In this second installment of land management with Land & Legacy, Matt Dye talks about being mindful before giving advice on land management. You never want to get ahead of yourself because an aerial photo of a property doesn’t tell the whole story. He details his approach to land assessment, and highlights the importance of diversity, habitat change, and wind direction in increasing hunting success and improving the property for years to come.
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Land & Legacy Land Management Part 2 with Matt Dye
Welcome to the second to segment of Land Management with Land & Legacy, sponsored by, provided by, offered by Whitetail Rendezvous podcast. I have Matt Dye, he and Adam Keith own Land & Legacy. Matt, we’re going to talk about boots on the ground. Last segment, we talked about, “Why land management?” To our audience, you have to read that on our website. I don’t remember the number right now but it’s there and just look for this miniseries. I hope you understand what we’re going to talk about, boots on the ground. We answered the question, I called up, I got a 140-acres and I want to put eyes on it. You helped me understand why your land management was important to me and my buddies on our farm. We’re going to go boots on the ground. Tell us about that process.
This is where the fun portion happens because we already established that based on your hunting seasons, your success or failures or overall knowledge of the habitat, that something needs to change. Something is not working and you’re not seeing what you want to see. You want to see improvements, so we’ve established that land management is necessary on your property and now, we are able to take action and get all the information Adam and I need to be able to make proper recommendations. This is a common thing that happens.
I’m a little upset to see it. It’s where someone posts a map to social media and says, “I’ve got this issue, how do I solve it?” You get a big spread of comments and explanations and such from a lot of folks offering advice, which is great. I like to see people offering advice to those who are looking for it. That’s incredible, that’s honestly what our hunting community needs more. However, one thing that we have to be careful and mindful when doing that is understand that things aren’t always what they seem in an aerial photo. Bruce, you go out west all the time. You probably looked at aerial photos of properties or portions of public rounds saying, “That’s going to be a great place to find sheep.” You get there and it’s different from what your initial thoughts were when you’re looking at that aerial photo. Have you ever experienced that?
Yes, lots of times.
I feel everyone can put themselves in that position. That’s why there’s a big difference between an aerial photo of a property versus being on the ground, boots on the ground approach. It’s great to offer advice but just looking on aerial photos is only step one of this recommendation process. We’ve established that land management is necessary. Step one, to get boots on the ground as for Adam and I, after we’ve been contacted and had a consultation, is to look and study aerial photos. We want to look at hunting area maps because they’ve got awesome telephone lines. We can look at the high-definition images, understand the flow of the property the terrain changes or if there’s no terrain changes. You’ve got to understand exactly what we’re looking at. That’s a great resource for us to use. We use it often.
Google Earth is another one because of the fact that we can go and say, “This is the most current image that’s on Google Earth.” Then we can slide it back and backdate it fifteen years ago, and then we can understand if and what changes have occurred to that habitat that may point a finger or draw conclusion to why that hunter is seeing. Fifteen years ago, that property was logged, maybe there’s a previous owner but it was logged. For the first seven to ten years, that hunting, right after that harvest was really good. There’s a lot of food offered, there’s a lot of covered offered. If you go back to that first podcast we did, Bruce, you can go back and understand that, “That habitat has changed because I haven’t been manipulating it and it’s getting out of reach or the benefit is getting less. My hunting is tailing off too. It’s decreasing my success because that habitat is also decreasing.” We can go back and look at that information through Google Earth image and say, “This is likely why you’re seeing what you’re seeing or not seeing in the hunting situation because the habitat has changed.”
Before we get to the property, we want to gather as much information as we can about the property. We’ll ask the land owner questions about some neighbors, their experiences where habitat work thus far. Here’s the important thing, we take that information, little bit a grand assault and keep an open mind. We don’t make recommendation until we get our boots on the ground. We’ve gathered our information. We go to the property and now we’re at the property. We want to see 90%-plus of this property because we know the value or the recommendations that need to be made and we know the implications of poorly suggested information. We don’t want to make that mistake. We don’t simply look at an aerial photo ahead of time and say, “This is going to have to happen and we’re going to place it here. Let’s spend some time with profit.” It’s not like that at all for us. We say, “This is what we got, this is what we’re working with.” In our head we might say, “That’s an area of interest that we need to spend a lot time at or this is an area of interest we need to spend quite a bit more time at.”
