Ep. 272 What Deer Need to Eat with Dr. Mark Turner
For landowners managing for whitetail, food plots are common, but what are we overlooking in the native landscape? This episode we were joined by biologist Dr. Mark Turner to discuss a critical component of deer nutrition, native forbs. Dr. Turner explains how these wildflowers and prairie plants are more than just "weeds" and how they provide essential nutrients for antler growth and overall herd health. This is a must-listen for anyone serious about creating a truly resilient and superior wildlife habitat.
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00;00;00;00 - 00;00;21;26
Unknown
This is Mark Turner, wildlife extension specialist at Oklahoma State University. Welcome to the Prairie Farm podcast. I'm Doug during a landowner trying to be a conservationist. I'm Tabitha Panisse, president of the Iowa Prairie Network. I'm Ryan Callahan, director of conservation at meat Here. Angela from Ax and Group homestead. Chris Selzer, the Nebraska director of science for the Nature Conservancy.
00;00;22;01 - 00;00;48;20
Unknown
John Mccollam from working class bow hunter Taylor Keene, founder of Sacred Seed Ryan Bryson price and wildlife Luke Fritsch, Mr. James Holtz, Joy and wine garden. Sam Philibert, Julie Meacham. And you are listening to the Prairie Farm, the Prairie Farm, Prairie Farm, Prairie Farm, Prairie Farm podcast. Prairie farm podcast, welcome to the Prairie Farm podcast. Well, everybody, I, I need to, give a little disclaimer here at the beginning or a little, explanation here.
00;00;48;21 - 00;01;12;11
Unknown
Nicolas is not with me on this podcast. As you've probably seen on social media, and in fact, there may even be a coffee time. I'm, of course, recording this before we, make any official announcement on the podcast, but I believe there will be a coffee time episode where we talk about Carol, our founder. Carol.
00;01;12;14 - 00;01;34;19
Unknown
Sadly passed away this Monday. And, you know, left a big hole here at Hoxie, one that we will never, completely fill. Of course, you don't replace people like Carol. They're, they are one of a kind. And, we are incredibly blessed here at Hoxie to have had his leadership for as long as we have.
00;01;34;22 - 00;02;12;29
Unknown
And the prairie community is blessed to have had his expertise and and his seed that was, you know, helping build up the industry, along with, a bunch of other great early pioneers in the, in the prairie industry. Carol was right there with them. And, the, pretty much the very beginning. And, he, has passed away, though, and, I just personally want to say, I'm I'm forever indebted to Carol giving me a chance, at doing this, coming out of, my, former career.
00;02;13;01 - 00;02;35;17
Unknown
Which which was, being a science teacher, and I'm, you know, just sometimes, I can't I can't believe why somebody would give me a chance. But Carol did. He he, was gracious enough and taught me, as much as he could in the three years that I worked with him. So, that is why Nicholas is not here.
00;02;35;19 - 00;03;00;14
Unknown
Carol, of course, is his stepfather. And so, he's got some additional family things going on, but, I, I am available, and this is a topic that, I really, really am excited about. We have. So is it doctor Mark Turner? Is it? What's your what's your official, professional title? It is, but you can just call me, call me Mark.
00;03;00;16 - 00;03;18;12
Unknown
What are your friends call you generally just Mark. They don't ever. They don't never mess with you, like Doc Turner or something like that. Occasionally, but, but but no, it it kind of, it kind of wears off after, you know, day one of you getting the title, it, you know, just kind of all wears off. So. Yeah.
00;03;18;14 - 00;03;40;09
Unknown
Well, I tell you what, you got the you got the perfect mustache for, like an old Western. I think you should go by Doc Turner. You're out there and you're out there in Oklahoma. You know, that's basically the West. And, not that you're you're the neighbor to Texas. So I'm sure there was some Old West stuff that went on down there, but, no, we're we're glad to have you on the podcast.
00;03;40;09 - 00;04;13;20
Unknown
And we're talking about something that we talk about in increasing levels of specificity, but oftentimes in general. Right. We understand well that, native forbs are are in just native plants, I guess I should say are critical to a healthy whitetail diet. But, as to which ones and why, we need to call in someone like, like yourself and, so we're going to get into that.
00;04;13;20 - 00;04;43;13
Unknown
But I wanted to start here, just to kick things off in studying, deer nutrition, what is something that almost everybody gets wrong about what deer need or want to eat? Yeah. So there's there's a couple things. I think probably just starting right off the bat would just be the time of year that we need to be thinking about managing deer forage availability.
00;04;43;16 - 00;05;07;07
Unknown
Certainly a lot of hunters, they're only thinking about deer from, say, September through December or January. And so just, you know, incidentally, that's the only time of year that they think about deer nutrition. Instead of thinking about it during the, during other times of the year. And certainly, you know, there's something to be said for having deer forage availability throughout the year.
00;05;07;09 - 00;05;28;06
Unknown
But a lot of hunters, you know, I think I think historically maybe, maybe this has shifted a little bit now. But, you know, they've really focused on fall food plots, acorns, standing grain things of that nature. And certainly, you know, especially if you're in a part of the country where, you know, winter forage is, is limiting and you have really cold, severe winters.
00;05;28;13 - 00;06;06;29
Unknown
There certainly is a lot of benefit to having forage, during that, that winter stress period. But in terms of biologically, especially if we're thinking about managing for for a larger deer or a healthier deer herd, we really need to think about managing for high quality forage availability during the growing season because despite what you know, you may see on YouTube or hear on other podcasts or whatever, Deerford availability is not just limitless during the growing season and in a lot of places now, if you're surrounded by a sea of soybeans, then then maybe a lot of the growing season is taken care of.
00;06;06;29 - 00;06;26;16
Unknown
But but they're certainly in most places, the vast majority of the country. There's a lot that's left on the table, in terms of forage availability during the growing season, that that we ought to think about if we're interested in managing deer herds. Yeah. So what's the what's the effect of that. That is it just a, a lower number of deer.
00;06;26;16 - 00;07;01;27
Unknown
Is it is it less healthy deer. Is it less, you know, survival, chance for fawns. I mean, what's the what's the what's the real risk? Yeah. So all of the above depending on, you know, the severity, generally, you know, if we think about the worst case scenario, certainly there are some places that are really low productivity in the, in the coastal plain where, deer, you know, farm survival can be decreased because of limited food availability.
00;07;01;29 - 00;07;23;16
Unknown
Not only do you have, in some cases fall starving, in other cases you have, you have fawns that are more vocal because they're hungry or they're more likely to get eaten by a coyote. Then, there were some really good work, done by, some colleagues, Marcus Lashley and, Colter Chitwood was involved in this project as well in North Carolina.
00;07;23;19 - 00;07;47;08
Unknown
And they found that basically those that dropped their phones closer to areas that were recently burned, which in that part of the world represented really high quality nutrition. Those were more likely to survive, whereas those that were farther from those recent burns, were actually more likely to starve. So really, just just as an example. Yeah. But you know, that's that's generally not that big of a deal.
00;07;47;11 - 00;08;07;22
Unknown
I mean, that's that's extremely low, low productivity sites, in areas with more moderate or more normal productivity, we would tend to see, you know, most places don't have as large of antlers. They don't have, as heavy of dose or as heavy of bucks as they might otherwise have. Certainly there's less fat reserves on those deer.
