By Glen Wunderlich

When my neighbor telephoned me a few weeks ago, there was urgency in his voice. “You should see all the deer! And, there’s a really big buck out there.” We watched together as the whitetails milled about, heads down with only one mission: eating.

Amid the brassica plot of a couple acres were a good mix of does and bucks – many of which we had never encountered during hunting season based on the headgear being displayed. Dozens of hungry deer in survivor mode had somehow passed the word that the all-you-can-eat smorgasbord was open for business. After a short visit, I had already set my sights on next season’s wide rack.

Even though we had experienced record-breaking warmth in December, a fair amount of deer routinely frequented the lush green landscape for the turnip and rape leaves. However, it now appeared as though all the deer in Shiawassee County decided to take part in the buffet bonanza.

Winter had finally arrived with high temperatures in the 20s with little snow present. However, about two inches of ice blanketed the low-growing clover and alfalfa plants, making them inaccessible. Turnips, on the other hand, protruded to please the crowd; our pact to plant turnips each year was reinforced by the sight of the feeding frenzy.

Bait piles – even small ones – have been outlawed in the Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD) management zone in which we live. Food plots are a legal exception and remain a legitimate means to draw and hold deer on a property, however.

Turnips are in a group of annual plants called brassicas, which includes radishes, turnips, cauliflower, rape and kale and are extremely high in protein and highly digestible to deer.

Brassica Plot a Month after Planting

Protein content can range from 15 to 20 percent in both the leaves and the roots. They remain highly digestible to deer throughout the growing season and beyond and fill a nutrition gap when the going gets tough.

Turnips grow on a wide range of soils but do best on well-drained, fertile soils in full sun with a pH of 6.5 to 6.8.

Purple Top Turnip

Even though turnips are relatively easy to grow, the first step is to obtain a soil sample, which will indicate soil requirements before blindly throwing money at the project. Lime is used to increase the pH level and should be given a few months to break down before planting.

Preparing the seed bed will require a small tractor, an ATV, or at least a rototiller to churn up and level the soil. Spraying with glyphosate is a good means to control weeds, and if ignored, some fast-growing weeds will stunt the growth of desirable plants to the extent of failure.

Seed can then be broadcast with a hand-spreader and pushed into the ground with a cultipacker. Turnip seed is very small and should not be buried more than about 1/8 to 1/4 inch. It’s also easy to apply too much seed, and in this case more is not better, because too many plants will mean tiny, overcrowded specimens with little yield.

Fertilize at or before planting with about 300 pounds of 19-19-19 per acre to get the plants up and running but soil testing will provide a more accurate recipe for fertilizer and lime needs. After that, sit back and enjoy the show.

A great resource is Ed Spinazzola’s paperback, Ultimate Deer Food Plots or just click on the Quality Deer Management Association’s web site at www.qdma.com, where more detailed information can be found.

The Michigan Department of Natural Resources asks those who live in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, or those who are just visiting, to share any moose sightings through the Moose Observation Report form, now available online.

The DNR has been monitoring Michigan’s moose population since the species’ reintroduction to the state in the 1980s. To estimate the population status of Michigan moose, the DNR conducts aerial surveys across the core moose range in the western Upper Peninsula. When determining the aerial survey sample area, observation reports are important resources that help to identify where resident moose occur. Read more

By Glen Wunderlich

Have you seen your first robin yet this year? I have.

American robin, male
Shiawassee County, MI

I had just taken a break from chainsaw aerobics and had removed my safety helmet with hearing protection. When I first heard the cheerful tunes, I thought it sounded much like a robin but I was having trouble wrapping my mind around the notion that spring was here already. After all, it was January 21 and not an earthworm in sight.

Intently looking and listening, I heard the sound again. Sure enough, it was a robin alright. That’s when I caught its image atop a naked deciduous tree, just as the forlorned visitor flew off.

A few days later, while observing one of my feed sites, tiny juncos, chickadees, and titmice were dwarfed by another ground-feeding visitor: a wood thrush. They winter in lowland tropical forests in Central America but obviously, this loner didn’t get the memo.

