Brush species provide food and cover for many native wildlife species, but in excess brush can also cause habitat problems. Brush species vary by ecoregion, but brush management is a common habitat management practice for many Texas landowners. As a result, Brush Management Certification Training for Landowners, land managers and brush control contractors will be held at the Meridian at the Meridian Civic Center located at 200 West River on April 12, at the Kerr Wildlife Management Area located at 2625 FM 1340 Hunt, Texas, on April 26, and in Johnson City at the AgriLife Extension office located at 101 East Cypress on April 27.
It is important that any landowner or contractor who plans to conduct brush management within Golden-Cheeked Warbler or Black-capped Vireo habitat as part of work involving Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) is encouraged to take this training and become brush management certified. The training is not required, however, everyone is welcome to attend and become certified and learn more about habitat management.
Certification of completion of the brush management training will be provided by the Texas Department of Agriculture. In addition, Texas Parks and Wildlife Department will offer “certification” that allows the holder to control cowbirds, which are nest predators. Cowbird trapping and control falls under Predator Control for the wildlife tax valuation. Read More…
Protecting natural habitat is the key component to successful wildlife management. Without quality native plant communities both the habitat and associated wildlife populations suffer. Texas, which has been aware of the importance of natural habitats for some time, has once again put it’s money where is mouth is. During the mid-90′s Texas passed the wildlife tax valuation, commonly incorrectly referred to as the wildlife exemption, that allowed landowners to manage for native wildlife and habitat while maintaining their agriculture taxes – without having to perform farming or ranching practices.
This legislation has gone a long ways towards protecting Texas’ wildlife habitat, but they are far from over. Now, a bipartisan group of legislators, representing both rural and urban parts of the state, is supporting a bill that would create an innovative incentive for landowners to protect water resources, preserve the state’s cultural heritage by protecting natural resources on privately owned land, and advance Texas’ long-range water plan – all without costing taxpayers money. Read More…
In addition to population estimates, habitat management and conservation, a key component of wildlife management for most popular game animals includes regulated hunting. This holds true for elk hunting, too, but the recently-discovered record elk from Minnesota was not shot by a hunter at all. After learning about this lucky deer hunter that stumbled into a bull elk of record proportions, it seems you just never know when you are going to run into a wall hanger!
Whitetail hunter Ryan Muirhead had set out to fill his buck tag on December 12, the final day of Minnesota ’s muzzleloader season, but little did he know he would bump into a huge 9 x 10 bull elk with antlers that may rewrite the record books. The manner in which he found the bull was even more extraordinary…it was pinned flat on its back with its antlers stuck in the mud. Read More…
Population management is often a key part of wildlife management when it comes to large ungulates such as elk, which can negatively impact areas where they are found in large numbers. Elk overpopulation is a non-issue for the most part, but there are areas in North America where elk numbers, at least for short periods of time, can cause potential problems. One of the places that experiences healthy elk numbers in addition large numbers of humans in Estes National Park, Colorado. Read More…
Mountain lions, commonly referred to as cougars, panthers, catamounts, and lions, are extremely secretive animals that live a solitary lifestyle, often in rugged terrain. That being said, it seems every single person in the great state of Texas has a real-life mountain lion story. How could so many lion encounters have occurred unless many of the proclaimed and reported mountain lion sightings were due to mistaken identity?
Sure, some people may outright distort the truth, but I believe many alleged mountain lion sightings are reports of only what persons wanted to believe that they had seen. Seeing even a single lion is quite a feat considering the secretive, solitary lifestyle that they live, but what about seeing several lions or a group of lions? How about observing eight mountain lions? Read More…
Landowners interested in wildlife and habitat management are always looking to jump-start their practices by the direct planting of native species. Often times, high quality native plants can be difficult to find at a reasonable price. The Texas Forest Service West Texas Nursery (WTN) produces and sells quality tree and shrub seedlings at an affordable price allowing Texas landowners to plant large quantities of quality seedlings for natural resource conservation.
From windbreak construction to wildlife plantings, or whatever the need, the WTN can supply quality tree seedlings to fit the purpose of your habitat management project. As a matter of fact, WTN has been working since 1978 to grow seedlings from local seed, providing landowners with trees that are especially adapted to Texas climate and specifically suited for Texas landowners. Read More…
Texas is well known for it’s large size, diverse habitats and its abundance of wildlife. However, Texas is just like every other state when it comes to battling on-going wildlife and habitat issues. Without continual research and wildlife and habitat management, many plant and animal species could be lost. I was just sitting here thinking of a few issues that state and federal biologist should think about when looking for habitat enhancement projects and research ideas.
Deer overpopulation in suburban areas in Texas and across the U.S. is not the most important problem, but it can be quite controversial. The problem is that many home owners do not like high deer numbers because of ornamental plant damage, but residential areas do not want hunting either. It’s a weird deal. To complicate matters, deer overpopulation is not healthy for the deer population or the habitat. I can only assume that solutions would be ways to decrease numbers through regulated hunted, trapping, and fencing, but like I said earlier, this topic is controversial.
Being an avid hunter, I know that lead shot ingestion by game and non-game animals is still a problem. After all, lead shot is still legal for hunting many animals. However, it is not legal for waterfowl hunting, such as for duck hunting and goose hunting. However, waterfowl, other game animals and non-game animals still ingest lead shot when feeding and looking for grit. Study after study has found that lead causes big problems and the eventual death of just about every living thing.
Lead, even when consumed in small amounts, can also accumulate within animals and up the food chain. I think the easiest solution would be to make only non-toxic shot shells legal for hunting. Period. Many hunters argue that steel shot does not perform as well as lead shot. I tend to disagree, especially since I have duck hunter for years and have had outstanding success with lead shot ranging from #7 shot all the way to #2 shot. Besides, there are way more non-toxic alternatives that perform as well as lead. Lead is a killer, so we need to choose to stop putting it out across the landscape, especially over duck and goose habitat. Let’s do away with it where we can to protect our fish and wildlife. Read More…