00;08;07;25 - 00;08;37;21
Unknown
And so, yeah, you you certainly leave a lot on the table in terms of, antler size of box and, and, and even, you know, you think about parts of the world that have really productive deer herds where you're seeing more triplets, you're seeing fawns, more productive, and in some cases, fawns even breeding. Those tend to be more Midwestern states that in areas specifically dominated by agriculture, which, again, is just highlighting the fact that, you know, it's nothing magical about a soybean plant or, an alfalfa plant to deer.
00;08;37;21 - 00;08;59;01
Unknown
It just represents high quality forage during the time the antlers and body are growing. And so, you know, places that that's limiting you tend to see smaller deer and generally less productive herds. Although that's not to say that you can't have too many deer, in places with limited food availability. Oftentimes there's there's too many deer, in those places as well.
00;08;59;03 - 00;09;24;26
Unknown
Yeah. Yeah. No, I think that's, that's a great explanation there and made me kind of think of another concept. So on this podcast, we don't just talk, you know, wildlife and hunting. We do a lot of that. We also talk agriculture and, you know, food for humans. You know, like, human diets. And this concept of food deserts is something that we're familiar with.
00;09;24;28 - 00;09;55;07
Unknown
They talk about different parts of our country that are food deserts for humans, where you're so, it's so much more difficult to find. Like food. That's good for you, I guess is a good, simple way to sum it up. And what does using that same concept to you, what does a food desert look like for a whitetail deer.
00;09;55;09 - 00;10;24;14
Unknown
Well it can take a variety of forms. So you could think about a lot of especially the eastern part of the country, you know, close canopy woods, relatively limited disturbance. There's hardly any sunlight hitting the ground, but it could also take the form of, non-native pasture. Certainly areas that are dominated by non-native, as well as native grasses, although generally the non-native ones would tend to be a little bit more dominating.
00;10;24;14 - 00;10;51;05
Unknown
But places that are dominated by grass, deer, grasses, you know, comprise a very small proportion of a deer's annual diet. Especially during the summertime whenever we're thinking about growing antlers and, and, those that are producing milk for fawns, and so areas that basically have either sunlight's not reaching the ground or it's reaching the ground, growing plants that aren't desirable forages for deer.
00;10;51;08 - 00;11;22;04
Unknown
That's that's kind of what I would think about. But, you know, I think something that's oftentimes overlooked that would kind of hit on this, you know, if the only place that a deer has on your property is a food plot, that that's going to represent, you know, somewhat of a, a food desert as well, obviously thinking about the landscape as a whole, you know, if there's, there may be food around you, but if your particular property's not providing attractive forage for deer, then certainly there there's there's going to be some negatives from that.
00;11;22;07 - 00;11;40;24
Unknown
Certainly, you know, some areas could serve as cover. But, but, but you know, when, when food is limiting, that's going to be, you know, a major concern and a common problem that we run into on a lot of properties. Yeah. That's, that's well, that's well said. You brought up something in there.
00;11;40;24 - 00;12;09;19
Unknown
Grass. I was kind of surprised you didn't go that route with your, most common misconception. Because I think most people think of deer just going out and, I mean, how many how many paintings of deer in a field grazing on grass, like, like some kind of, you know, indigenous cows species or something, you know, or I think a lot of people just think that as long as you have, you have plenty of nice, lush green grass, you're going to be feeding deer.
00;12;09;19 - 00;12;38;20
Unknown
But that that isn't the case, right? Yeah. So. So deer are they're not grazers. You know, things like, like cattle or bison we would refer to as grazers. They're also technically not browsers. They're, they're closer to being a browser. Than than, than a grazer. But, technically, deer are what we would call a concentrate selector, which sounds like a, you know, made up scientific term, but, it really is pretty self-explanatory.
00;12;38;22 - 00;13;11;19
Unknown
So they're they're a selector. That means that they selectively forage and they concentrate that selective foraging on the types of plants, as well as the plant parts that are going to be higher quality. Whenever you think about a cow, for instance, you know, part of the reason that cows can handle, more, eating less nutritious forage and specifically grasses tend to be higher in fiber and, and lower in a lot of the, the things like protein and minerals, compared to a lot of the Forbes and even some woody plants at times of the year.
00;13;11;22 - 00;13;34;17
Unknown
Part of the reason that they can handle that is because they're so large and so, you know, cows having a room and similar to Whitetails, and other other ungulates, they're so much bigger. And so because they're bigger, they can eat more forage and, and then take their time more in extracting those nutrients. The actual, you know, digestive process between a cow and a deer is different.
00;13;34;17 - 00;13;59;08
Unknown
But as you get animals with smaller body sizes, they actually have to have higher quality forage, okay, than an animal with a bigger body. So think about a cow can handle worse food than a elk, than a mule deer, than a whitetail even, you know, even, there have been some recent work showing that that mule deer can actually handle a little bit lower quality forwards than a whitetail.
00;13;59;10 - 00;14;16;21
Unknown
And so that just kind of shows that, you know, along that gradient, really Whitetails are in a spot where if they're relying on grass, I mean, they're generally just not going to eat grass and you're not going to have many deer on your property if you just have grass. But, that's really, really low on the, on the, on the list.
00;14;16;21 - 00;14;45;27
Unknown
And aside from cool season annual grasses like wheat, oats and cereal rye, they're comprising far less than 10% of the diet throughout the majority of the year. Yeah. Yeah, that's that's really interesting to, to hear that. And I think it probably does, you know, clear up, some misconceptions out there, but I, I like how I would have always said that a deer is a browser, and I think 99% of deer hunters, would, would probably say that too, but a concentrated selector.
00;14;46;00 - 00;15;10;22
Unknown
Yeah. And again, it's not you know, they're closer to a browser than a grazer. So it'd be more correct to say that they, you know, they do. They're more of a browser than a grazer. There's kind of a, somewhat of a, a gradient there, if you will, but. Sure. But yeah, they're they definitely focus in on those, those high quality plants and those youngest, most adjustable and highest, in nutrient parts of those plants as well.
00;15;10;24 - 00;15;20;12
Unknown
Yeah. That's that's really interesting. Okay. So here's, here's another question then, along those lines,
00;15;20;15 - 00;15;45;14
Unknown
We, we often talk about so on this podcast, I'm saying we often talk about, the, reality that while deer I've said this many times, deer, they adapted to these native plants for millennia. I mean, this is this. That's all they had to eat. There were no soybeans for deer to be eating. There were no clover plots.
00;15;45;14 - 00;16;32;11
Unknown
There were no, you know, name your favorite. You know, bag of throw and grow food plot mix, you know. Right. They, they were surviving on these plants as a concentrated selector with the addition of these non-native forage crops that get thrown into the mix here. I mean, our deer going to it, let's say if you had, if you had, 100 acres of, super, I mean, remnant quality, diverse prairie, you know, so we're talking over 100 species of plants, many, many species of forbs.
00;16;32;14 - 00;17;09;23
Unknown
And, if you had, then along with that, you know, maybe 20 acres of white oaks, and then you have a five acre soybean plot with the deer and, and with so much more abundance in the native food sources, are they going to pay attention still to that five acre soybean plot, or because, I mean, they did so well without the soybean for so long?