We then go and get boots on the ground and confirm or realize that our first initial suspicions weren’t correct. We’re traveling and seeing 90%-plus of the property, we’re on the road system, if we get to habitat change, we want to get out of that UTV or that truck and walk around, understand it. We need to understand how deer, other game species are utilizing that area or not utilizing it at all. There are a lot of places on properties that could be characterized as dead zones. The habitat is not a position or its topography is not changing in an area that’s going to concentrate deer down. The sign is very minimal or the sign is spread out across a hundred yards wide of an area, “A deer could walk here or they could walk there the next day or over here.”
There’s not an edge that is going to funnel deer around the property. I’ve always heard deer creatures at the edge, it’s so true because one, they like to walk the edge, it’s a natural travel corridor. Two, the species that they like, vegetation mines that they pee into and they’re really successful vegetation types. Those who grow along the edge because they get more sunlight, they naturally want to walk there because there are natural browsers, they walk and eat, you can create that. That’s a huge plus and it’s a great hunting tactic.
We want to see that property in its fullest. We spend as much time as necessary to walk the property or drive around and understand how deer utilize or don’t utilize the property. Confirm or deny what we see in aerial photos layout, at that point, we’re able to make more confident recommendations to the property owner in the field. When we’re out there, we can say, “We got this slope over here, this would be a great area to encourage deer to bed in.” It may seem weird that you’re off of a slope, “Why not come down to the bottom? Why not let them bed on the ridge top?”
For one reason, it’s easiest for us to walk along a ridge top. It’s easiest for access. Road systems are typically at all the ridge tops. I don’t want the deer to be bedded where I’m going to be walking most of the time. Ridge tops, the way the wind blows is a lot more consistently so I can consistently hunt that area and bank on, “It says I’ve got a west wind.” It’s actually blowing with the west wind, it’s not swirling. Deer prefer to bed on slopes or in areas where that wind is going to swirl so they are up to speed on what are in and around them. If there are any critters around them or are approached by hunters, whatever that may be, they can detect that sooner because that wind swirls and it’s coming from this direction and this direction.
That slope, once we get in there and see it, we can layout a bedding area and suggest how the manipulation can be done there. Maybe it’s in close proximity to a food plot or maybe we can put another bedding area on the other side of the ridge where they’re crossing back and forth. A hunter can access that area where they’re going to be crossing back and forth. The big thing is getting an idea of what we may be seeing prior to getting into that property and keeping an open mind until we’re actually on site and confirm what we see on a map. Bruce, we can both look back in instances where they were hunting public ground and we’re states away trying to understand the property the best. We get there, “I thought this was a great spot.” In reality, it’s not good at all, so we X that off the map and go on. That map, that aerial photo didn’t tell all the truths of that specific area. We’ve got to be mindful of making recommendations prior to getting on site.
When somebody calls you and says, “I’m interested in working and making my land better,” do you ask them to do any homework before you show up on the ground?
There's a big difference between an aerial photo of a property versus being on the ground. Share on XWe’ll ask simple questions like, “What’s your neighborhood like?” I’m not trying to ask too many questions because we still want that open mind as we go to the property. We want enough information but not too much that we try to get ahead of ourselves and think, “This could happen or this could happen or we’re going to experience this.” Let’s sit back and wait until we get there and confirm everything. It might be simple questions like, “Has the timber been harvested recently? How many acres of food plot currently? What’s the overall neighborhood like? Is there a lot of hunting pressure around there?” Simple questions like that. From there, when we get on the site, we sit down over a map and discuss all that process again. We want to understand, “This is the neighborhood you referred to on the email. This is that farm that you talked about that ran cattle all year-round throughout the timber, so it’s a dead area over there.” We go through that process again. The questions leading into a consultation are simple and we’re consultants to keep an open mind and confirm everything once we get on site.
