September 2006 Food Plot Update

Youth Squirrel Season

Ghost Deer

After a dry summer, late August and September have brought much needed rain to our neck of the woods. Hopefully this will give our fall plots the moisture they need to mature before the harsh weather hits us.

We have replaced a three and one half year old plot of clover with a combination of seed blends and we watched the remainder of the plots that were planted in the spring and late summer for deer activity.

So far the deer have stayed one step ahead of my cameras. When I put the good cameras in a plot the deer leave the plot alone, but just as soon as I strap one of my undependable cameras in a plot they come in and mow it down. Such is the nature of chasing whitetail deer.

Planting the annual seed blends has added some variety to our food plots and has made things much more interesting. As the clover plots are left reeling from all of the summer browsing some of the annuals matured and became attractive to the deer. It’s going to be interesting to see how our plots do through the fall.

Oldhouse Food Plot

We had started disking this plot back on August 19th and finally got back to it again on September 3rd and 4th. On the 3rd we added 400 pounds of lime and 50 pounds of 19-19-19 fertilizer and disked the ground up. The next day we disked the ground again, dragged it with bedsprings and then planted three different seed blends including Imperial Whitetail Clover, Biologic Maximum and Tecomate Ultra Forage. After sowing we ran over the seed with our ATV’s. There were sections of the plot where the ground was worked up into a powder consistency and about six inches deep so we didn’t want to burry the seeds too deep by dragging it with the bedsprings. So far it looks good.

This plot is a little less than one-quarter acre in size so 400 pounds of lime is about one ton per acre. We had also put 200 pounds of lime on this plot back in May, which would make 600 pounds this year.

We planted a small portion in clover to add a seed that would come back up next spring and also because we just happened to have it left over from the spring. We sowed it in an end of the plot so that we can plant something else in the rest of the plot next spring.

The other two blends are what we had planted in the spring in two different plots that grew very well over the summer. Hopefully they will grow well here as well and be attractive to the deer over our hunting season. Digital game camera pictures have shown us that the deer have started to eat the Ultra Forage over the last week. The Ultra Forage is right behind the mineral lick that we set up our camera over so it’s the only one we have photos of. We’ve set up cameras on the Maximum and Imperial Clover this last week to see if they are spending time there as well.

Each of the seed blends came up well in September.

The cornpatch plot is no longer the big draw that it was all spring and summer. This is typical of how our clover plots have reacted in the past and is the reason we’ve tried some annuals this year.

The plot looks more like a grass and weed patch with some clover but I’m confident that with a little attention in the spring it will jump back and once again provide a lot of good nutrition next year.

We haven’t seen deer in this food plot much for a couple weeks now. The sparse clover hasn’t been as inviting for the deer when compared to ripe fruit and acorns.

There is still some clover left in the plot but you have to look a little to find it. Unless something changes we plan on re-planting this plot next spring. Right now a good heavy dose of lime over the winter would be our first order of business. We would like to plant another a perennial here again, maybe some alfalfa, chicory or a blend. We’ll have several hours in our stands this fall to figure our what we want to do here.

We planted the Evolved Harvest Shot Plot on August 11th. Through September the plot grew quite well after getting some rain and our digital scouting cameras revealed that deer were spending a little time there as well. They are not eating much of it yet but I’m not disappointed since we’d like to see them wait until hunting season before they use this plot heavily. This plot is in the woods and is a good hunting spot. Ryan and I both have tree stands up in the woods nearby.

Through the end of September it has grown to about 12 inches in some spots. We're hoping some warmer weather after the rain, will allow this plot to continue to grow into hunting season, which starts on October 14th.

We haven’t thought much about what we’ll do with this plot in the spring. We have plenty of time to figure this one out.

As we reported in August this plot had turned into sorghum, weeds and grass with the seed heads still on the sorghum. When we visited on September 30th the seed heads had all been eaten. One week and they were all gone. Unfortunately we didn’t have one of our good cameras monitoring this plot so we didn’t get any pictures.

I’m not sure there’s anything valuable left for the deer in this plot now that the seed heads have been eaten. We’ll see if our cameras catch much activity in the plot in the coming weeks.

