I'm just happy that it is all working out as planned by bstone. His BG responded to feeding and they grew to excellent individual weights reaching the potential the environmental conditions allowed. They don't look anything like the originals ... they look none the worse for their original condition. To cap things off there were prodigious quantities of YOY produced. So much so that growth slowed when they reached the limiting standing weight leading to the condition you guys are remarking about. Just can't see a negative here. Wasn't that the plan? To have a large population of small slow growing forage that can feed a limited number of LMB (when he stocks them .... they are not there yet) for a few years? Now that he has succeeded in that, why is he being criticized for the success? There are several posts complaining about poor condition ... but only one remarking about how good the condition his adult BG are in now.
Next year, when he stocks LMB according to the plan he stated in the original post I do fully expect them to thin down the bank of forage he built if they are stocked appropriately sized, and I do expect that this years crop of BG will resume growth and reflect better condition after the introduction of predators. I can't think of any good reason to grow them too fast. If they could grow only as fast as to remain at optimum lengths for his growing LMB ... that would be ideal.
bstone is following a recipe someone advised him on. The questions I have are:
What is the benefit of delaying introduction of the LMB to early summer next year over say this past autumn?
With the large numbers of YOY standing, how likely is it that the BG will recruit much forage next spring?
Would the spring recruitment of YOY be better if some of this year's crop of YOY were thinned down?
Is next summer better in an effort to delay LMB reproduction by an additional year?
What size and how many LMB should bstone stock next year?