00;17;09;26 - 00;17;37;12
Unknown
What it what it basically just be the superfluous thing that they, they wouldn't find much, you know, find much, value in or or because right now it's basically the exact opposite, right. We have these small prairies, we have these small oak timber stands, especially here in Iowa, surrounded by thousands of acres of soybeans. But if you kind of flipped that, what would be what would be the effect?
00;17;37;15 - 00;18;05;06
Unknown
You know, coming from deer behavior. Do you think so? I'll give the classic biologist answer. It depends. So I think, I mean, all this is context dependent, right? So, yeah. If you're on a property, there's no doubt that deer likes soybeans, and there's no doubt that they probably are about as highly selected as any forage that that you could provide.
00;18;05;08 - 00;18;29;11
Unknown
So it really depends more on the landscape context. You know I've been on properties where you know typically at least in and in a lot of the country and, and even, you know, again depending on the landscape, y'all's part of the world, you wouldn't even recommend somebody planting less than a five acre plot and usually less than 7 or 8 acres in soybeans, because the deer are going to eat it down to nothing.
00;18;29;11 - 00;19;07;28
Unknown
And and, you know, a night basically. Yeah. But I have been on properties that had extensive coverage and eat that, relatively large properties, you know, a thousand plus acres relatively, large coverage of, native early successional communities, native grasslands, depending on the part of the country you're in, thinned and burned woods. In those cases, when there's extensive coverage of that and you don't have 150 deer per square mile, and you're managing the herd to be in line with the, nutritional carrying capacity.
00;19;08;00 - 00;19;31;22
Unknown
I have seen places where you could get away with growing a relatively small soybean plot, because the deer weren't relying on that as their sole source of high quality forage on the property. So. So, yeah, you certainly do see less use of, you know, less intensive use. Of that soybean plot compared to a place where that's their only source of nutrition.
00;19;31;24 - 00;19;57;19
Unknown
The thing that I will say that regardless of whether you're in a situation where you have only natives or you have, you know, only soybeans or something like that, especially in a place where, you know, soybeans or AGG is, is really your main source of nutrition. Think about the available of that forage, relative to the nutrition of deer, when, when to most soybeans going go in the ground in your part of the world?
00;19;57;21 - 00;20;24;11
Unknown
Some is some as early as around, you know, mid April to, you know, some guys will finish up well into June, right. Yeah. That, that or that kind of mid to late spring time frame. Yeah. So if we think about that and then we think about let's just say June 1st, if you plan it in the middle of May, the amount of biomass that they're providing is not that great.
00;20;24;13 - 00;20;44;13
Unknown
You know, certainly you could push your plant date earlier and, you know, there are other forages like alfalfa that would be providing forage. But if you're in an area that's dominated by agriculture and all the deer have to eat and all their nutrition is coming from something like soybeans, of course you're going to have larger deer than a place that's just forested, or there's not much nutrition.
00;20;44;15 - 00;21;03;03
Unknown
I'm not discounting that at all. But during that time period when bucks are just starting to grow, their antlers or those or, you know, in that late gestation or late in pregnancy and even in some places they may be dropping their phones and starting to, need to find nutrition to, to support lactation. Your soybeans are about.
00;21;03;04 - 00;21;26;24
Unknown
Yeah. You know, we're only talking you know, they're just popping out of the ground. They're going to provide good nutrition later in the summer, which is also important. But even if you're in a place that's dominated by agriculture, there's a lot of good, good that can be said about having native plants there, because clearly deer are going to be relying on nutrition earlier in the year than when that biomass is really popping from soybeans.
00;21;26;24 - 00;21;49;25
Unknown
I mean, just because you can drive around in, in late July or early August and see big bucks standing out in the field eating soybeans doesn't mean that most of the nutrition to grow those antlers, was actually from the soybeans. Certainly a lot of it was. But there was some during that early antler growth period that, you know, the soybeans either weren't even growing or they were only providing, relatively limited amounts of forage.
00;21;49;28 - 00;22;13;05
Unknown
Yeah. Yeah, that's that's it's an interesting, you know, mental game to kind of walk through these, these scenarios. But yeah, just just good points in general there. Okay. So let's talk a little bit here where we're kind of dancing all around it. You wrote an article here very recently for the National Deer Association, which has provided excellent information to, you know, deer enthusiasts.
00;22;13;05 - 00;22;37;06
Unknown
I guess we could say mostly hunters, but I suppose not all our hunters, and certainly not only hunters, make use of the information they put out there. But, this article was on the three main things. A, are the three main nutritional components, I guess would be a good way to say it, that a deer needs in its diet.
00;22;37;08 - 00;22;58;21
Unknown
You list them as crude protein, phosphorus and calcium. And when I was first starting to read that article, I'm like, now, wait a minute. You talking about bucks here because you think calcium, phosphorus, antler development, right. But you stayed consistent with the article in saying deer and you even start talking and you've already mentioned it here in this conversation.
00;22;58;23 - 00;23;20;15
Unknown
The importance of lactation, for the dose as well. And they it's just kind of that's it seems based on what I was reading there, that those really are the three most important things that a deer, needs to have a healthy diet. Is that is that accurate? Yeah. So there's there's certainly a lot of other, sure.
00;23;20;15 - 00;23;43;00
Unknown
Micronutrients and, other macronutrients as well. Yes. And even even things like energy that we might consider, that they need to meet those demands. But in terms of what's generally considered to be most limiting on the landscape, usually plants don't have, you know, a deer. There's not enough availability of forages that are high in crude protein and phosphorus.
00;23;43;02 - 00;24;04;10
Unknown
Calcium generally isn't as limiting as, you know, as was kind of previously thought. But, but but all three of those are kind of the main, nutrients that a lot of folks focus on whenever they're thinking about deer nutrition and the types of plants that deer like to eat. Yeah. Yeah. I thought I found that to be.
00;24;04;10 - 00;24;22;23
Unknown
I found it to be interesting. I guess I would have kind of along the lines of the grass misconception. You all, you oftentimes hear people talk about. Yep. You need the soybeans out there in your food plot during the summer for all the protein. And then when it comes around to winter, they need corn for all the carbohydrates, for energy.
00;24;22;25 - 00;24;55;13
Unknown
And of course, I'd prefer those to be native plants instead of just, conventional, agricultural crops, one of which is largely intended to be, turned into, biodiesel, and ethanol. But, the, I guess really both are used for biodiesel, but, but, the, the carbohydrate element of it, I was interested it was interesting that that wasn't listed in there and protein was listed ahead of it.
00;24;55;13 - 00;25;18;06
Unknown
And I guess you're saying because of how limited it is on the landscape, I assume that just the time of year, you know, okay. But yeah. So the, the they're probably just getting carbs basically in everything they're eating. Right? Because they're eating specifically plant material. Well, they're. Yeah. And they're, they're, they're not really. That's not limiting during the, during the summertime.
00;25;18;06 - 00;25;35;02
Unknown
Now as you move later into the fall and then into the winter, carbohydrates, you know, and just energy in general do tend to be a little bit more, more limiting. And that would be, that would be the sort of thing that, you know, I would start to consider then more so than crude protein in the middle of winter.
00;25;35;04 - 00;25;53;24
Unknown
But again, on a lot of places, forage is not as limiting in the, in the fall and winter as it would be, during the summer. And, you know, deer are not trying to support lactation or antler growth during that time either. Right? Right. No, that's, that's a good that's a good clarifier to put in there.