The final word on the Powerplant in this plot would be that we gave it a bad start due to our planting difficulties. On the other hand the deer spent a lot of time eating what did come up so we feel we still provided nutrition for the deer and we learned through our experience. We’ll use Powerplant again but we’ll plant it like a bean and not like a small seed. It will be disked to some extent and not dragged to cover the seeds.

The hayfield plot is a tale of three food plots. The Powerplant that was planted still had sorghum, and similar to the whippoorwill plot the deer moved in over the last week of September and cleaned them up. Once again the wrong cameras were in place so we don’t have any photographic evidence. There may still be some beans here and there but you would have to look hard and the sunflowers were eaten long ago.

The Maximum had grown over the summer and had been ignored like the plague until the first week of September. The Maximum now looks like we used a weed eater on it. The deer finally found the turnip leaves and rape palatable and wiped it out. It is now stubble with some turnips lying just under the surface. I figure they’ll be back for these later.

The LabLab Plus grew well and then the deer decided that they’d had enough after one month and moved in. The LabLab had jumped up real nice and then they ate just about all of it. Now the sorghum is coming on strong but we’re wondering if there is enough growing season left for it to develop seed heads. We’ll have to wait and see.

We’ll watch these plots from a tree stand on a few occasions this fall and get some firsthand information.

Right Of Way Food Plot

The Tecomate Ultra Forage in the right of way had grown tall over the summer and we were wondering when the deer would finally decide to eat the large leaves. The same week the deer cleaned out the Maximum they crossed the logging road and cleaned this one out also.

Since that week we’ve kept a good game camera on this plot and the deer have continued to spend time here. I’m curious how long it will continue to draw them into the stubble that is left.

The turnips that grew here are nice and big and should also provide some nutrition at some point.

It has been a good year for our food plots and we’ve learned a lot. Hopefully the deer have benefited by our efforts.

September 30th was a one-day youth squirrel hunt here in West Virginia so after the soccer games Ryan and I traveled to our hunting property to chase squirrels around.

After collecting our digital scouting cameras and putting the batteries on charge we headed for the woods. We hadn’t eaten anything for a while so I was looking forward to sitting on a log and having a candy bar and a fresh picked apple. If we were lucky we would see a deer.

Not a minute after setting down we heard noise coming from a tree right behind us and there was little doubt it was a squirrel. So much for the snack and relaxation on the log.

I tried to ignore it but Ryan had to go see what it was while I kept watch from the log, just like the proverbial lump on a log.

Sure enough the squirrel came right down the tree to him. He must have gotten his shooting skills from someone else because that squirrel is still eating acorns in those trees. Maybe next time he’ll leave the .22 at home and take a shotgun.

After our fruitless search for this elusive squirrel we took a walk to check out the squirrel (deer) sign and acorn crop. After walking a quarter of a mile from our ATV a thunderstorm chased us back.

In the end it was great just to be in the woods.

Over the last three deer seasons we have been watching a deer that we called double white throat patch or DWP for short. Amazingly enough this deer we call double white throat patch has an extra white throat patch that made him easily identifiable.

In 2003 I first saw this deer as a respectable basket racked eight point. After years of not seeing many large bucks he was tempting but fun to watch.

In 2004 he was again an eight point and we got dozens of photos of this deer at our feeders and we watched him during deer season on many occasions. He was not shy at all. We found both of his sheds right under one of our feeders.

In 2005 he had grown nine points and we only got about a half dozen pictures of him. All of these pictures were taken in mid November right before gun season and we never laid eyes on him. This buck seemed to have completely changed his patterns and lifestyle but the pictures we got of him revealed that he had a large body and a slight potbelly. He had been eating well.

The last set of pictures in September again had pictures of a deer we have been calling the high racked eight point but there was one difference that we noticed. This buck now looks like he has a faint extra white patch on his neck. Could this be our old friend DWP? I held his sheds in my hands and had a hard time matching them to the pictures of the high-racked eight point. Why would he now only have eight points? Could he be the son of DWP?

Stay tuned; you know I’ll be looking real close at our next set of pictures.