Waumandee

Creek Farm

Land Management

Plan

January 14, 2002

Draft: for discussion only

Background We purchased Waumandee Creek Farm in the spring of 2000. This 425-acre parcel encompasses a wide variety of habitats and, because of relatively un-intensive farming practices in recent years, significant areas in which native plant species are regaining a foothold.

The property, roughly 1 ¼ miles by ½ mile in size, includes a ½ mile segment of Little Waumandee Creek surrounded by about 50 acres of wetlands, 8 remnant bluff prairies totaling roughly 70 acres, just over 150 acres of active cropland and roughly 120 acres of woodland.

The land was originally homesteaded in the mid 1800’s and by the late 1930’s was a substantial dairy farm, with most of the land being used for grazing (see Appendix A for an aerial photograph, taken in 1939). Much has changed in the last 60 years. Grazing ended some time before 1970 and the land was put into cash crops. Heavily grazed hillside areas were allowed to return to woodland and the bluff prairies began to recede. Pastures in the wetland areas near the creek have been inactive for about 25 years, in many cases returning to native vegetation.

By the early ‘90’s the extensive farmhouse and outbuildings area had disappeared – a fire in 1991 claimed the last building. Since that time land use has been limited to rental cash crop operations, on about 150 acres of fields, and hunting in the wooded areas.

See Appendix B for a 1998 USGS aerial photo that fairly accurately depicts the land as we acquired it.

Objectives We hope to restore the land as close as we can to the state that it would have been in prior to homesteading. We will take our time, this is a recreational project for us and we’re planning to spend several decades at it.

To ensure that the land remains in a natural state after we’re gone, we’ve donated a conservation easement on the land to the Wisconsin Land Trust. This easement removes all the development rights to the land and is intended to prevent the undoing of our restoration efforts by subsequent owners of the parcel. It is our hope that we will be the first in a long series of stewards who will maintain this as a special place where people can enjoy the land as it looked before agriculture.

Plan Summary This plan addresses the four different types of areas found – wetlands, remnant bluff prairies, woodlands and agricultural fields.

Wetlands

Roughly half of the 50-acre wetland area is in good condition, apparently never being converted to fields or pastures. The remaining 25 acres is in poorer condition, but with the exception of several large stands of Reed Canary grass, appears to be an area that can be improved dramatically with periodic burning. We will initiate a burning program, and use more direct measures to eliminate the invasive non-native plants in the stand.

Bluff Prairies

We have identified 8 distinct remnant prairie areas, each of which requires slightly different management. But in general we will rely on periodic burning, mowing and reseeding as the primary management tools, and take selected measures to address needs that are unique to each area.

Woodlands

We have identified 9 separate stands in our wooded areas. These may change as we continue developing the firebreak and trail system on the property, and as we get a better understanding of what we have in each stand.

The woods consist of many old white and burr oaks, some open grown, but all surrounded by many smaller trees. There are extensive areas of Paper Birch, Trembling Aspen and big Toothed Aspen, especially around the edges of the bluff prairies and on the west facing slopes. The understory of smaller trees consists of small oaks, elms and hickories. Prickly Ash, dogwoods, hazel and sumac also fill much of the understory.

In general, it is safe to say that none of the woods are currently in very good condition. For the most part they have all been logged hard within the last 15 years, with the result that the stands are undesirable from a commercial logging standpoint. Our aim is to return south facing wooded stands to either prairie or savanna through a program of burning and selective clearing. Other stands will be managed to return them to pre-settlement dry oak forest.

Agricultural Fields

We have 15 fields (aligned on the boundaries established by the FSA, plus a few subdivisions of our own making) that we plan convert to prairie or savanna. In the early years we will convert the smaller fields that generally lie in the lower valleys. As we get more experienced and have more time available at the farm, we will convert the large open upland fields. In all cases we will follow similar processes of weed control followed by no-till seeding to establish the prairie species. We will primarily use burning and mowing to maintain the stands, with specific interventions when required to address special circumstances.

Plan Details The pages that follow provide detailed information about our plans for each of the stands that we have identified so far. All of this is subject to change as we get a better understanding of the situation and the needs of the stands. The first page is a map that delineates the stands on a recent aerial photo.

Contact Marcie O’Connor
Email: Marcie-at-haven.com (replace “-at-“ with @)

51-645-2043

Mike O’Connor
Email: Mike-at-haven.com (replace “-at-“ with @)
651-647-6109