THINK SPRING!  If you’ve just completed your shoveling projects, we’ve got some ideas for warm-weather plans you can kick back with as we work our way out from under the blanket of white.  We talk about how to improve habitat and considerations for wildlife planting in today’s Three Things.

 

Featured Photo:  We thought you could use this. Wildflowers bloom in a prairie planting. Simonson Photo.

 

WEATHER (Bismarck Forecast):
Today: Fri 12/28 – First touch of cold. – Hi 10, Lo -2, Wind NW@10.
Tomorrow:  Sat 12/29 – Warming. Hi 25, Lo 3. Wind S@10.

 

SOLUNAR (Bismarck Times):

Sunrise        Sunset
8:28AM       5:02PM

Moonrise      Moonset       Overhead    Underfoot
Fol. Day       12:37PM      6:05AM       6:30PM

 

Moon Phase: Waning Gibbous (57% Full)

 

EDGE HOUR:    5:00-6:00PM.  The sunset hour will be cold, but calm and make for the best 60-minute stretch in our Edge Hour.

DAY RATING:

THREE THINGS

SPRING PLANTING.  Now is the time to secure your seed and look over aerial maps for places you want to put food plots and habitat on your hunting lands.  For pheasants and deer, feeding areas near deep cover and normal travel corridors will help reduce winter stress in seasons to come, and prevent predation that comes with long trips to the trough.  Plant stands of grass and conservation mixes, or pollinator plots between deep cover and these feeding areas to provide safer travel corridors and rearing areas.

 

TALK CRP.  Check in with your local Soil & Water Conservation District for information on conservation planting programs that will be open this spring, including (once the government restarts in 2019…sometime) an increase of 3 million acres in CRP.  Another great resources in the NDG&F Working Lands Program.

 

THE RIGHT TREES.  When you see a pile of old shelterbelt trees cut down, don’t fret, they were just hawk perches anyhow, that allowed raptors to snipe ducklings and young upland birds.  When considering planting cover trees in their place, focus on those that don’t grow over 15 feet, and are bushier in nature, like spruces and other conifers along with dogwoods, buffaloberry, plum and crabapple, the provide cover and food as well!

 

Stay Sharp!