00;25;53;27 - 00;26;20;00
Unknown
So I've often wondered then, Mark, with needing the still needing the carbohydrates in the winter months. You know, you think of native plants. They've been the rock star for the diet up until winter. Certainly there are some species that hold on to their seeds and maybe, deer get some value. I think that's probably better for like quail and turkeys and pheasants and and songbirds and things like that.
00;26;20;00 - 00;26;42;02
Unknown
I would think probably, probably make more use of the seeds because they are so small on native plants. But, maybe like Illinois bundle flower or some people call it prairie mimosa, it can hold on to its seed for quite some time. I believe. Bush clover is kind of the same thing. But aside from seed value, do you do these?
00;26;42;05 - 00;27;18;01
Unknown
Do native plants have much forage ability in the winter? I mean, it's all the grasses. Of course they aren't eating much grass anyways, but everything's just, you know, the leaves on the on the forms are all dried up, and the grasses have since then have all, you know, become crispy and brown. I mean, are they are they still pulling carbohydrates and calories out of things like that, or are they specializing on, you know, tree branches and, and corn, you know, corn kernels of corn on the ground and things like that.
00;27;18;03 - 00;27;44;22
Unknown
Yeah. So, again, it all comes back to availability. Certainly deer are really going to hone in on those energy, rich food sources during the winter time if they're available. So if they're, if they're standing grain, they're certainly going to make use of that. They'll also make good use of things like, you know, cool season food plots, or cool season agronomic plantings of things like wheat.
00;27;44;24 - 00;28;03;20
Unknown
You know, those also have sufficient energy. They're not necessarily high in energy, but it's sufficient to, you know, meet their maintenance level demands. But in terms of native plants, that deer are going to get a lot of use of in the wintertime. There are certainly, several forbs that will have, winter rosettes or basal rosette.
00;28;03;20 - 00;28;21;08
Unknown
So they can that they can, you know, have access to throughout the winter. I never thought of that. That's a good point. Those do get some use. Certainly more use if they're available versus not. But then the other two things that I really like to think about, especially for winter time, would be, acorns of red oaks.
00;28;21;10 - 00;28;44;22
Unknown
Now, you can't count on having acorns every year because, you know, deer are going to drop, or, oaks are not going to have acorns every single year. So there's, there's variation between species, there's variation in the timing that they're available. But those red oaks tend to have acorns that are higher in tannins, and those are going to be, more readily available later into the fall and into the winter.
00;28;44;24 - 00;29;13;09
Unknown
So, so those are going to be commonly used. You're also going to see, again, a lot of use of woody species. If there's not other food sources. And even in cases where there are, you know, the backbone of kind of winter nutrition for deer on most places is going to be woody brouse. And so there's something to be said about not eliminating, woody species, you know, in, and more either early successional or grassland systems.
00;29;13;11 - 00;29;42;11
Unknown
Certainly you want to maintain that forb coverage and, you know, have some grass to help you burn. But, if you if you end up losing the coverage of those woody plants, that's going to be a negative. And so, you know, I'm really thinking about managing the woods, such that I do have some woody brouse in the wintertime as well as, you know, from from some of the more desirable woody brown species out in fields, not just trying to, you know, broadcast eliminate those, but but allow some of those to persist.
00;29;42;14 - 00;30;07;05
Unknown
Yeah. It's interesting. I've always wondered about that. What, what is the the, you know, benefit of that, but that's a good point, especially on the rosettes. I should have thought of that. But that is that is a good point. Okay. Yeah. So we we've, you know, kind of laid out what they really need. What are some of the advantages of, I mean, because it is easier to just grow soybeans.
00;30;07;05 - 00;30;36;13
Unknown
Mark. It is easier just to, plant a big old field of, of soybeans and maybe leave back a certain percentage of them, to be there throughout the year, obviously. You mentioned, like, the timing is, is critical. So, first and foremost, you talked about this, by the time those soybeans have started, become available to eat after they're planted, there's a significant gap in time there.
00;30;36;16 - 00;31;07;11
Unknown
And, there's some native plants, some early, sprouting, native plants that can fill that, that gap there. But but anything else, I mean, is it just, you know, we hear all the time, like, especially in ecology, diversity is, is the key to a healthy ecosystem. And, is, is that just I mean, is that as big of a deal for deer nutrition as we often preach that it is?
00;31;07;18 - 00;31;45;09
Unknown
Do deer truly like having a whole bunch of different native forbs to select from, or is that kind of overblown? No, I think there's there's a lot to be said about that. And I think that there's there's a couple different things that come into, you know, why diversity might matter within, within a plant community. Again, we got to think about just having like, the first thing when I'm looking at a property would be just having enough biomass of high quality forage available either on the property or on the landscape, whether that's agriculture or whether that's, you know, native plant communities.
00;31;45;11 - 00;32;07;18
Unknown
So certainly that's that's kind of like step one is just making sure that there's enough, availability of forbs to, you know, to feed the deer that we have on the place. The second step, though, that I would start considering is the diversity. Forage. That could be from planted forages, you know, having different species that we've planted in food plots and things like that.
00;32;07;20 - 00;32;31;12
Unknown
But but really, more specifically to this conversation, I do think a lot about the diversity of native plants that that are available for deer to eat. For two reasons. First, the timing, just at its most basic level, the timing of availability is going to be different between species. There are some species, such as daisy, flea bang that comes on really early in the spring.
00;32;31;14 - 00;33;07;01
Unknown
It's very highly selected by deer, very nutritious, but it's seeded out. And, you know, the leaves are sensing and and it's it's pretty much done by the time we get to the middle of summer, compared to something like, poke weed, that would tend to produce forage that's high quality. Later into the summer. And so and there's obviously many other, many other examples, where if you have more plant species diversity and specifically here species that deer eat, you know, that's going to be beneficial just because there's going to be differences in timing of peak nutrition.
00;33;07;03 - 00;33;32;10
Unknown
The other thing though to consider is there are differences in forage availability. And you know, oftentimes when we think of deer nutrition, we're we're really focused in on providing enough nutrients. And for most landowners that's kind of step one that they're probably not accomplishing right now is just providing enough plants that are high in nutritional quality. The problem with that is similar to cattle.
00;33;32;10 - 00;33;59;19
Unknown
There are forages that are too high in some nutrients. The deer will then tend to avoid. Sulfur is kind of a classic example. You know that that there's good work from, in the cattle world that shows that, you know, cows can have problems if they consume too much sulfur. There's similar work with deer showing that the deer do tend to select against some species, at least at some level, that are, that are higher in sulfur.
00;33;59;21 - 00;34;24;10
Unknown
And a lot of the forms that we're promoting, you know, several of them that are really good forages and really high quality, you know, coincidentally, also tend to be high in sulfur. And so by having some plants that are, you know, higher in nutrients the deer want and others that are, you know, maybe high in nutrients that deer want, but also don't, don't have some of that toxicity concern from things like sulfur, is going to be beneficial.
00;34;24;10 - 00;34;52;22
Unknown
And so I think in general, just having a diversity of plants allows deer to kind of pick and choose the plants that, that they want to meet their needs while also, avoiding any, any toxicity issues. Yeah, that's a great point. Yeah. The the toxicity side of it is one that I keep learning just slightly more about. Our other coworker we have here, Riley, he, raises, bison, and uses bison to help restore Prairie.
