Curmudgeon

What a can or worms. Basing wildlife management on referendum is a nightmare. Basing it on science could be also. Does the science support agriculture over wildlife habitat, game over non-game? How about lead-free ammunition? Science would ban lead ammunition. Be careful what you wish for. An amendment to provide a "right to hunt" could never allow all practices. The ME bear hunting practices would not be legal in NYS. If bears were out of control, they would probably call in APHIS instead of dealing with the public resistance to politically unpalatable measures.

Ornithology sometimes uses the concept of population "sources" and "sinks". A source is an area in which a species can thrive and reproduce thus providing individuals to inhabit new areas and support the larger population. A sink is an area which draws in a species but has a net negative affect on the population. For a grassland species, a sink would be a hayfield which seems inviting but will result in a wasted nesting attempt when hay is cut during the nesting season. The same idea applies to other wildlife. 4 Seasons has a coyote sink in the middle of a huge coyote source. I have a deer sink in the middle of a large deer source. My DEC biologist friend told me it did not matter how many does we killed on my 80 acres. We could kill them all and it would have virtually no affect on the local population. There are that many deer, and several large properties where no does are killed - one being 700 acres. There is a 120 acres across the road where no hunting is allowed we refer to as the deer preserve. You can see 15-30 deer out in the open during the gun season.

Buckwheat cannot stand a frost so any attraction won't last into deer season. When I've used it as a cover crop, they will mow it down to the stems once they find it. They eat everything green. He may not get a crop.

Deer love buckwheat.

That might be more dangerous than the skunk.

Your typo had me thinking you were constantly perused by their models. Quite a different thing.

Hmmmm. That's weird Grow. Nothing chases me but I'm a curmudgeon. The only other time my wife was chased, it was a raccoon. She got me out of bed, I killed it, and the DOH confirmed it was rabid.

On her pre-dawn walk, my wife was chased - yes chased - by a skunk. She isn't very fast, but fortunately faster than a skunk. She made a couple of 90 degree turns to make sure it was chasing her. It broke off the chase after about 100 yards. This was my opportunity to hunt dangerous game. I figured this would be my only chance to experience the adrenaline rush that comes from being charged by a cape buffalo or lion. I stalked around the whole area where the skunk chase took place. I was totally focused - at least as focused as I can be at this point in my life - waiting every moment for the attack to come. The skunk never showed. Either it left, went to ground, or knew it was no match for me.

Most of my Christmas tree customers are quite familiar with the deer problems. The see the damage and browse lines. Nothing will change that person's mind. Most of my pain is economic. This is a combination of localized over-browsing within the context of too many deer in a large area. Quite a few local farmers and large forest owners get DMAP tags in this town. The most severe problem has been the nipping of fir leaders on short trees. There was a 50 degree day in early January which gave me an opportunity to spray repellant on the little ones. Since there wasn't any rain, the repellant seems to have worked all winter - at least until the snow got too deep for the deer to move. What is interesting is that they hammer a couple of small, separated areas within a plantation of several acres while ignoring trees in between.

About a decade ago, one of my neighbors got very upset at me. When I told him we shoot multiple does each year, he accused me of "killing the brood stock". Since that conversation he never came back and bought another tree. In that time we've taken probably 40 does off the property. These balsam firs show the result of "killing the brood stock". Actually, damage this winter was less than usual.

A couple of sites still have cameras running. This is a nice photo of a relaxed bobcat (yawn) and a coyote. This is interesting. Watching the sequence, the second skunk went completely inside the abdominal cavity.

If she is the next President, I'm blaming the Republicans - again!

Let's hope that either the Rs put out a candidate that is moderate enough to elect, or that Jim Webb has a chance. I'm hoping Hillary is not a given, that the D's will take a hard look at alternatives.

My Dad had it right. He went on a hunting trip when I was 5 days old. My brother is an Irish twin. 6 decades and Mom still hasn't forgiven him for leaving her with 2 infants.

