Improving our wildlife natural habitat?

[sam03]

What do you guys do to improve our wildlife natural habitat? I have been reading and watching whatever i can find abt improving our widllife in Florida. From simple things like fertilizing natural food sources to increasing bedding areas. Most of us work on a hunting/fishing budget and I think the first step to management on a budget is to improve what is already there. I hunt private land and i already know my biggest problem will be 2 legged trans-passers which no matter what i do i will always be a problem. I'm not really a book reader...i rather watch it or listen to it but if anyone has any material they recommend let me know.

[Iluv2hunt]

Controlled burning is the BEST practice in the world for habitat improvement. But 99% of us can't do it, and the landowner usually won't agree to it. Other than that, I think mowing, fertilizing and planting food plots is the best we can do

[9dawgs]

What Allen said plus providing a water source if there's not a naturally occurring one. You may want to even think about planting some fruit trees that are native to Florida. The water thing is the issue on the private property I hunt. There are low areas that will fill with rain but the soil is sandy so it percolates down into the ground and disappears. We've thought of several solutions from digging a well to supply a water trough to actually using a plastic covering over the low areas to catch the water. We haven't done anything with it yet though other than digging down about 6ft to see if we would hit water.

We're thinking of making a catch system using rain gutter and the blue plastic storage barrels. We'd basically build a lean-to with a tin roof to catch and drain rain water into a 4 barrel system via the gutters and eventually into a water trough. Should work well as long as there's rain. The plan is to set these up at a couple of locations on the property.

[sam03]

Ya i have been thinking abt adding some fruit/nut tree and fertilizing the ones we already have.

[HuntAddict]

It's semi-expensive, but there's a seed out there called sweet tea. They advertise for it in WoodsNWater magazine. Not sure how it works, but i am on the fence to try some. The stuff I have read about it says it's very attractive browse for deer.

[kc45]

I don't know if it helps or not but we have been planting a lot of trees at our property... about 50 in past one year.
All kinds of fruit trees like orange, lime, grapefruit, mango, avocados, guava, etc. We've also planted about 30 small oaks. Some don't survive due to lack of consistent watering in the beginning but some do so we continue to do it. We do it mostly to see what will grow and to see if we can get fruit later. It also teaches my son to perform physical work.

[sam03]

KC45 your food forest sounds like its going to be pretty badass in 5-10yrs!!