00;34;52;25 - 00;35;35;10
Unknown
And, so he's, you know, very interested in native pasture and, and, you know, how some plants can, can have that effect. And, but we've also heard too, that, you know, sometimes that can be overblown, like, Jeremy French we had on from the Southeastern Grasslands Institute talked about how a lot of people fear having their cows graze on, milkweed, common milkweed, and, he said, you know, he presented some research to us that that, there was a study that that said that that's not really, as big of a deal as people think it is, you know, and so, but I do think that it is an
00;35;35;10 - 00;35;57;22
Unknown
important part of it, like a new, a new secret we're unlocking about how animals utilize native plants. So it's, it's a great point. Yeah. So I'm certainly just to clarify, not not concerned about deer keeling over dead from eating some plants or something like that. It's just that you know, by allowing them to selectively forage on the things that, that they want to.
00;35;57;22 - 00;36;24;03
Unknown
I mean, it's, it's similar in a, you know, in cattle, you tend to see more problems with toxicity when you elevate stocking rates to the point at which, yeah, they don't have the ability to be selective. And it's the same with deer. If we limit their forage availability, either by not providing enough of it or because we have over abundant deer populations, they then don't have the ability to be a selective because there's just not as much food out there per mouth.
00;36;24;05 - 00;36;43;12
Unknown
So, you know, I'm not worried about toxicity from a standpoint of deer dying or anything like that happening. Yeah. But we do want to consider the fact that having diversity allows deer to avoid that. Just naturally by by picking and choosing what they eat. Yeah. You're essentially just putting more options on the, on the shelf for them.
00;36;43;14 - 00;37;02;25
Unknown
Exactly. That's that's, that's a that's a great point. Okay. Yeah. So along that line along those lines, we, we have a, whitetail deer mix which I should send to you, have you just, like, look it over and see what you think, you know, give us a grade on it. But, at first, you know, when we first did it, we we had some general understanding.
00;37;02;25 - 00;37;26;25
Unknown
And then this last year, we retooled the whole thing and put, quite a few hours of research into, what is it that what species are useful to deer, what do they like to eat and what what don't they like to eat? And while we were doing that, we realized we had some, some species on there. That deer actually, really do not find to be very palatable.
00;37;26;27 - 00;38;06;09
Unknown
And what was interesting was it had kind of a common thread, just that I noticed from working with these species and growing some of these species very strong, smell to, you know, very fragrant. So, like the mint species, yeah. The, I want to say another one on there that they didn't like was, wild bergamot, which I think is technically in the mint family that that, I mean, it's not, you know, like Virginia mountain mint, which we grow that smells like crushed toothpaste.
00;38;06;12 - 00;38;29;22
Unknown
I'd say wild bergamot smells much more like, you know, your grandma's potpourri on the back of the toilet or something like that, but, the the, you know, anything that Rattlesnake Master, I think was also on there, very, very, strong smell to that maybe sweet comb flower might have been on there. Have you found that that.
00;38;29;22 - 00;38;52;04
Unknown
Yes, it's. I guess, first of all, it's true that there are some species that deer just don't like. And then, if so, is it just a matter of, okay, they don't eat it, you know, but it doesn't it doesn't impact their behavior beyond that. Or do you actually see, like, there's, you know, a repulsive effect to,
00;38;52;07 - 00;39;12;26
Unknown
Oh, man, there's mint over there. I'm going to skirt around that area because it smells so strong. And I hate that smell. I mean, it kind of makes sense from we know as deer hunters, we understand well how how strong of, sense of smell deer have. I mean, they can they can pick you off, if you don't have the wind blowing just right, you can go ahead and and kiss your opportunities away that day.
00;39;12;29 - 00;39;55;25
Unknown
But, it's, I mean, what have you observed with that? Yeah. So, in that case, you know, I don't think the deer are going to avoid an area based on, you know, the smell of a plant or anything like that. What you're most commonly seeing in those cases are just deer avoiding secondary compounds. And so secondary compounds or things, that, you know, among other, other things that they can do, you know, they can produce scent and, and, and some of those more fragrant species do tend to be higher in those secondary compounds, which would then act as basically nutrient binders to prevent, those forages from being
00;39;55;25 - 00;40;24;23
Unknown
as easily digested. Again, that's not the case in every single species that smells. But but a lot of the time when you have, plants that if you look at the nutrient levels, you think, well, deer should eat this, but they really don't. And same for any herbivore. A lot of the time it's just those secondary compounds and them not being able to process, things like tannins, as easily as, as forages that are lower in those, those compounds.
00;40;24;26 - 00;40;50;19
Unknown
Okay. Yeah. Yeah. That's true. Yeah. The tannins with. I never thought of it that way. That's truly it. That's that's purely a taste. Right. The the tannins. They just and aren't I mean there's other animals that avoid or that prefer white oak acorns over red oak acorns because of the tannins as well. Right. Right right. Yeah. That's pretty pretty common across most species that they'll, they'll select the the white oak versus the red oak if both are available.
00;40;50;22 - 00;41;11;12
Unknown
And yeah. So that's just another example of, you know, secondary compounds. But, but several of those are also present in leaf tissue. And and deer will, you know, selectively forage on things if they were to avoid those, if they're in a situation where they're, you know, they're, they're starting to be filled up with things that that have more of that.
00;41;11;14 - 00;41;44;22
Unknown
Sure. Okay. So so another thing I noticed in your article, and I've seen this before in other articles on, on, the National Deer Association website, the mention of these native what, what most people would consider weed species, but they aren't native species. Mare's tail. That wouldn't surprise me the most. Yep. The ragweed and let's see Polk weed was on there.
00;41;44;25 - 00;42;13;17
Unknown
And lamb's quarter, those are all species that love disturbance. I mean, you know, a year one prairie planting is going to have all kinds of those things that we just mentioned, other than maybe poke, we don't see a ton of poking, but it's, it's it's, you see, on occasion, it's more of like a true, like timbered edge, disturbed timber edge, I guess coming into Prairie or AG field or something like that.
00;42;13;19 - 00;42;51;09
Unknown
But, Lamb's quarter loves disturbance. There's got to be some kind of correlation there. I mean, just do you think if we rewound the clock a thousand years? First of all, other than Native Americans setting fires and maybe Buffalo and elk wallowing, I just, I guess maybe flash floods or something. I mean, where are we naturally going to be getting all this disturbance that is going to, you know, produce the perfect conditions for all of these species to to exist?
00;42;51;10 - 00;43;15;02
Unknown
I guess, there's got to be some kind of correlation there. Well, I mean, if you think about historically, and again, it depends varies widely between the, the part of the world that you're talking about. But, you know, we really do live in a, in a place that, you know, disturbance is in some ways, you know, become less common, especially from fire.
00;43;15;02 - 00;43;40;07
Unknown
But, and grazing to, to some extent, depending on the system. But, you know, think about things like tornadoes and hurricanes and floods, you know, all those things are going to be reducing canopy coverage in forests. And then you pair that with, you know, the, across much of the eastern U.S., you know, fire from, from Native Americans as well as lightning fire, especially in the coastal plain.