I was on the Citizens Task Force for 4F. Except for the SW corner and eastern edge, the unit is overpopulated. The only places where people commented on few deer was in the State Forests. Hunting in the City of Oneonta or Village of Cooperstown should be very good.

Thank you. I have hundreds of thousands of photos. It's good for people to see some of them. Here's some from a couple of years ago. Bald Eagle clash Barred Owl collage Cautious yote and Golden Eagle Coyote chasing ravens Blond coyote

Snow is going fast in western 4F yesterday and today. There is still a lot where it drifted and in the woods but open areas are growing increasingly brown.

jjb - I don't believe the woman was evil - just tragically ignorant. Giving issues such as this attention counters such public ignorance.

This year-old Golden Eagle dropped in for a feed this week. Almost all the goldens we see now are migrants. The adults go north first to get on their territories. The juveniles go later, usually in April. What is interesting here is that you can see the tail feathers of its first molt coming in. Each year, the white flight feathers of the wing and tail are gradually replaced with feathers with more dark and less white. When they are sexually mature, they are all dark.

There is now a petition you can sign asking for Federal charges to be brought against the falcon killer. http://www.thepetitionsite.com/920/369/720/?z00m=22833258&redirectID=1637969236

To see video of a raven yanking an eagle's tail, go to https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCGcjAKZaOiGDOlfkJDQbqEg and sort through the full playlist.

Some recent photos from sites that are still operating. The first is a Cooper's Hawk. Accipiter hawks very seldom scavenge. This is the only cooper's ever photographed doing so in NYS as part of this project. There is only one photo taken just before dark. It may have been a very hungry migrant stopping late in the day. This is a migrating Golden Eagle that stopped for a meal. This is a Common Raven yanking on a Bald Eagle's tail. This is very common. They will do it to get the eagles to move so the raven can get at food. I have many videos of this behavior. It seems to me that they often do it for fun. They also do it to wolves but are very reluctant to do it to Golden Eagles. You do not want to provoke a Golden Eagle. This is a nice looking cat. I just thought this was cute.

For this scenario, iIf there were a 501c3 that could handle the money, it would simplify everything.

If you want pure American, listen to G-Man. Do not plant Dunstan, Chinese or any hybrid. They hybridize very easily. The GE tree is the most pure tree able to resist the blight. I am personally very wary of transgenic organisms. However, this tree has only a few individual genes that have been changed. It was not developed for profit - such as the Roundup Ready products which are all about increasing herbicide use while denying farmers the right to save seed. It is not a tree that will be grown in monoculture for fiber - monocultures that are a sterile environment for wildlife. It is a tree whose resistant genes can find their way into crosses with all those small but flowering American trees out there. Comments to the National Research Council are needed to help move the approval of the transgenic American Chestnut forward. http://nas-sites.org/ge-crops/2014/06/15/provide-comments/ The message below is from Allen Nicols, President of the American Chestnut Foundation's New York organization. Please comment. Hi,I am contacting all the TACFNY members and asking if you could post positive comments about the American chestnut to the NRC at http://nas-sites.org/ge-crops/2014/06/15/provide-comments/ . We just found out that the "Stop GE Trees Campaign" is asking their membership to send in negative comments and we need to balance their message with a positive one. The silent majority needs to be heard from. Can you specifically mention the American chestnut and in your own words state how you have directly supported the SUNY-ESF research for many years and that you think everyone should have the choice to plant our transgenic American chestnut trees on their own property. Positive or negative public feedback will determine how long the federal regulatory review will take. So if more people respond positively, we will be able to offer our blight resistant American chestnut to the public sooner. So please leave positive comments and try to get others to do so also. It only takes about 5 minutes to leave a comment. Feel free to forward this email to anyone you think would like to see the American chestnut reintroduced back into the forest. Thanks, Allen Nichols President, TACF-NY

If you weren't confused about taxonomy, why did you even bring Sunn Hemp and a Hibiscus plant into the discussion? Dom wasn't talking about Sunn Hemp or anything else. He was talking about Cannabis plants, actually Cannabis sativa grown for fiber. Forgive me if I'm having trouble following your train of thought.