A common sight on the ground is yet another visitor from the far north: the tree sparrow. Plump and long-tailed, American tree sparrows are busy visitors in winter backyards and weedy, snow-covered fields across southern Canada and the northern United States.  Sometimes they number in the hundreds in a particular plot of indigenous pigweed I’ve left for their nourishment. In fact, it’s the primary reason I’ve quit trying to rid the patch of the otherwise undesirable weed.

Hopping up at bent weeds or even beating their wings to dislodge seeds from grass heads, they scratch and peck the ground in small flocks, trading soft, musical twitters. Come snowmelt, these small rusty-capped and smooth-breasted sparrows with a black spot on their breasts

Tree Sparrow

begin their long migrations to breeding grounds in the tundra of the far North.

If you are fascinated by watching and studying birds, you may be interested in an online course at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology in Ithaca, N.Y.  For the first time, lectures will be available online to anyone, anywhere.

Though species native to the Finger Lakes Region of New York will be discussed, course lectures are also packed with information about bird identification, migration, nesting, and other topics that are relevant to anyone hoping to improve their bird-watching skills.

The eight-week course is taking place March 23 through May 15. Visit birds.cornell.edu/sfo to learn about the course schedule, which will run concurrently with each Wednesday evening lecture available to online participants the following day. The online lectures will be hosted on the Cornell Lab’s Bird Academy website.

The course cost is $140 for online participants and is taught by Dr. Stephen Kress, Vice President for Bird Conservation for the National Audubon Society. “I can think of no better way to greet the spring migrants than taking part in Spring Field Ornithology,” says Kress. “Whether people take the course in person or watch the lectures online, they’ll come away knowing much more about birds and appreciate them so much more. There’s great value in that at a time when so many species are in trouble. Plus, bird watching is just great fun.”

By Glen Wunderlich

Have you seen your first robin yet this year? I have. I had just taken a break from chainsaw aerobics and had removed my safety helmet with hearing protection. When I first heard the cheerful tunes, I thought it sounded much like a robin but I was having trouble wrapping my mind around the notion that spring was here already. After all, it was January 21 and not an earthworm in sight.

Intently looking and listening, I heard the sound again. Sure enough, it was a robin alright. That’s when I caught its image atop a naked deciduous tree, just as the forlorned visitor flew off.

A few days later, while observing one of my feed sites, tiny juncos, chickadees, and titmice were dwarfed by another ground-feeding visitor: a wood thrush. They winter in lowland tropical forests in Central America but obviously, this loner didn’t get the memo.

A common sight on the ground is yet another visitor from the far north: the tree sparrow.

Tree Sparrow

Plump and long-tailed, American tree sparrows are busy visitors in winter backyards and weedy, snow-covered fields across southern Canada and the northern United States.  Sometimes they number in the hundreds in a particular plot of indigenous pigweed I’ve left for their nourishment. In fact, it’s the primary reason I’ve quit trying to rid the patch of the otherwise undesirable weed.

Hopping up at bent weeds or even beating their wings to dislodge seeds from grass heads, they scratch and peck the ground in small flocks, trading soft, musical twitters. Come snowmelt, these small rusty-capped and smooth-breasted sparrows with a black spot on their breasts begin their long migrations to breeding grounds in the tundra of the far North.

If you are fascinated by watching and studying birds, you may be interested in an online course at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology in Ithaca, N.Y.  For the first time, lectures will be available online to anyone, anywhere.

Though species native to the Finger Lakes Region of New York will be discussed, course lectures are also packed with information about bird identification, migration, nesting, and other topics that are relevant to anyone hoping to improve their bird-watching skills.

The eight-week course is taking place March 23 through May 15. Visit birds.cornell.edu/sfo to learn about the course schedule, which will run concurrently with each Wednesday evening lecture available to online participants the following day. The online lectures will be hosted on the Cornell Lab’s Bird Academy website.

The course cost is $140 for online participants and is taught by Dr. Stephen Kress, Vice President for Bird Conservation for the National Audubon Society. “I can think of no better way to greet the spring migrants than taking part in Spring Field Ornithology,” says Kress. “Whether people take the course in person or watch the lectures online, they’ll come away knowing much more about birds and appreciate them so much more. There’s great value in that at a time when so many species are in trouble. Plus, bird watching is just great fun.”

— Virgil Moore, Director, Idaho Fish and Game