00;43;40;07 - 00;44;09;04
Unknown
But but even in some other areas, you know, fire used to be much more common, than it is now. And so, yeah, I think I think there's a lot less disturbance that, you know, you've kind of lost you've lost fire out of a lot of those systems. You've also lost, especially in more grassland systems, you know, having a large herbivore that would follow the fire, that would then, you know, tend to promote more form coverage after, you know, in that in the time immediately after fire.
00;44;09;05 - 00;44;41;20
Unknown
So you've really lost a lot of the natural disturbances within the system. That would have maintained coverage of some of these species. And, and again, you know, I listed just a few in the article. There's obviously several other species that, the deer selectively forage on that, that provide, excellent nutrition. But, you know, a lot of the species that are going to be most nutritious and most highly selected by deer, are some of those more annual or, you know, a few of those are more biennial species?
00;44;41;23 - 00;45;15;27
Unknown
It's not necessarily always going to be something that's, you know, perennial or anything like that. And you think about the life cycle of those species. They've got to germinate, get through a growing season and die and produce seed in order to persist on the landscape. Well, during that whole time, that means that they're actively growing. Whereas, you know, there are several other species that are more, you know, more even even within forbs, more, you know, prairie or more, grassland species that, that tend to have a longer life cycle than that.
00;45;15;29 - 00;45;37;19
Unknown
And that's not to say that I don't want those species on my property if I'm managing for deer, but it's just to say that, you know, you do need a lot of disturbance that's going to promote more of those annual and, biennial forbs, because those are the ones just because they're forced to complete their life cycle within a single growing season, or two growing seasons, they are going to tend to be higher in quality.
00;45;37;22 - 00;45;57;05
Unknown
And so when you think about what the landscape used to look like and it's, you know, it's it's hard to say. And, you know, only only God knows. And people that were there, what it looked like at the time, but. Right, you know, from, from just reconstructing based on, historical accounts and, you know, fire history and things like that.
00;45;57;12 - 00;46;25;10
Unknown
I mean, it's it's probably likely that, you know, certainly you had large herds of, of, of large herbivores moving around and maybe deer weren't moving around at the same scale that, that things like bison were. But certainly, I mean, we see even now deer selectively using areas, you know, if you burn an area in April or May, a few months after that, that, that for, forage availability and quality will peak and you'll see deer heavily using that.
00;46;25;10 - 00;46;50;15
Unknown
So, you know, I tend to think of deer, you know, operating, you know, in a similar way at a smaller scale, you know, to where they would be just moving around actively foraging on, on that, those areas that were freshly burned and, you know, in some cases grazed. And again, you know, depending on the larger scale disturbance, there obviously were other things going on that they would also selectively take advantage of.
00;46;50;18 - 00;47;09;12
Unknown
Yeah. But I think fire and grazing are the two that we've really lost out of the, at least fire and grazing in the way that it would have occurred historically. Those are, you know, what we've lost. Yeah. Yeah, those are those are interesting points. And, you know, I think that something that probably ties into it too is we we know deer as edge species.
00;47;09;12 - 00;47;31;21
Unknown
And you're going to typically find the greatest amount of disturbance along an edge. You know, it's just going to be like you're saying, you know, the travel pathways for some of these larger animals and things like that. And, and maybe, you know, maybe there's a correlation there too. Because really, in a mature prairie, you don't find a lot of mare's tail.
00;47;31;21 - 00;48;04;16
Unknown
You don't find a lot of ragweed just around the edges. You will, where where dirt's getting stirred around a little bit more, but, very, very interesting concept. Another one I have along that is, invasive plants. So Iowa grows anything that our soil or soil wants to, wants to grow whatever it can get seed for. And so we get all kinds of invasive plants.
00;48;04;19 - 00;48;31;05
Unknown
Through your research, have you come across I mean, obviously some of the maybe listening to this and say, well Dutch white clover, red clover, you know, those are invasive plants and yeah, they might be on to something there. But, I'm talking like true, like nobody plants them. They just end up here, you know, things like bush honeysuckle or Sirisha less species, or or bird's foot trefoil.
00;48;31;07 - 00;49;07;12
Unknown
The, you know, hairy vetch or crown vetch, you know, are is there any research into deer adapting to all these invasives and utilizing invasive forbs? For a, you know, significant portion of their diet. Right. So, depends on the species and, and, really in terms of forbs that are, you know, especially the more noxious, more invasive ones, you know, like Sirisha deer don't really eat Sirisha very much.
00;49;07;12 - 00;49;33;08
Unknown
It's another one where the secondary compounds are a problem. It's actually fairly high in protein, and, and phosphorus as well. But the secondary compounds deer interest. Deer. I mean, if you see deer hardly using Sirisha at all, it's it's definitely, should be a sign that there's, there's not enough forage on your property. But but thinking through, you know, there's not that many.
00;49;33;09 - 00;49;53;26
Unknown
You know, there are several that are non-native. But in terms of ones that I really think of as being super aggressive, part of the reason that, you know, that they may be as successful as they are is because they're not receiving that herbivory. And a lot of cases. So you do tend to see things like, bush honeysuckle or privet or autumn olive.
00;49;53;29 - 00;50;22;18
Unknown
Those certainly will receive use by deer. Japanese honeysuckle is another one that, you know, they will use those plants, especially, you know, after disturbance, either burning or cutting where, you know, they're fresh re sprouting. You know, they are just by the numbers, relatively nutritious. But it's one of those things that if deer on your property are relying on that, that should be, you know, a major, a major red flag for you.
00;50;22;20 - 00;50;43;17
Unknown
Certainly. You know, I'm not going to get bent out of shape out of having a couple plants here there that the deer using. But, you know, if deer having to rely on non-native plants on your property and especially invasive plants, the vast majority of those are not going to be, nearly as nutritious and also, not as highly selected.
00;50;43;20 - 00;51;10;04
Unknown
You know, another one from in the South that that does get used would be kudzu. Okay. Yeah. Kudzu does get for somebody. It's interesting. It's not, you know, it's it's certainly got moderate forage quality, but, you know, again, it's not a plant that I want on my property for. Otherwise. No kidding. There's certainly a lot of other species that I could, be promoting that would be just as nutritious, if not more nutritious.
00;51;10;04 - 00;51;32;13
Unknown
And, also not have some of the other problems associated with it, but but, yeah, for the, you know, in terms of forbs especially, I mean, like Sirisha, which to me is the worst non-native species as well as, and especially for, that's, that's one that I'm not going to try to promote for to your food or for any reason.
00;51;32;13 - 00;51;52;12
Unknown
But it's, it's, hardly ever eaten by deer. Yeah. That's that's that's very interesting. Especially when you do consider the, the nutritional benefits of something like that. But those secondary compounds that you mentioned, that's, that's that's really interesting. Well, and it's, it's the same that plant's an interesting one because it's kind of the same for, for quail.
00;51;52;14 - 00;52;13;29
Unknown
And actually opposite of deer. Quail do commonly eat it. And on places that, that there are, you know, good numbers of quail, and a good amount of sources on the landscape. In some cases it'll be just about as common as anything that shows up in the crop of a quail. The problem is the seeds are hard.