We have to get the disclosure sometimes from some land owners as we’re touring around, we’re walking around and seeing the property. That’s Adam’s and my time, that’s us taking inventory, that’s us saying, “This is here. This is how that habitat is like. This needs some change. This is poor habitat. This is good habitat,” putting it all in our heads. Sometimes we walk around or drive around quietly. They’re looking at us like, “Are you good? Do you need to stop? Do you need to see more?” I’m like, “We’re good, we’re taking inventory, we’re catalogue-ing all this information.” We can then get back to our office, we’re on the ride home where Adam and I discuss the property. That’s when all the plans come out.
We can make strong recommendations from the field, but that concrete recommendation comes after we leave the property. We’ve seen it, Adam and I have conversation, sometimes we may not agree on exactly what need to happen or the exact placement of a bedding area, or the exact timing that this timber needs to be harvested. Whatever it may be, we may not necessarily agree. We sit down again over a map and go over things and see how that would affect this versus that and the manipulation of everything over time, what is going to be the best scenario.
I hope that makes sense as to our process, the thought processes that we go through and the actions that we take and what come off the actual plan. How that is developed through time, from the initial contact, whether they email us or find us on Facebook or Instagram or listen to our podcast. However they contact us, these are the steps that we take to finally make the proper recommendations. Bruce, I know we had a lot of conversations about making the best choices that we can for a habitat. A lot of times, a land may be passed down from generations or may have just bought a property and you want to pass it down to your kids. The decisions that you make can last your lifetime. They can last and influence your children’s lifetime when the property is turned over to them.
Our recommendations that we make, we take them to heart. We want to make sure that when we say something that it’s the right steps, it’s the right path for you to take to experience and reach your goals on your property. It’s not, “You could do that here. You can hinge cut all these whole wood lot.” That’s not a technique that we’re going to suggest because that’s going to drastically influence the timber’s value, the productivity of that wood lot for many years to come. That wood lot will likely never look the same.
We’ve got to understand the implications of techniques but also understand the end result and what it’s going to look like, not only two years down the road, but twenty years down the road. These are resources and resources need to be managed, not simply destroyed or left alone. We’ve got to find that middle ground. That’s why Adam and I love what we do because we take that time to walk a property, to make recommendations. For us to talk through it and look over a map and build a custom map for a property and write out a management plan that makes sense for that land owner and his family to reach their stated goals. Whether it may be to have more opportunity to harvest deer, maybe not even a specific caliber of deer. A lot of our clients have kids, “I want to have the opportunity to chase a least one mature buck on the property, then my kids will be successful and shoot whatever they want.” Or it’s the guy that’s like, “I’m strictly a trophy hunter. I want most mature deer.” Whatever it may be, we need to make suggestions that are going to allow them and their property to reach those goals.
You mentioned timber harvest. In every wood lot, there’s value not only in the ground but also in the timber. Sometimes people miss that connection between you can do a whole timber plan that generates revenue, that generates any improvement you’re going to make for the land management plan. Sometimes people forget that because it’s all symbiotic. It all beats together to the betterment of all the habitat not just whitetail. You mentioned squirrels, bunnies, turkeys and coyotes are part of that and all the birds. Sit there for a day, out of season, so you’re not all that amped up waiting for Mr. Wonderful and look at what uses your land. You’ll be amazed.
One of the craziest things, this is off topic, you think of all the diversity of plant species, of animal species that we see and observe on a daily basis. The craziest thing is that underneath the ground, in the soil, in healthy soil, there’s more life than above ground. It is microscopic, it is bacteria, it is fungi. That diversity in the soil allows us to see and experience what is above ground. That base, that foundation is more diverse than what we see and experience. It’s microscopic but it’s still life, it’s still the foundation that gives us the ability to manage the deer, manage the timber or enjoy creation with it. That basis is even more diverse than what we see. I often stop and think about that and it’s amazing.
Every earthworm and beetle and bug and plant root systems, if that’s healthy, your above ground is healthy. That’s not healthy if that’s dead, you’re screwed.
You have to mend the soil more or you have to put more into it and then your crop is limited. That’s a whole new topic and I’m not going to talk about it, so if you’re interested in that stuff, be sure to read that episode with Bruce as well. It’s still fun to think about.
