dogdoc Posted March 25, 2005 Report Share Posted March 25, 2005 takes more than just food plots to get big bucks. proper doe harvesting, non-harvest of young bucks, proper cover, and good natural habitat---but food plots are a great place to start. Are you wanting to plant the entire 8 acres--if so--you are off to a great start. I would recommend dividing the 8 acres into 4 acres of annual planting and 4 acres in perennial plantings. As far as warm season annuals my favorite are cowpeas, soybeans, and forage sorghum. My favorite fall annuals are wheat, rye, vetch, winter peas, and the brassicas. As far as a perennial nothing performs like clover--but I don't like to plant just one tyep of perennial---I will usually plant a mix that will contain several different perennial clovers, trefoil, and chicory. I don't like to start my perennial plants until the fall--but that depends more on your location. good luck and let me know if I can help more in any way! todd Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dogdoc Posted March 25, 2005 Author Report Share Posted March 25, 2005 Re: decent sized deer heard crappy food sources there is a big difference between a hunting plot and a feeding plot. for an archery hunting plot you need a smaller plot--like 1/2 acre so you can better predict where the deer are going to enter the plot from. A better bet is to set up several stands on major trails leading to the plots----a lot of times the bigger bucks hang out in staging areas and don't enter the plots until dark. If you can figure out their bedding areas---then set up 1/2 way between the bedding and food plots---and you are good to GO! todd Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dogdoc Posted March 25, 2005 Author Report Share Posted March 25, 2005 Re: decent sized deer heard crappy food sources nope--never have! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wtnhunt Posted March 25, 2005 Report Share Posted March 25, 2005 Re: decent sized deer heard crappy food sources Clovers perform great for sure. Todd gave great advice as always. On your fall plantings I would definitley plant some sort of perenial clover mix. If you have one 12 acre field you want to setup for a bowhunting plot, you might try something like a mix of winter rye mixed with hamannfarms grower mix adjacent to the woods you plan to hunt. Another great seed blend is the pennington rackmaster clover and rye supreme. I would not suggest any biologic seeds, in my experience they just do not perform very well. As far as how much to plant in your two fields, 20 acres, I would probably plant a few smaller plots and maybe one larger 1 acre plot for rifle season. Total food plots percentage I read somewhere maybe on the qdma site that it is recommended to have a rate of something like 20 percent in food plots if I remember correctly. So that would be like 4 acres total out of 20 dedicated to food plots. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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