00;52;14;06 - 00;52;39;17
Unknown
And so those those seeds having such a hard coating on them, they're not very easily digestible. And in fact, quail gain no nutritional benefit from eating. Seriously. And so, I mean, there's been, trials in the lab that if you feed a quail just Sirisha seed, it will die with a full crop. So that it kind of makes it even worse in some cases, than than the deer situation.
00;52;39;17 - 00;53;02;18
Unknown
And to make matters worse, they actually through there, you know, they can't digest it well enough to get nutrients, but they do scare off the seed. So they're they're propagating it. Exactly. Which, that's, you know, from, from an ecological standpoint, it's, it's a successful plant for a reason, but it's, it's definitely one that, you know, from managing my property for, for wildlife.
00;53;02;18 - 00;53;35;12
Unknown
I don't want to have, and I want to decrease the coverage as much as possible. Yeah. That is that is really, really, important for people. Understand? You know, I you think that the memo had gotten out on invasive species, you know, a while ago, but I just recently had, I saw somebody post on social media about how beautiful Iowa is because of all the corn and soybeans and all the, birds foot trefoil and all the hairy vetch and I kept my mouth shut because I didn't I, you know, I respect this person.
00;53;35;12 - 00;53;53;22
Unknown
I didn't want to, you know, be that guy. But I wanted to say I had it all typed up and everything. One time I saw somebody make a comment, I want to go to the place where all the unsent text messages and Facebook comments go, you know, just to see what's been said. Or what was almost said.
00;53;53;24 - 00;54;13;17
Unknown
So I sent it to the land of unsent Facebook comments. But but, I wanted to say, imagine how beautiful it'd be with all of our native plants. But, it's it's true that, you know, people, they, they still propagate stuff that shouldn't be propagated or they don't usually today, it's just they don't get rid of it, you know, they don't control it.
00;54;13;17 - 00;54;35;08
Unknown
They just let it let it take over. But yeah, it's, you know, it's, sober reminder that we have to we have to, you know, keep keep side of that, not just be so concerned about having what we do want, but getting rid of what we don't want. To it's important ecological service that, you know, we need to offer.
00;54;35;10 - 00;54;58;29
Unknown
Okay, so as we wind this one down, if you could design, your dream hunting property, I'm debating if I'm going to make you say what state it has to be in, because, you got that, OSU shirt on there. Well, how about we'll do a region? We won't make you say a state, but we'll make you say a region.
00;54;58;29 - 00;55;26;29
Unknown
You get a pick a region, you get a pick your ratio, of, we'll say it's, we'll say it's, 500 acres. Now, let's do a, let's do a more round, round number, a thousand acre farm. You get to pick your region and your ratio of forced acres to non forested acres, and how are you going to set it up for optimal herd health.
00;55;27;02 - 00;56;04;04
Unknown
And also good hunting opportunity man. Just, just left it wide open didn't you. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. So, for me, just based on, you know, the proximity and, and also in terms of, you know, the sorts of landscapes that I've really come to enjoy working in, you know, I'm probably thinking southern Great Plains, you know, if you want me to be more specific, probably Kansas, just in terms of, you know, having a little bit more restrictive, season structure and things like that.
00;56;04;04 - 00;56;32;06
Unknown
But, you know, there's lots of places in Oklahoma that look, look just as pretty, if not prettier. So, you know, some more southern Great Plains, or either Great Plains or Cross Timbers. You know, we're you have a mix. I mean, I could go anywhere from. 20% all the way up to, near, let's just say 60 or 70% wooded versus versus forested.
00;56;32;06 - 00;57;02;27
Unknown
I don't, or wooded versus, open. I don't have a real strong opinion on that. I probably want to be, I would say probably somewhere between 20 and 50%, forested. You know, I wouldn't be terribly upset if if I did have some agriculture either on the property or around it. I probably would, you know, would want most of my open acres to be, native plant community just because I, I enjoy managing that.
00;57;02;27 - 00;57;37;06
Unknown
And there's a lot of other benefits for, for turkeys and, and quail and, and, pheasants as well can go there's. I'm glad you said that. We'll come we'll come back to that. I love that, I'm going to be managing, you know, with, with fire frequently. Probably going to be you know, doing some, some forest land improvement in the woods, getting a little the sunlight on the ground, also doing cedar removal and, you know, at least the majority of the woods, and, and certainly the, the, the grassland acreage as well, to where I'm not relying on that for my cover.
00;57;37;06 - 00;58;17;05
Unknown
I can instead, either use native woody species or, you use things like or not that cedars non-native, but, you know, less aggressive woody species, more shrubs and trees for cover, as well as, you know, things like even hinge cutting in the woods, to, to concentrate, cover. And then I'm going to be, you know, frequently burning both in the woods, but but especially in the, in the openings, on a pretty frequent fire return interval, probably every, depending on how far to the West I am, you know, probably on average, every, every 2 to 3 years, to maintain good form coverage and, yeah, yeah, that probably pretty well
00;58;17;05 - 00;58;36;11
Unknown
sums it up. And like I said, you know, the exact place doesn't really matter, but I definitely want probably more open ground than, than not. And that can really allow you to concentrate the cover, to have more, you know, a little bit better ability to, to pattern deer as opposed to, having, you know, broad swaths of cover.
00;58;36;11 - 00;58;59;08
Unknown
Sure. So, yeah, I think that's great. I like I chose that region too. I think it's, the the more I'm around it, I think people just they like where they hunt, you know? But if I had to be in southern Iowa, I also would complain when I twist your arm too hard. Yeah, yeah, it's, it's interesting that you mentioned the, secondary benefits of that.
00;58;59;08 - 00;59;24;17
Unknown
We recently had Kyle Leber from the Native Habitat Project, on the podcast, and he, he went as far as saying, I think we need to quit managing for deer. He's like, look, deer live everywhere there. I mean, they they're all over people's HOA eating their hostas and they, you know, they're we have we don't really have a problem recruit, you know, bolstering deer herds.
00;59;24;19 - 00;59;49;13
Unknown
And obviously he's speaking in generality there. There are there are certainly cases, where people want there to be dear, dear, have been there historically. They're native there. And they just aren't doing well and there's not many of them there. And that's a different circumstance, of course, but a lot of the world where people are managing for dear, dear really are not struggling to, to do well.
00;59;49;16 - 01;00;24;17
Unknown
But a lot of those other species that you mentioned are and when you manage for quail or you manage for turkeys or you manage for songbirds or you manage for pollinating insects, I do really neat thing about deer management is you get deer as a return for investing in and improving to have a habitat quality for those things, because general concepts like we talked about in this biodiversity, high number of forms, you know, yeah.
01;00;24;20 - 01;00;58;28
Unknown
Having the right even, you know, location like you talked about, you know, the, the right geography and topography fee for it, all those things, when you maximize those things, then deer just in general do better as well and are healthier as well. And so, I think that, you know, as someone who's an avid deer hunter themselves talking about myself here, I think that's a good, like way to almost reframe, the conversation around managing property for deer.
01;00;59;00 - 01;01;24;23
Unknown
I think the idea of having a much more holistic, way of doing it. We have a, good friend, Thomas Mills up in Wisconsin who does holistic land management practice, and that's exactly what he's aiming for. He's he's wanting to address the whole ecosystem, elevate the whole ecosystem, by by incorporating eating like that.
