old, woody and offers very little nutrition wise, we'll be able to improve that with some new zero till/rotation techniques that have been developed over the last few years in the states. But that will be in year two.

So it would seem we've found a better spot, now it's time to make our spot even better. David and I will be putting in a day of work in May (should have been today, stupid snow). We'll take lots of pictures to share.