My theory on what would have happened with a natural lightning burn this time of year way back when buffalo and elk grazers were around is that it would have probably only really carried in the areas with excess grass that the grazers didn’t consume….It would have just crept everywhere else if it burned at all……..We’re talking about low intensity for the most part....These natural spring fires would have served the purpose of using up any excess grass left over as the fuel to help control hardwoods, promote forb growth, and release rats for the predators to key in on instead of going after things like turkeys.

This leads into your raptor population discussion........

Bankheadhunter………..Here’s really the bottom line when it comes to raptors……We cant solve the problem at this point by simply trying to get rid of them……..Yeah, one landowner could SSS but I’m talking big scale…..The reason being is the rodent issue. The overabundance of raptors is directly related to the way our land management practices have caused an overabundance of rodents…..Take away the raptors that are a big part of controlling the rodent numbers and you’re gonna be over run with rats and rattlesnakes to a plague type level…….I think the only way to really effect some kind of reasonable change would have to either come through tweaks/changes in how we manage the land or some means of rodent control, which doesn’t really sound too feasible…..Our best options are gonna come through ideas to tweak our land management practices to reduce rodent populations.

Again this is really dreaming BIG…..but modifying the way we grow cattle in this state would be a complete game changer for many of these issues.

I posted this pic in another thread or maybe earlier in this one but it’s a pic of a “grass prairie” where I was tracking a deer for some folks….Its a result of very frequent dormant season burning….This is pretty common in some areas across large expanses….As it concerns turkey habitat and turkey nesting, correct me if I’m wrong but I’m pretty sure that the only part of this that a turkey hen is really gonna utilize is going to be a certain buffer area around the perimeter of it…..In other words, the center will not be utilized and the larger the expanse the larger the unutilized center……However…….temporarily turn a cattle herd loose on it for a few weeks and suddenly you’ve created a big checkerboard out of it and maximized the number of nesting sites that the hens have access to…..all while depositing fertilizer, stimulating the seed bank, etc…..You also change the future fire behavior when fire is introduced to being less intense…. Isnt this grass in essence just standing “hay”???……Instead of mechanically harvesting the hay and hauling it to the cattle……Why not take the cattle out of the overgrazed pastures and bring them to the hay??? The totality of how it would change land management would be HUUUUGE!