Tree ?

[Wingman]

SWAG, Novacaine, DanP, JaMak, Ramsey or any other person that knows about trees, I have a ?

I'm not much of a tree genius but was wondering about what % of the following species to plant. My intentions are for wildlife. Not worried about cutting timber. I'm planting on a 12x12 spacing, which is roughly 302 trees per acre.

Will be in fishpond bottoms. Primarily Alligator (Ag, Ac), Dowling (Da, Dc) and Forestdale (Fa, Fm, Fo, Fc) soils. Recommended to me by the forester were nuttall oak, willow oak and overcup. I've bounced around the idea of throwing in some persimmon, bitter pecan, hackberry(sugarberry) and red maple for diversity and soft mast and these trees are on the approved list. I will have some cypress in seperate ponds that I plan to keep wet or moist most of the year. The ponds the other trees are going in have been breeched and will only hold water by natural flooding and will drain and flood with the surrounding landscape.

I also plan to have Chickasaw Plum and maybe some Roughleaf Dogwood in strips along the edge of the levee slope where they won't be as wet as the above species.

Now I need to decide what % of each to plant. How would y'all do it?

Nuttall
Willow
Overcup
Persimmon
Bitter Pecan
Hackberry
Red Maple

Thanks!

[novacaine]

Nuttall 33%
Willow Oak 30%
Overcup <10% just because i cant stand them
Persimmon 7%
Bitter Pecan 10%
Hackberry 7% actually sugarberry
Red Maple 3% drummond red maple (native)

or something like that
he didn't recommend a little Green Ash just for filler (3-5%). Although if you are within 200-500' from a woods line with mature ash it will show up......depending on wind direction.
I have yet to find a forester or biologist explain to me what is so wonderful about an Overcup Oak!
My 2 cents .
As we discussed by phone............be onsite for the planting so you can mix the bags...
otherwise Pedro will give you 100% nuttal in one pond,100% willow oak in the next, etc.etc

[novacaine]

Also if you could scrap up 1000 or so locust to dot around(if you can find them). Between water and honey i cant remember which one takes the wetter site.

[Wingman]

I reluctantly asked about green ash and he just rolled his eyes kinda.

I've never thought much of them either but I look across these tree plantings and it seems like every 3rd tree is an ash.

I thought about some locust, too. Would love to have a little island of persimmon and locust next to a big swamp chestnut tree on top of the levee with a lockon stand hanging on it one day. But by the time they produce fruit, I'll probably be too old to climb a tree and pull back a string.

I know you said you didn't like overcup very much, but from what I've read about them they seem like a fairly good wildlife tree. The NRCS site says the acorns are eaten by ducks, deer, turkeys, hogs, squirrels and smaller rodents. I'm all about some smaller rodents.

[SWAG]

You mentioned swamp chestnut. I would scatter a few of those in on the old levees or some rises. Like Bill's percentages. A 60% stand of striped acorns and small acorns will benefit a lot of different wildlife. I am no forester, but I know what I like walking/hunting through. Nice list.

[Wingman]

Also if you could scrap up 1000 or so locust to dot around(if you can find them). Between water and honey i cant remember which one takes the wetter site.

Waterlocust.

Habitat: Wet soils of riverbanks, flood plains, and swamps, especially where submerged for long periods; in floodplain forests.

[DukGrl]

The NRCS site says the acorns are eaten by ducks

eh. have you seen the size of those things? It's gonna take either a mighty big duck or a mighty desperate duck to get that down...

[novacaine]

The NRCS site says the acorns are eaten by ducks

eh. have you seen the size of those things? It's gonna take either a mighty big duck or a mighty desperate duck to get that down...

I agree.........anytime you get a seed count below about 75 seed/pound..............it takes a critter with teeth(which rules out quackers and cluckers) to get that down. Overcup with the hull runs around 65-80 count ( if memory serves me).

[Wingman]

If I could substitute overcup with swamp chestnut I would, but forester says they won't do well. Maybe I could put them on side slope of some interior levees that aren't critical for holding water in the future.

[cockandlock25]

The NRCS site says the acorns are eaten by ducks

eh. have you seen the size of those things? It's gonna take either a mighty big duck or a mighty desperate duck to get that down...

A deer eating one even looks like he has a golf ball in his mouth. I always wondered why they said ducks eat them myself.

[novacaine]

If I could substitute overcup with swamp chestnut I would, but forester says they won't do well. Maybe I could put them on side slope of some interior levees that aren't critical for holding water in the future.

Cow Oaks like to be really high in the landscape.............probably higher than you would put a cherrybark.
I guess if you had a few levees you weren't gonna maintain you could dot the cow's on top but you still may have a soil or ph issue plus its gonna take up a lot of levee. Seed count on a cow oak is 30-45/lbs. That is one big ol acorn. Deer may have to take those in one or more sitting
I would also dot a few waters on levee edges(if your not worried about levee maintenance.

[ScottyLee]

SWAG, Novacaine, DanP, JaMak, Ramsey or any other person that knows about trees, I have a ?

I'm not much of a tree genius but was wondering about what % of the following species to plant. My intentions are for wildlife. Not worried about cutting timber. I'm planting on a 12x12 spacing, which is roughly 302 trees per acre.

Will be in fishpond bottoms. Primarily Alligator (Ag, Ac), Dowling (Da, Dc) and Forestdale (Fa, Fm, Fo, Fc) soils. Recommended to me by the forester were nuttall oak, willow oak and overcup. I've bounced around the idea of throwing in some persimmon, bitter pecan, hackberry(sugarberry) and red maple for diversity and soft mast and these trees are on the approved list. I will have some cypress in seperate ponds that I plan to keep wet or moist most of the year. The ponds the other trees are going in have been breeched and will only hold water by natural flooding and will drain and flood with the surrounding landscape.

