Belushi

New to the forum and just thought I'd pick your brains a little. Do to a death we lost our lease at the end of last season. Through persistence, and a little luck, we managed to find a new lease for this year. Even though this new place is only about 15 miles from our old place the land is totally different, This is causing us to re-think our management plan. We never have been able to do much with food plots.(Too costly and no access to equipment). Most of what we have done in the past invoved supplimental feeding (mainly corn in spin feeders) and land improvements. Since this new land is paper company land, we are limited in what we can do to the property itself. We intend to mow all existing roads and utility easements ASAP and we can do some brush thinning, but no tree removal. But our biggest problem is just the lack of knowledge we posess about the land. The few times we have been able to look around we find lots of tracks, trails and old scrapes and a check of the sucess in the area has shown it to produce some quality deer over the last several years.

Here's where I need help. I am totally pumed up about this year and I want to do something (anything) to start making this place even better, but I know enough to realize I don't even know the place yet, so where to start. I have noticed an ample amount of natural forage so my thinking is until I learn more about the land I can help with what's already there. In particular honeysuckle and dewberry bushes are spread all over the place. Also since this is paper company land (all in new pine growth) what oaks we have are mainly along the creek bottom that runs through the place.

Q: can I fertilize these bushes and trees ? When? With what? Some areas are walk in only, will fertlizer spikes work in these areas? Should I fertilize the oaks?
Would appreciate any ideas.
JB

habitat

You may want to get your local forester involved,check out qdma.com for some good info

shamlin

you may want to also check with your county extention agent.

Belushi

Thanks Habitat, I found answers to some of my questions on qdma. And Shamlin you remind me there is no generic answer, every area is different. Thanks fellas.