thanks for the replies!
harvest the cow that's in the first pic
good idea, but that's no ordinary heffer. look at dem beady eyes, paul. that cow is pure evil!
Personally I'd avoid electric. Don't want the deer any spookier than they already are....
jeff, do you think electric fences cause anxiety compared to barb wire? btw----the entire half section (320 acres) is strung w/ 1 wire electric fence in addition to the ancient barb wire that is falling apart, so i would assume the deer have become acclimated to getting zapped when careless. my primary concern for the fence (either barb or electric) is to create an effective barrier that doesn't require a large investment of my time and money during the installation.
I would consider going ahead and hiring a logger with a feller buncher for a couple of days to cut off most of the trees and use a skidder to bunch them up in a pile they could be easily burned.
what is the habitat value of a slash and burn approach in a bedding area? sounds like LOTS of work to me! seriously, i don't intend for the fenced in pasture (<10 acres) to be anything other than a nice quiet bedding area. i have two food plots approx. 500 yards from this proposed sanctuary and i'll hunt the travel routes between the bedding area and food plots.
actually, i have buddies who would gladly spend their weekends cutting posts out of the osage orange for fence posts. a good saw man w/ a guy pulling brush and another on the tractor pushing brush/limbs into piles could probably get the job done in a couple of weekends. i'd
guess there's a $1K in hedge posts that could be cut within the confines of the sanctuary, but osage orange is a real #%#@8 on workers and equipment. i had anticipated cutting posts to save on the cost of the fence installation and also clearing brush and overhanging limbs that are in close proximity to the fence, but i'm anticipating a minimal amount of cutting.
i'll probably spray most of the osage orange w/ XXX juice to eliminate the tree canopy and stimulate the understory growth, but my plan all along has been to leave most of the trees standing (clear-cutting is too much work for a negligible return). also, by killing the trees and leaving them upright, it will prevent unneccessary
ground clutter in the near future when putting up fence and planting tree seedlings and ground cover.
which brings me to my last question: what should i plant in the sanctuary? if the project stays on schedule, then the fence will be operational sometime in mid-june. i don't want to step foot inside that fence the rest of the summer/fall. after hunting season (or early next spring), i'd like to plant some oak trees as well as a variety of shrubs through out the sanctuary to replace the osage orange. sawtooth oak seedlings seem like the obvious choice, but i am curious if i could roto-till "strips" of ground criss-crossing the sanctuary and hand broadcast acorns w/ reasonable success. i'll focus most of my "habitat efforts" around shrub plantings in the sanctuary. the kansas forestry dept. has american plum, choke cherry, fragrant sumac, golden currant, liliac, peking cotoneaster, sandhill plum, and caragana seedlings available which should produce thickets of green browse.
The state offers a program for this where they pay for part of the cost to fence it.
alwyshntn, what state and how much?