I also plan to have Chickasaw Plum and maybe some Roughleaf Dogwood in strips along the edge of the levee slope where they won't be as wet as the above species.

Now I need to decide what % of each to plant. How would y'all do it?

Nuttall
Willow
Overcup
Persimmon
Bitter Pecan
Hackberry
Red Maple

Thanks!

persimmon is generally grown in a full sun setting, fence rows, not an understory type species. i would plant those type trees on the edges or on the levee's. red maple is usually grown in ridge type areas. i don't think there is honestly a scientific number to what you choose.

remember mast is something that only happens 2 months out of the year not every other month. it's not something that actually carries the wildlife. ducks would obviously benefit the most. but if for other animals i would look into other type things for food forage.

you will have to keep the native vegetation and million other type species of trees such as sweet gum that will be competingin check also, because a hardwood forest doesn't happen over night and the actual forest is manipulated as easily as pine stands. if the maples and sugarberry's are there the will occur naturally on their own. i would focus more on the trees that aren't going to grow naturally. jmo though.

hope this helps

[Wingman]

What about:

Nuttall 33%
Willow Oak 30%
Swamp Chestnut 3% (planted on the levee slopes)
Overcup 7%
Persimmon 7%
Bitter Pecan 10%
Sugarberry 7%
Red Maple 3%

[Wingman]

persimmon is generally grown in a full sun setting, fence rows, not an understory type species. i would plant those type trees on the edges or on the levee's. red maple is usually grown in ridge type areas. i don't think there is honestly a scientific number to what you choose.

remember mast is something that only happens 2 months out of the year not every other month. it's not something that actually carries the wildlife. ducks would obviously benefit the most. but if for other animals i would look into other type things for food forage.

you will have to keep the native vegetation and million other type species of trees such as sweet gum that will be competingin check also, because a hardwood forest doesn't happen over night and the actual forest is manipulated as easily as pine stands. if the maples and sugarberry's are there the will occur naturally on their own. i would focus more on the trees that aren't going to grow naturally. jmo though.

hope this helps

I actually have a LOT of edge on this place. The ponds range from 10-16 acres in size. There are 23 ponds on 315 acres, so you can imagine how many levees are criss-crossing the property. There are about 21 acres of levees on the place. Most are in the 30-50 foot wide range. I have food plots planned for some of them (some in white clover, others in sunflowers/corn, etc) and the rest of the levees will be planted to native warm season grasses and legumes (switchgrass, big and little bluestem, partridge pea). I also have perimeter levees that are too steep to fool with that are loaded with blackberry.


So what I'm trying to do is create good edge habitat along the food plots/ grass areas by putting the shrubs along them for escape cover and some of the tree species that don't like wet feet on the slopes beside the tops of the levees. Then down in the pond bottoms will be the trees that are adapted to those wet, clay soils.

[Double R 2]

What about:

Nuttall 33%
Willow Oak 30%
Swamp Chestnut 3% (planted on the levee slopes)
Overcup 7%
Persimmon 7%
Bitter Pecan 10%
Sugarberry 7%
Red Maple 3%

Sorry missed this earlier.

I'd personally lean much heavier towards Nuttall than preceding suggestions. Survivability. I'd skip SCO, too, from the official planting rate and self-plant a few (100 or so) in my spare hobby time and use the NWTF-like 5-gallon+ containerizeds. And yes, I'd probably plant a few sawtooth also because as much as I hate to say it survivability and water tolerance is excellent, wildlife utilization is great, and the limbs make great blind cover.

Nuttall gte 80%
Willow Oak lte 10%
Overcup lte 2%
Persimmon lte 2%
Bitter Pecan lte 1%
Sugarberry lte 1%
Red Maple lte 1%
Green Ash gte 3%

Now I like diversity as well as the next guy. But let's get real. Two words: Survivability. Practicality.

Light-seeded species, like rough-leaf dogwood, will come. Persimmon will come as well. I bought some water locust one time (maybe 500 seedlings to disperse across 10,000 acres) and found the mostly unused remains in various culverts; the mexican planters refused to plant the thorny seedlings!

On "bare-field" sites, I personally like to see a site-suitable, light-seeded species (i.e., fast growing) species intermixed at time of planting (and I'd rather even see a few already established to be honest). Green ash is widely available, but at higher elevations, sweetgum (which was a prevalent species throughought the historic delta) works as well and is the only super-emergent species in our area. Ever see sweetgum on a FWS or FWS-planted property in north delta, and I'm your culprit.

One of the most amazing naturally-established hardwood stands I can remember visiting was adjacent to a refuge property where Tippo annually winter-inundated a bean field: every native, site-suitable hardwood species imaginable had become established under a pioneer stand of black willow. It was the Alligator equivalent of the cottonwood interplantings that have been extensively documented on higher soils. It was an epiphany of sorts. So, sure, I'm not scared of fast-growing, short-lived willows either. The reason I like a good even mix of light-seed species is that they're pioneer-type species that grow quickly and compete well with herbaceous competition. Oak species are not. Southern red oak species acheive optimal growth not in the presence of 100% full-sunlight, but in 50% full-sunlight which, as God intended, generally exists under the canopy of light-seeded species. My point being, some fast-growing light seeded species such as green ash can be a good thing.

Two things:
(1) to hardwood afforestation a human lifetime or career is just a blink of the eye. It's a process that takes millenia, and the sticking of trees in the ground is a mere beginning. The effort at large misses this point I think.
(2) It is more important that, at inception, ecologically-significant species be established. Ultimately, species stocking can and will be reconciled through future timber harvests.