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Thought folks here might enjoy reading this article:

https://www.perc.org/2020/01/10/healthy-...BXCTADweLz6N0YA

I also posted it on my Facebook group for Midwestern landowner wildlife enthusiasts:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/442011656723370/

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Thanks for the link RAH, it was a good read. Very relevant also.


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Ditto


It's not about the fish. It's about the pond. Take care of the pond and the fish will be fine. PB subscriber since before it was in color.

Without a sense of urgency, Nothing ever gets done.

Boy, if I say "sic em", you'd better look for something to bite. Sam Shelley Rancher and Farmer Muleshoe Texas 1892-1985 RIP
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I am a big conservation advocate and make it known on my personal blog.

Our great American President, Teddy Roosevelt, declared that conservation “is the chief material question that confronts us, second only—and second always—to the great fundamental questions of morality,” exclaimed Roosevelt. Americans had “become great in a material sense because of the lavish use of our resources,” he explained and had “just reason” to be proud of what they had done. “But,” he intoned: "the time has come to inquire will happen when our forests are gone, when the coal, the iron, the oil, and the gas, when the soils shall have been still further impoverished and washed into the streams, polluting the rivers, denuding the fields, and obstructing navigation. By planning ahead, he said, these could be avoided. "One distinguishing characteristic of civilized men is," he said. "We have to, as a nation, exercise foresight for this nation in the future; and if we do not exercise that foresight, dark will be the future!"

Last edited by rms; 01/16/20 05:22 PM.

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I read an account, from Teddy, about him taking a bull elk. He said that, in that area, there were very few left and he felt privileged to get the shot. I’ve always wondered about that. As a hunter, I don’t think I could have taken the shot.

He also said “ I’m not a very good shot so I just shoot a lot.” I resemble that remark.


It's not about the fish. It's about the pond. Take care of the pond and the fish will be fine. PB subscriber since before it was in color.

Without a sense of urgency, Nothing ever gets done.

Boy, if I say "sic em", you'd better look for something to bite. Sam Shelley Rancher and Farmer Muleshoe Texas 1892-1985 RIP
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I leave the turkeys on my place alone since they are far and few between. We have a lot of oaks coming along which I hope will help, but the coyotes are thick, as are the hawks, owls and raccoons (egg thieves). Now have bobcats more regularly as well. Tough being low on the food chain...

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If we are not careful fishing and hunting will become a thing of the past in the United States, just look at Germany which has banned all catch and release fishing, because they claim it's cruel for fish to be caught, some of these people would call themselves "conservationists" I call them Socialists!

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I believe your land your rights. But also like almost everything in life moderation is the key.


The people who say I can't do it can just sit the @^#% down and watch me. Friends call me Rusto I also subscribe to pond boss mag. http://forums.pondboss.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=504716#Post504716
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You do not want the Federal Government controlling our waterways there is no limit to where that could go. Your private pond that drains into a small creek that feeds a major river could get seized.

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I most certainly do not like the current WOTUS rules and hope changes will ensue that allow me to proceed with some conservation projects on my land currently being obstructed by misguided bureaucrats. Check out my FaceBook Group:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/442011656723370/

Look at the text under "About".

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The King's land, the King's deer.

This is no different than any other thing.

The further away from local control the rules are made, the lesser individual rights are respected.

Wise, fair, and equitable management of fish and wildlife resources can not be accomplished at the federal level.

And that's enough politicing for me for one day. lol

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Originally Posted By: RAH
I leave the turkeys on my place alone since they are far and few between. We have a lot of oaks coming along which I hope will help, but the coyotes are thick, as are the hawks, owls and raccoons (egg thieves). Now have bobcats more regularly as well. Tough being low on the food chain...


RAH, get a predator control program in place and the turkeys will thank you. Especially the raccoons.


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I have more obstacles thrown up by the county surveyer than the feds, if you can believe that. Seems to love his "small-town" power.

