Packets available to help create wildlife habitat

AMARILLO – Managing land for wildlife is gaining interest with Texas landowners.  Whether it’s deer in central Texas or quail and pheasant on the Plains, wildlife seedling packets produced by the Texas Forest Service West Texas Nursery in Lubbock are available to assist landowners in creating habitat.

“Now is the time for landowners in Donley County to order wildlife packets from West Texas Nursery before preferred species are sold out,” said Brian Scott, Texas Forest Service forester in Amarillo.

Four wildlife packets are available: quail/pheasant, deer, turkey, and squirrel.  Each packet contains 100 bareroot deciduous trees and shrubs that cater specifically to the habitat needs of their labeled species.  Each packet includes the following trees:

Quail/pheasant: Russian olive, aromatic sumac, nanking cherry, and plum.

Deer: hackberry, flameleaf sumac, bur oak, and fourwing saltbush.

Turkey: hackberry, bur oak, aromatic sumac, and honeysuckle.

Squirrel: little walnut, shumard oak, osage orange, and bur oak.

Texas Forest Service recommends planting wildlife packets in blocks on grasslands, at right angles on dry corners, in “motts” along playas, or parallel on irrigated cropland.

For example, on a dry corner five wildlife packets can be used to produce a four row, right-angle wildlife planting.  The outside angle, that farthest from the circular crop land, would contain 1,250 feet (625 feet on each “leg”) of plum trees; the second angle, Russian olive; the third inside angle, aromatic sumac; and the fourth angle, that closest to the cropland, nanking cherry.

For best results, Scott recommends 10 to 25 foot spacing between each deciduous tree within a tree row; 6 foot spacing between shrub, within a shrub row; and 20 foot spacing between each row of trees.

Scott encourages landowners to order soon before preferred stock is sold out.  To order wildlife packets or windbreak trees and shrubs, contact the Donley County Soil and Water Conservation District. 

For technical assistance, contact the Texas Forest Service by calling 353-8952.