We’re creatures of habit. The older we are, the more habit we are because, “I don’t want to climb that ridge.” Things change, so as the land changes, you change. The terrain stays the same. By boots on the ground, you can see that. I like what you said about the wind swirls because sometimes people will hunt a stand and it works fine. Then all of a sudden, they start to get busted. What happened is one tree got blown over. One tree died. It’s no longer there, so that changed the whole wind flow coming off that ridge or the bumper and they didn’t realize it.
Some of the clients that we have, Bruce, have been doing habitat management for years. They’ve been managing their property and doing a fine job at it. However, through time, things change. Sometimes it’s for the good, sometimes it’s for the bad. No matter what, they’ve experienced changes in their hunting. They might not be happy, they may not be satisfied but they need simply a second pair of eyes on a property. It’s probably half of the consultations that we actually go out in this field and do. The first path is a new property, a new landowner. That’s one category or two, the other is, “I need a second set of eyes. I’ve been doing stuff on my property but it’s not all clicking. Things have changed, I need a second set of eyes on this property to help me get where I need to be.”
We can go to a property in five years or twenty years, we take the same route. We see it consistently enough that the slower changes that we’re going to see in hindsight over that timeframe aren’t as big to you because you see it all the time. For us, we come in and we say, “This is the first time on the property, but this habitat has changed from when you bought it or when you got it passed down to you to now.” You’re expecting it to produce the same thing as it did twenty years ago because it’s the same area, but the habitat has changed drastically. With a fresh set of eyes that we can bring when we are boots on the ground, we can say, “Actually, when we look at this property or this portion of property productivity-wise, it’s very low for what you’re trying to achieve.”
The diversity of life in the soil is what allows us to see and experience the diversity above ground. Share on XWe’re simply bringing that second set of eyes to either confirm or influence or share our insight on what the current state of habitat is. It’s tough for people to see those changes that have happened because they’re so used to seeing the property. It’s tough for them to bit the bullet and say, “I’ve got a big habitat management project ahead of me, I think this is the right move but I don’t know. Before I do it, I want a second set of eyes, I want a second opinion on it.” Before they dive head first into making a large change, that’s something that we commonly see.
I’m thinking, you’re walking my property. I’ve been there for a while, some of the tree stands have been there for a while. All of a sudden, when we get back to the barn, to the house, hit the table and we’re sitting around the office and I’m going, “What do you think, guys?” You say, “We’re going to build a plan and we’ll get back to you.” “What did you see in the last half day?” Then you start telling me about my land and even though I’ve been there for twenty years, you see it completely different. You gave me a cold shoulder and said, “Bruce, I can tell you why your hunting has decreased.” Then all of a sudden, I’m sitting there going, “I feel bad that I didn’t realize that I didn’t change with the land.” How do you handle that human emotion or human interplay there?
That’s something that we face. We have to break the news to people. Here’s the thing. With that potential negative of breaking the news to people, that their habitat is not as good as what they thought, what I know and I do on my own, and do across the country is change the habitat. Manipulate it and make it better. When I go to a place that’s not as good as some folks may wish it to be, but it can only get better. It can only improve from that point on. The easier it is to see the benefit of doing habitat manipulation.
Let’s say you’re managing 80% of the property and you want to influence the 20% extra that you’re not touching. The growth or the benefit is less on that 20% for you to be able to witness or see than it is for someone who has poor habitat who hasn’t seen good changes that have happened overtime. 10% of the property’s potential are sitting right there at that point. I’ve got 90% to improve on. The changes that I’m going to see are drastically going to affect the way deer use that property, turkeys use that property, ducks maybe even use that property.
I know I’ve got a lot to improve on but that means I also have a lot to gain when it comes to a hunting aspect, when it comes to a management aspect. When it comes to seeing the improvements that I want to see. I’ve got more area, more growth to experience. In a way, the initial sting or bite might hurt a touch, but it’s better to know that the future holds more positive than any negative because habitat manipulation, habitat change, habitat management, the proper steps, the proper techniques are going to improve what you can offer on your property.
We’re going to wrap up Boots On The Ground with Land & Legacy, Matt Dye. The last thing Matt and I are going to chat about is the third section, The Plan. Everything that we’ve invested up to this point, we’re going to put all together and then give a plan. Matt’s going to dissect that for us.