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Post by benmnwi on Jan 20, 2023 12:21:15 GMT -6
Anyone have plans for tree or shrub plantings this spring? My farmer renter in Wisconsin pissed me off last year, so I'm going to find a new renter and it seems like a good time to take a little out of cropland and plant some trees. I'm not going crazy planting thousands like I had in the past, but I'll plant about 350 shrubs and 100 white spruce in about an acre of tillable ground. It should be enough to give my kids a small taste of tree planting without hating me and swearing off tree planting forever. The goal of this small planting is to improve grouse hunting and it may give the deer a few more bedding areas as well. I'm trying to add a couple high quality shrub thicketts and shrub/tree rows for the grouse and woodcock. I usually bag a bird or two along this field edge, but I'm confident I can hold more birds if I have some thick upland buffer along the swamp edges (alder thicket to the NE and black spruce/tamarack to the west). Right now the field goes right up to the swamp in about half the areas. Wisconsin's nursery was out of a lot of some trees and shrubs, but I was able to get 100 ninebark, 100 highbush cranberry, 100 american hazelnut and 100 white spruce. I'll also pick up about 50 wild plums from another nursery. Eventually I'll add some red splendor crabapples to this area, but not this year. This is an aerial photo of the 4 acre field I'm taking out of production this year. On the east side I'll cut off that 1/3 acre corner, on the north side I'll about a 1/3 acre corner and I'll also add a couple rows of shrubs to the west side that is currently a 1 row black spruce visual screen. A 10 yard wide tree row there should be a great spot to hold some grouse. I'll probably turn the rest of the 3 acre field into a food plot of some type this year and see how that goes.
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Post by Reagan on Jan 20, 2023 13:11:31 GMT -6
I’m planning on 10 apples.
I’ll pull the remaining ROD from beside my house and move to the land. I’m putting elderberry in the ROD bed so I can shift to those in the future.
I didn’t order any evergreens this year. I just checked MDC. They normally sell out of pitch lolly pine by now but they have stock. I might place an order.
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Post by smsmith on Jan 20, 2023 13:43:09 GMT -6
I'm planting 200 white spruce, 5 each - silver maple, river birch, hybrid poplar, austrian pine, scotch pine, ponderosa pine, and 10 wild apple plugs.
After seeing the deer and bunny browse on so many of my evergreens I'm getting tired of spending time and money on them. I'm glad I planted a bunch back when there weren't many deer around.
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Post by benmnwi on Jan 20, 2023 14:00:38 GMT -6
I'm planting 200 white spruce, 5 each - silver maple, river birch, hybrid poplar, austrian pine, scotch pine, ponderosa pine, and 10 wild apple plugs. After seeing the deer and bunny browse on so many of my evergreens I'm getting tired of spending time and money on them. I'm glad I planted a bunch back when there weren't many deer around. Deer at my place in SE MN are eating red pine needles already and that's not normal. Last week I dropped a fairly 9" diameter red cedar and I checked on it last night and the deer ate every single green foliage they could reach. I might have to drop them a few more trees every week to give them some bonus calories.
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Post by Sandbur on Jan 20, 2023 16:18:37 GMT -6
I have 5 or 6 apple seedlings to plant and probably a few grafted trees. Perhaps I will transplant a handful of spruce.
I wonder if I should do any of it at this age.
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Post by Bwoods11 on Jan 20, 2023 16:19:30 GMT -6
I would say 5-6 apple trees. 20 spruce, 15 cedar, 10 Swamp White Oak…
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Post by badgerfowl on Jan 20, 2023 16:25:34 GMT -6
I've got about 8 crabs and 25 Norway Spruce going in.
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Post by Bwoods11 on Jan 21, 2023 8:16:27 GMT -6
Ben.. are you going to plant any oaks ? I would think the grouse and deer would love that. I’d consider planting 10-15 and caging them, maybe tubes? Just a thought ?
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Post by wklman on Jan 21, 2023 14:54:49 GMT -6
I'll play it by ear once I see how my bagged and burlaped trees did threw winter. I've got more important projects to do before I plant any trees.
I've got to replace my old wood stove with a soapstone one, spray my lawn with clethodim, then plant dutch white clover, pull off the steel roofing on my shed that blew over last spring, cut up blown over trees and split it for firewood, and much more before I retire in October.
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Post by Sandbur on Jan 21, 2023 16:35:14 GMT -6
I'll play it by ear once I see how my bagged and burlaped trees did threw winter. I've got more important projects to do before I plant any trees. I've got to replace my old wood stove with a soapstone one, spray my lawn with clethodim, then plant dutch white clover, pull off the steel roofing on my shed that blew over last spring, cut up blown over trees and split it for firewood, and much more before I retire in October. I have one more downed shed to clean up on this farm and put one more window in the old granary and just a bit of steel around it.
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Post by benmnwi on Jan 21, 2023 20:45:30 GMT -6
Ben.. are you going to plant any oaks ? I would think the grouse and deer would love that. I’d consider planting 10-15 and caging them, maybe tubes? Just a thought ? I’ll probably collect some bur oak acorns and plums from my house and direct plant them up there this fall. I’ve had good luck collecting a bucket of them in September when they drop at my house and planting them under an inch of dirt. It seems that the natural oak regeneration is pretty good up there, so I think I’ll have oaks growing there even if I don’t plant any.
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Post by Foggy on Jan 26, 2023 18:44:48 GMT -6
I dont do much in the way of chain saw work anymore. Too hard on this old frame.....and I just donot enjoy it. However I watch a few different you tub channels and I think this guy points out what most of us are after when developing good deer happiest. Watch.
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ruttin1
Full Member
Posts: 128
Likes: 201
Location: Shawano Co, WI
Zone: 4B
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Post by ruttin1 on Jan 27, 2023 13:08:46 GMT -6
I’ve got 100 ea of white spruce, ninebark, and red osier dogwood coming from the Wisconsin Nursery this spring. I’ve got some screening and thickening to do.
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Post by gsquared23 on Jan 31, 2023 17:17:05 GMT -6
5 fruit trees are on order and a decent amount of scion wood. I’m going to harvest some dogwood cuttings and punch those into some weed material, no more bareroots if that works well.
I’m going to triple down on the chainsaw work. I put in a solid day already, and it makes such a big difference, way more than planting anything.
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Post by honker on Jan 31, 2023 22:06:04 GMT -6
I’ve got 250 white spruce coming. I’m going to bring a few rounds of ROD cuttings to stick in the ground and a few cages. Going to pick up 25 or so bare root plums from the county. Smallchunk might talk me into a few more apple trees as well.
I’m taking next Monday off for a chainsaw day. Plan on getting a lot more of that in before the snow melts.
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