01;01;24;25 - 01;01;51;27
Unknown
But it's also interesting to hear you say, you know, having agricultural fields, you the way you said it wouldn't hurt your feelings, but, that to me says that you acknowledge that there is some kind of inherent benefit that those fields do provide for someone who's really interested in there being a lot of deer around. Yeah, certainly. And like I said, I mean, there's, you know, there's a gradient.
01;01;51;28 - 01;02;09;11
Unknown
I'm sure that y'all I mean, y'all even say in your part of the world, you know, there can be too much ag for even deer places, right? Places where, you know, it's flat as a pancake. And that's the only thing for several square miles are not where I'd want to be if I was managing for deer. And I so I certainly agree.
01;02;09;11 - 01;02;36;19
Unknown
And I think, you know, especially for landowners that are managing with, with deer and turkeys is they're kind of two primary objectives. Certainly turkeys do require they have a little bit more nuanced, my history requirements that, that do allow you to kind of inherently promote diversity. But, I think the one thing I would say is just that the species that most people, if they buy recreational property, they're number one species is going to be whitetail deer.
01;02;36;21 - 01;03;03;03
Unknown
And regardless of whether we would rather they manage for something else or not, I mean, it's it's it's probably always going to be whitetail deer. You know, and I don't think there's too much we can do to change that. But, you know, something that, I've kind of adopted by, my mentor, Craig Harper at the University of Tennessee is if we're going to have people managing for deer, why don't we take advantage of that?
01;03;03;03 - 01;03;27;21
Unknown
And instead of, you know, just instead of, you know, just throwing our hands up and saying, well, we have deer everywhere. Well, yeah, we do have deer in most places, but we don't have as robust A populations. We don't have as large of antler sizes. And so if we can leverage their interest in managing for deer into a way that they can then focus on managing and promoting native plant communities, I think that's great.
01;03;27;21 - 01;03;48;11
Unknown
And that's, that's why I, I probably don't have, as you know, as purist of an approach in terms of, you know, I plant food plots, I enjoy planning food plots. That's, something that, you know, I'm not going to look down on. But I also, you know, no, from a holistic management standpoint, that that that can't be the focus of of all of our management.
01;03;48;11 - 01;04;07;21
Unknown
We really need to focus on the native plants and allow, other things that we do to kind of supplement that. And, you know, if, if we can have more people managing, let's just say, 80% of their properties in a holistic manner, to me, that's a bigger impact than, you know, having a few less that are 100% all in on just holistic.
01;04;07;21 - 01;04;33;16
Unknown
So you know, I kind of look at it from a more realistic perspective or, you know, a realist perspective, rather than trying to be, you know, a purist. But but I, I totally agree. I think there's, you know, there's a lot that needs to be done. And a lot of folks within the deer management world that need to, you know, kind of get refocused and understand that what they're doing is not, you know, is beneficial for either the deer or the ecosystem as it could be.
01;04;33;18 - 01;04;55;15
Unknown
Yeah. Yeah. I think that's where the yeah, that last part there, I think is you hit it just right on the head. That's where the biggest risk of it is, is where you can start making those shortcuts, where you don't incorporate native plants and you focus on on some of these other shortcuts, like doing, you know, all these non-native screens, you know, like, miscanthus or whatever.
01;04;55;15 - 01;05;20;20
Unknown
Yeah. Pompous grass, you know, things that things that have no ecological value and, and you can really short sighted or focusing so hard on it. Gotta have a kill plant. Gotta have a kill plot. You know, it's this little tiny postage stamp of something that has zero benefit to anything other than maybe a deer coming in there at the right time, grabbing a few mouthfuls before you, you know, takes an old rage to the cage.
01;05;20;26 - 01;06;02;10
Unknown
Right. But exactly. Well, this is this has been awesome. One other thing I kind of thought of while we were discussing this, it kind of dawned on me as you were describing, like, laying out like, like good, you know, nutritional setup for deer. Makes me wonder if that's why urban deer populations another I mean, obviously, the lack of hunting pressure there is, is number one, but but, they really do have a pretty diverse diet in an urban environment, people having little flower beds and, and, people having, you know, even gardens, vegetable gardens and things like that.
01;06;02;10 - 01;06;41;28
Unknown
There's that diversity and diet and the ability to kind of take this back to your article that that just a better chance at meeting those, those three critically important nutrient needs that they have. And, so, you know, I think it's we can we can kind of almost look to that example as a because I'm going to tell you now, I've seen a lot of, really nice books across the state of Iowa, but I think with the exception, I think the biggest buck I ever saw was was not not a urban buck, but the other several that I've seen were all urban bucks.
01;06;41;28 - 01;07;26;06
Unknown
And I have a good friend, Chris, who, shot like a I use A208. This last year, was he was on an urban tag here in Iowa, and I just there's there's a lot of diversity, and, people's landscaping and everything else in, in an urban environment compared to some of these rural environments that might just be dominated by old pasture, you know, corn and soybeans and, some Japanese bush honeysuckle back in the timber, you know, getting these, getting, getting promoting this, these diverse plants really helps meet the needs of, of, these animals that like, like you said, are just the most charismatic animal here in the United States.
01;07;26;09 - 01;07;48;20
Unknown
Yeah, absolutely. Well, thank you very much. How can people follow along with more your work? Is most of it showing up on, National Deer Association or you published elsewhere, too? Yeah. So, a lot of just in terms of especially, you know, popular press type stuff that would be, you know, more towards landowners would be on, on the National Deer Association website.
01;07;48;22 - 01;08;11;12
Unknown
They can also just Google Mark Turner, wildlife Extension. Okay state or OSU, not Ohio State. Oklahoma State. Yeah. And they can, follow along. I've got a web page on, on the OSD website. They can also follow me on Instagram. Extension wildlife doc. I'll post about various things, research projects and things like that.
01;08;11;15 - 01;08;32;18
Unknown
And then we've also got a, a podcast that I do with a couple of colleagues here that's, blaze and grazing and other wild things. So awesome. I love it on various, podcast apps. And we talk a lot about fire and, fire and grazing and various wildlife, concerns in Oklahoma and, and beyond. So, yeah.
01;08;32;21 - 01;08;53;11
Unknown
Yeah, just, just look me up on the, OSU website and, yeah, yeah. Happy to happy to be here. And, much appreciate the opportunity to. Come on. That's awesome. Hey, make sure you gobble up that, Doc Turner handle on, on, Instagram before it's gone, too. I think that I think that'd be pretty sweet handle for it.
01;08;53;13 - 01;09;18;28
Unknown
But, we really appreciate you, Mark. And, thank you so much for all your, research that you've done and made available to people through these different mediums that you mentioned here. And, we, we, you know, I feel like I learned a ton today that can be easily applied back to, what we do here where we grow, native grasses and, and, flowers for, people to do their own prairie reconstruction.
01;09;18;28 - 01;09;40;26
Unknown
So if you're listening, you would like to, pick up a seed mix. We do put together a white tail mix. I think we also have quail mixes and pheasant mixes and turkey mixes as well that we, custom designed to, help reach your goals but also promote biodiversity on the landscape and, healthier ecosystem. So thank you so much to everyone tuning in.
01;09;40;27 - 01;10;17;24
Unknown
Head over to Hoxie Native seeds.com to check out everything else that we got. And, I guess until next time, remember, conservation happens one mind at a time.
