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Post by skwirl on Jan 16, 2008 18:41:03 GMT -4
The PGC spent $30,790,759.00 or 42.41% of their 2007 income on wildlife habitat management.
Has anyone seen any evidence of this??
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Post by dougell on Jan 16, 2008 19:03:40 GMT -4
Yep.
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Post by skwirl on Jan 16, 2008 19:24:11 GMT -4
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Post by mrlongbeard on Jan 16, 2008 19:30:34 GMT -4
not any thing in this area. must only apply to the northern part of state or something
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Post by dougell on Jan 16, 2008 19:31:38 GMT -4
certainly,First,they maintain and plant foodplots.Since most of the gamelands have poor soild to grow crops,it can cost well over several thousand dollars per acre to even start a foodplot.Once those foodplots are established,it takes money to keep them maintain them in the form of moowing,liming and fertilizing.Last year they didn't have the funds to lime the foodplots on SGL 93 so Pa wildlife habitat unlimited stepped in and donated several tons of lime and seed.They do edge cutting and even rotate cutting stands of pole timber so more acreage stays in the seedling/sapling stage.the habitat on the gamelands around here have some of the best habitat around.it's actually amazing what they do with the limited funding and resources they have.Then again,there's a few excellent organizations that help by donating,time,money and equiptment.
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Post by beauregard on Jan 16, 2008 23:41:06 GMT -4
and the funny part is, most of those plots are useless or nearly so to deer. Ive seen mostly areas planted in grasses to be used as basically only as pheasant killing fields where they are stocked.
Also how hard would it be to plant apple trees? Howards nursery SELLS THEM FOR NEXT TO NOTHING yet pgc cant plant a bunch of them on all gamelands??? SOme persimmon maybe? Crabapple? Start some seed for their own planting,(could even get the seed where they do exist on some of the gamelands for nothing!) cost next to nothing except the minimal time to plant. How about some TALL switchgrass and shrubs that would benefit deer and small game and pheasant as opposed to the knee high pheasant dog running crap that isnt good for anything else.
Instead of all the land prep and taking the time to plant something that is necessary to plow deeply etc. Why not plant more clover which you can no-till? Why not more varieties that dont need as much lime and can take acidic soil, and is eaten by deer, turkey, grouse, rabbit and others which is also very long lived without maintenance...such as birdfoot trefoil and vetch.
I think things could be done better AND cheaper than currently. Several thousand to start a one acre foodplot to me is absolutely unacceptable. I know the costs of lime, seed and fertilizer arent expensive and when you throw in the labor it shouldnt be anywhere near that, in fact WELL under 1000 and thats not with the cheapest seeds you can plant. Course Im sure the labor is probably done about as fast as Penndot. (LOL)...One guy diggin' and a dozen watching. ;D
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Post by dougell on Jan 17, 2008 10:25:04 GMT -4
Do you know anyone that works in land management Beau?These guys work hard and use oudated equiptment that they're constantly have to fix themselves.
What you have to realize is that most of the gamelands were purchased cheap because they were worthless as far as agriculture is concerned.It takes alot of work and alot of money to get foodplots established in these areas.
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Post by mrlongbeard on Jan 17, 2008 18:11:13 GMT -4
just my 2 cents my bother in law is care taker for the state gamelands in part of 2g and he has a lot of new equipment to work with. but i won't say which gamelands he works on . he seems to hate when people bother he. thats why he went from law enforcement to grounds management
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Post by dougell on Jan 17, 2008 18:32:34 GMT -4
Where did they get that equiptment from?Was it donated or purchased by the PGC.
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richg
new member
Posts: 6
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Post by richg on Jan 17, 2008 22:39:58 GMT -4
9 times out of 10 donoted.
Down in 5B they do a fine job with habitat improvements.They plant a good bit of corn,crab apple,clover,and there's even a small chesnut grove.That's on top of cuts and other work.
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Post by mrlongbeard on Jan 17, 2008 23:36:58 GMT -4
maybe in your area they do a good job but around here they do little. everytime we go there it's the same crap. the same food plots that show little use. the only thing that sticks out is the clearcuts all over the property and the atv tracks all over the place.
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richg
new member
Posts: 6
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Post by richg on Jan 18, 2008 23:52:48 GMT -4
They do a good job here but there's no deer to eat the stuff.Wouldn't bother me if they sold them.
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Post by beauregard on Jan 19, 2008 13:12:21 GMT -4
Here there a few, oddly planted foodplots that usually arent for the benefit of deer. And like longbeard said, same here with lots of atv trails.
Many parcels have NO apples, NO chestnut, no tree planting of wildlife species preferred at all. On other gamelands, there are thousands of acres and the plantings of trees or foodplots are there but extremely few and far between.
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Post by skwirl on Jan 20, 2008 13:39:34 GMT -4
In this area there are some absolutely useless food plots with patchy wild apple trees as far as Pgc Spending any money I cant see where
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Post by beenthere on Jan 20, 2008 19:15:20 GMT -4
Personally I think the PGC does a much better job of managing the habitat on SGLs than they do managing the deer on those lands. As RichG said , it doesn't matter how much food the SGLs produce if the deer aren't there to use it.
While it would be nice if the PGC had the time and money to manage the habitat on SGLs like a QDM lease, by planting apples, chestnut and imperial clover. But, it is much more economical and beneficial to manage the existing habitat to produce the max. amount of food and cover. Studies show that an acre of 80 yr. old mixed oak forest can produce up to 586 lbs. of acorns/yr. The study also shows that in most years more lbs. of acorns were produced than woody browse.
Since it is much easier to manage existing stands of mast producing trees than it is to plant a maintain apples and chestnuts,maximizing the existing habitat is the best way to proceed.
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