One year in

Tony Bracci finds things to carp about and enjoy as the many elements of his shoot in its first year take shape

- Tony Bracci

We were halfway through the year and although all seemed to be going well, there were a few areas of concern about things that were out of our control. Things that with some experience wouldn’t be a worry, but being the first year of the shoot caused some sleepless nights.

The covercrops that we had put in had grown well but we found out that a long-standing favour of a local contractor spraying over with a pre-emergence spray meant that all the canary grass we had put in had been killed off. The canary grass was sown with a primary crop for the first year – we used sorghum – and had time to grow and establish itself. The whole crop was topped and the idea is the canary grass comes good for the second year and can then last for three to five years, being topped off at the end of each season. So, next year we will have to start over again with the long-term plan for using canary grass.

Liquid asset

The ducks were due and although there was plenty of water in the main lake, the smaller pond had dried up. As the plan was to release 100 ducks there, something had to be done, though nothing available seemed big enough. Not only did it have to be big enough for that amount of ducks, it also had to be able to be emptied and refilled as the ducks would quickly make the water very dirty.