Neighbor normally traps my place but not with current low fur prices. The well-meaning armchair environmentalists don't seem to know a renewable resource when they see it and prefer plastic shell coats. I certainly have a lot of predators, but maybe the coyotes and bobcats will reduce deer density and help with all the diseases that are starting to appear in Indiana herds. I took my county limit this year on my place. Raccoons could certainly use culling to help the birds, including ducks. My neighbor did remove two colonies of trouble-making beaver. Our dogs even love eating the beaver meat (muskrat too) but will not feed them raccoon due to possible distemper (not really sure of the risk).

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How does a surveyor have any input other than marking boundary lines ? I could see where in a small town he might hold some type of government office and then be able to have some influence. I read some where that coons will also affect fawn survival.

I am gun shy when it comes to giving any access to any government official to my place. Been my experience that some lean toward being socialist minded and don't like the idea that I own land and they don't.


Do not judge me by the politicians in my City, State or Federal Government.


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Surveyor issues pond permits and wanted multiple "studies" conducted at my expense even though plan was drawn up by NRCS. Also would not give me an exemption for an open geothermal heating system due to water use even though the source of water was going to be an artesian well that dumps water on the surface anyway. Just hired a contractor from outside the county to put in a regular high efficiency heating system instead on the original contractor from within the county to ensure no additional tax money went their way. Also put a bunch of our land into the Wildlands program so property taxes would be dramatically reduced when they tried to tax woodland in a floodplain as "excess residential". Represented myself in the state hearing where they referred to the county tax assessor's actions as "disturbing" when they reached a judgment in my favor. -end rant-

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Rah, we have a wildlife program in Texas. If not my taxes would be like a residential/luxury tax. But, you can only get it if you have previously had a grazing exemption. When it became available, I immediately sold my cows and let the neighbors worry about fence repair.

We have to do 3 of 7 allowable things. In my case I provide brush piles for small animal protection when I cut firewood. I provide water for wildlife from my ponds. I shoot predators like coyotes but that doesn't make a dent in their numbers. I also provide supplemental feed for wildlife. I have to do an annual report and overload it with pictures.

If not for this program I couldn't keep the place. Yep, the County taxing people don't like it but can't stop it.


It's not about the fish. It's about the pond. Take care of the pond and the fish will be fine. PB subscriber since before it was in color.

Without a sense of urgency, Nothing ever gets done.

Boy, if I say "sic em", you'd better look for something to bite. Sam Shelley Rancher and Farmer Muleshoe Texas 1892-1985 RIP
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We also have to do an annual report telling of our conservation activities and brush piles are a part of it along with making vernal pools and invasive plant control. I would be doing all that anyway.

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I have seen declining turkey numbers in my area in recent yrs, I primarily blame it on a mass influx of coons robbing nests, they don't have a chance to hatch, I have a coyote on my game cameras occasionally but I don't think they are thick enough, (right in that area) where my farm is to be the cause, coons on the other hand, are thick as all get out, nothing to have several at a time on cameras, with fur prices down they don't get trapped or hunted anymore. I aim to make a difference in their populations in the near future, somehow.
As for bureaucracies controlling local land, don't get me started on that, I was thinking the WOTUS thing has been pretty much downgraded, a national association I belong to fought that pretty hard back in the days when they were trying to enforce it. But we did have a subdivision here locally that the houses where we are building on, and some that already been built, were all of a sudden classified as being in a flood plain, although these houses and the land was on a hill 25 to 30 ft higher in elevation then the actual flood plain, some engineering Einstein in Dallas had decided to rewrite floodplain boundaries as he wanted to. Insurance companies were dropping homeowners due to their houses now being in a floodplain, They had to hire lawyers, surveyors and huge costs and paperwork to prove that they were 25 ft above any possible flood, 20 miles from any river. all because some irresponsible idiot 600 miles away, that worked for the government, decided to redraw some boundaries without having a clue what he was doing.


All the really good ideas I've ever had came to me while I was milking a cow.
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Sad but true...

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The floodplain fiasco happened to us.

