Does anybody know what the deadline is for planting vegetation like smartweed and stuff in ponds to attract and hold more ducks? I think it's sometime in the summer? Any of yall do this, and any success or increase in duck numbers? Plan on doing this for the 2010 season, see if it makes a difference. I know its a ways away and everyone's got scouting on their minds right now during the split, but figured i'd throw this one out there..

smartweed, barnyard grass etc. and most native plants have about 120 days before seeds become mature, so if you plant in June it would be October before the seeds were mature, if you plant in april it would be ready by september.

If Japanese millet has 60 day maturity so if you plant in July ready by September, etc.

Its more a function of if you can keep the water off when it needs to be off and can you put water on when it needs to be put on. If you dependent on mother nature then some years will be good and some will be not so good.

I don't do it personally but have looked into it. Its tough to find native seed mixes reasonably priced. About the only place I've found is Turner Seed Co. out of Brownwood, TX, but it still isn't what I would deem cheap. when your planting 10-20 lbs per acre.

I tried the millet thing this year but didn't get it out until late September and it didn't take at all. I have a few tiny plants but nothing that is a difference maker. I am planning to plant much earlier this year. I don't plant a big place so I can according to the spec sheets I was able to do all 3 of my ponds with one bag of millet (around $40), not that it worked. I am curious to see if others have had success and how they did the water management.

I had spoke with a guy with the the sabine river authority that said smartweed was one of the easiest to use, and the ducks eat it up apparently. Also, I believe here in Texas that the law says you cant plant any vegetation in a pond with or without the intention to bait ducks past a certain date? sometime in the summer. Can anyone verify this? Thanks for the input by the way

I think its mainly millet you have to worry about as far as that goes, with the limit on when you can plant.
Its within I believe 3 weeks of planting you can't hunt it because its considered baiting. HOwever if you follow guidelines placed by the ag extension agency you should be in the clear as it would qualify as a normal agricultural practice.

Pink smartweed is the one that produces the most and preferred seed by waterfowl there are a number of other species of smartweed but this one is the one most often planted.

for native plants like smartweed once its established all you have to do is maintain it. so you would only have to seed one or two years and then just try to maintain the crop the other years as seed from the previous year should come up and make next years seed crop

As for an actual deadline i have no idea

Hey thats some good info, thanks tinkerbell. Looks like i will prob try the smartgrass. Do you have any idea if it could take over a pond or primarily stay around the shoreline and shallows? I was talking to a game warden in wood county a couple months before the start of this season and he had mentioned to me that it was too late to plant anything by law, had to wait till next year. That's why i was curious about the deadline thing. He had said a date but i cant remember what it was.

Smartweed is not aquatic or submerged, it is an emergent plant, it just happens to grow best in moist soil enviroments. Read up on the various plants on this site to get an idea what will work for your place.

http://aquaplant.tamu.edu/index.htm

The law states that an area is "baited" if planted. The plants have to re-generate through a growing season on their own to be considered a "non baited" area. The game warden was probably tell you that you would be hunting a baited area if you planted this year.

Nope, you can plant all you want and hunt over it the same year. You can't manipulate a first year crop, like millet. That includes driving a 4 wheeler thru it.

That is not correct. As long as you don't mow it, you can plant and it's fine. If you plant millet one year, and it comes back on its own, then you can mow to your hearts content, and be perfectly legal. The main thing they are trying to cut down on is someone throwing a bunch of seed out, and saying that they are "planting it" when the intention is for the birds to eat it before it grows.

For waterfowl, you can do pretty much anything on planting as long as there is not seed just sitting out during season, and you don't manipulate it at all, unless the manipulation is part of "normal agricultural process" such as discing or harvesting or somehting else that is not just intentionally to get the seed knocked off.

It's pretty cut and dry. If you grow it all year and it falls, you're in the clear, if you do anything to add to the seed on the surface (mowing, running cows through it, throwing out bags of corn on the surface) then the area is considered baited. It is baited until 10 days after the "complete removal of the bait" Whatever that means. The feds get pretty serious about that stuff, there were some guys on a minnow pond over in AR that had been throwing corn on the bank, got all their guns, vehicles, hunting priveleges removed, and a fine of over $100,000. It ain't worth that!

That would explain why you cant plant anything past a certain date and hunt it. Thanks for all the info. The above sounds about right, thanks duckboy.
with so many stipualtions in laws regarding hunting you just gotta be sure, ignorance is no excuse and not worth all the fines that can come into play.

Thanks for the link by the way

Plant jap or brown-top millet at different intervals during the summer. Increase your odds of success and have it seeding-out throughout the season.

Can you buy smartweed seed or plants ? I think this would work great for some ponds I have.

And throw the seed on the mud flats, this will allow the seed to germinate and sprout. Each interval, the water will recede and create a new mud flat allowing you to plant another row of millet.

Also, don’t throw seed to thick, the plants will be too crowded and not grow as think.