July Food Plot Update

Feeder Follies XI

A Night at the Oldhouse Plot

Bucks

The month of July has not been an active one in our food plots. The weather has been relatively dry for our area and I haven’t been able to get to the plots. I had big plans for the weekend of July 23rd but letting my kids talk me into riding on one of their bicycles was my downfall. I’ve been on crutches ever since and have depended on my dad and son to mow and get pictures for me. So without turning this into a knee rehab newsletter let’s see what the food plots look like.

Oldhouse Food Plot

This food plot is still looking real good but there is a weed or grass that is working real hard to take the plot over. I used Arrest grass herbicide earlier and it did a great job getting rid of the grass, but there is what looks like a wide blade, grass type of plant that is growing strong. I’m assuming that it is actually a weed and plan on getting some Slay weed herbicide to see if we can knock this stuff back.

There is still a lot of clover in the plot and a little rain would do it some good. If I get the chance I have some fertilizer I’ll put on later as well. We also would like to get it mowed to put everything back at the same height as the clover.

Our expanded corn patch plot looks like a couple different plots depending on what section you look at. One area just took off with grass and a tall large leaf weed, while other areas are relatively grass and weed free. I had spot sprayed with Arrest and these areas look pretty good. This plot needs more Arrest and some Slay to get these weeds and grasses back under control.

My dad mowed the plot for me on the 23rd. It will be interesting to see how both the weeds and clover react. This is now one of our larger plots and I would like to see it get a chance to do well. It had grown higher than I would have liked before we got it mowed but that’s the way it goes sometimes.

The old garden plot continues to do well after we killed the grass and it had popped back up strong in the spring. As the name implies this used to be our garden but it never was the best dirt on the property. I think it was just the close location to the house that set it apart as a garden. Unfortunately the dirt is still not the best and when the weather dries out the ground will crack. It sure could use some rain.

We’ll probably need to mow this plot at least one more time. The weeds haven’t come on strong and the deer are keeping the clover under control.

I’ll be honest and say that I haven’t seen the middle clearing food plot since July 3rd. From the pictures my son took of it and the reports from my dad it looks like the plot needs mowed and it may be turning into a clover plot.

If you’ll remember, this plot was planted in Imperial Extreme last fall. The Extreme didn’t come on too strong over the fall and winter so I overseeded it with some Imperial clover this spring. Although clover is part of the Extreme seed combination clover now appears to be the major plant growing in the plot.

Hopefully we can turn the plot into a nice clover plot or maybe it will surprise us.

This plot was planted in Extreme this spring but has been taken over by a weed that has a pretty little pink flower. The fortunate thing is that the deer are eating the weed. It is much higher inside of the exclusion cage than the rest of the plot.

I’ll just let this plot go and see what happens over the winter and maybe try something next spring again. This plot is very small and tucked into the woods at the edge of a hayfield. I’ve thought of forgetting about this plot or maybe using it to test some annual seed mixes. This plot has the best dirt of all of our plots. I have several months to make up our mind. If you have something that you think would do real well in good dirt in a small plot use the e-mail link to let us know.

I had been thinking about starting a new plot in part of the hayfield. I had a grand vision of using some Round-Up to kill about an acre of tough hay and planting it in Imperial Alfa-Rack. Hopefully the alfalfa would take off and the farmer that cuts our fields would have some alfalfa to cut come next summer. Needless to say this plan will have to wait another year or maybe I’ll have another brainstorm (these are always dangerous, just like getting on that bicycle).

Now our grand plans only include trying to keep the plots that we have under control. All of this fertilization, mowing and herbicide work depends on me getting back on my feet again soon. Hopefully this is the case and we can take care of the weeds, if not we’ll get to see how the plots do when we can’t give them much attention.

I would never have thought that our deer feeders would have created enough stories to stay in this newsletter for six updates but the raccoons have helped that along.

The latest news is a dead raccoon at one of our feeders. It appeared that it somehow got its front paw stuck in the varmint cage. The scouting camera photos showed us that it didn’t suffer over endless days. The good side is that after this happened it looked like the remaining raccoons, and there are plenty, are not climbing on the feeder. We’ll see how long this lasts.

Now that my dad is filling the feeders we’re all real glad that we bought those tripods with winches last winter. They’ve made this chore much easier.

When we visited our hunting property in early July my son wanted to camp out near the oldhouse plot to try to shoot a raccoon. I thought that we could just use one of our blinds but he wanted to take a tent and stay all night.

As it turned out my son, daughter and I all stayed in the tent on Friday evening. I now know for sure that food plots are great for deer but are very uncomfortable bedding. By the time morning rolled around I was hurting real bad. My legs cramped up trying to get my shoes on in the morning and I never thought I was going to get out of that tent.

By the way, we didn’t even shoot a raccoon but the kids thought it was great, they slept like rocks.

The bucks’ antlers are starting to show some promise. We have identified one for sure and we are guessing at the identity of another. The biggest buck from last year has been a no-show for a while now. Hopefully he’ll show up soon.

The most promising thing is the number of racked bucks that we are getting pictures of. We’re seeing very few spikes.

Their antlers will quit growing soon; it’ll be interesting to see when they start shedding their velvet. Things are starting to get exciting. You can see a nice trio of bucks in the picture below.