Daughter started biilding her new home right next to our pond. Half way through she found out she could not get a 911 address because where she was building was in a flood plain. That would not have been an issue, except the electric utility would not put electric in without a 911 address.

Not only that, the house we live in was changed to a flood plain.

So we had to hire a survey guy to survey the area and show it was not in a flood plain.

A few thousand dollars and several months later, all is well.

Last edited by snrub; 01/18/20 06:03 PM.

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They had people around here that were suddenly mapped in the floodplains back about 2008, that had to hire surveyors to prove they are not, to avoid having to get flood insurance. Someone hundreds of miles away, who didn't know squat about the lay of the land, put them in a floodplain, and cost them thousands. You could be 150 feet horizontally from the river, and be on top of a 120 foot bluff, in a few cases. Hopefully, with better mapping, the next floodplain map will be better, but around here, we are still living with those bad 2008 maps. It doesn't bother me, cause I'm not selling, and don't have a lender.

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Last week I purchased a dozen DP coon traps and 1/2 dozen traps for coyotes. This week I will be getting the 'yote traps prepped for trapping. With the population levels here, something has to be done, low fur prices or not. Multiple coon and multiple coyotes in the same picture on the trail cam tells me that some thinning is needed.

Last year between myself and my neighbor, we trapped 18 coon around his chicken coop. A neighbor not more than 1/2 mile away loves coons, feeds them, and even has the animal control services drop them off on his property.

When I can shoot a coyote with my 9mm pistol less than 30 yd. from my front door they need some thinning......


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We have had a huge decline in wildlife numbers. 20 years ago, turkeys were abundant on my place. They are still in the area but no longer on my heavily wooded place. They show up some during the breeding season but leave to go back to a big ranch close by. Deer were much more abundant. Coyotes were everywhere. Small game like armadillos, coons, quail, bobcats and possums were almost daily sightings. Snakes of all kinds were something that we had to watch for.

Tarantulas and the large centipedes were something to be careful of. I saw one of each this year and got excited. We now have hogs but the snake and small animal decline started before they showed up.

Other than building a pond and riding 4 wheelers, I haven't changed much. Not a lot more people have moved into the area so I can't blame encroachment. We did have a 4 year drought but the decline started before that. I believe it was a factor.

I believe hogs have played a part in it. They will kill/eat anything. I have hog traps that are ignored.

Deer season was a bust this year. Due to a massive acorn crop deer seldom moved around. I saw one that I could have shot. It was a yearling doe.

Game cam pics at feeders and on roads tell me that I still have coons and coyotes but I never see them.


It's not about the fish. It's about the pond. Take care of the pond and the fish will be fine. PB subscriber since before it was in color.

Without a sense of urgency, Nothing ever gets done.

Boy, if I say "sic em", you'd better look for something to bite. Sam Shelley Rancher and Farmer Muleshoe Texas 1892-1985 RIP
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Over the last 30 years, we have had the opposite trend. Our conversion of farmland to wildlife habitat has had a dramatic positive impact on wildlife. My trapper neighbor has seen a more widespread increase in fur bearers as well which I attribute to wider adoption of conservation tillage facilitated by glyphosate-tolerant crops. Even during droughts, we have a lot of water for the wildlife on our place which I believe, in combination with development of dense cover, has kept our wildlife numbers high. The one counter trend is the prevalence of ground-nesting birds which I attribute mostly to high raccoon numbers. I am hoping fur prices will recover to incentivize trapping. I am not against others controlling predator numbers, but personally would like to see their fur go to good use. I have had to remove damaging beaver and muskrats though.

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RAH, sounds to me the surveyor falls in that category I mentioned of being socialist minded and will do most anything to punish landowners. I'm telling you that today it's all over the place when dealing with government personal. I even ran across it when dealing with a local bank employee as we discussed taxes that I paid because of being a successful business owner. I dropped all my accounts with that bank.


Do not judge me by the politicians in my City, State or Federal Government.


Tracy
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