Arbuckle Mountain Area Chapter
 Habitat Planning

What Can You Do? 1 See our What To Do page - Once you have an idea of what to do, then continue
Where Do You Start? 1 Obtain the legal description (and survey if available)
2 Gather topographic maps, solis maps, etc.
Make Some Sketches for Tinkering 1 Get aerial photos of the land 
...try the County Assessor or see our Maps page for online maps
2 Find some onion skin paper from a surveyor/drafting shop
3 Overlay the onion skin over the aerial and trace the key features like ponds, trees, creeks, washes, thickets, fences, etc.  sample (jpg)
...(pencil allows you to make changes in the future)
4 Copy the onion skin on a copier a bunch of times
5 Use the copies to color in disc strips, food plots, edge feathering, etc.
6 Date the sketches and file them by year, or topic, to remember what you did
Pasture Restoration 1 Understand the grazing dynamics of our native pastures and to use cattle to your advantage in managing cover. Read more here.
2 Learn how improved pastures impact quail habitat here.
3 Consider Tree Thinning to promote native grasses, forbes and legumes and to improve cover for deer, turkey and quail.
Do an Inventory 1 Use one of the inventory tools to understand what you have.
Missouri Habitat Appraisal Form (43 kb pdf)
Okla State Univ Habitat Appraisal Form (2.6 mb pdf)