I like to mow my clover plots about 4-5 times a season to reduce weed competition and grass encroachment. We have found that deer prefer the tender young shoots that the clover plants produce after a low mowing of about 4-8″, basically cut on a hay schedule here in Michigan.

Whitetail season is right around the corner so get out and make sure your plots are happy!

Shoot Straight!

Tex

All our hard work this summer and fall on the FLG Down Patrol timber hole is finally complete. We are now just maintaining water levels and waiting on the migration. Wood ducks are using the creek as well as the new pools. Lots of acorns and pecans have fallen in the water. There is some millet left although the deer have eaten the tops off most of it. Just sitting on our hands waiting to echo the words “Kill ‘em!” through the timber…

Rooney

Well it official, Spring has arrived here in mid Michigan and our food plots are looking amazing! The deer have absolutely hammered these food plots all Winter with the lack of snow cover here most of the season. With this early Spring and unseasonably warm temperatures the food plots are just blowing out of the ground and looking beautiful!

We have put away our predator gear and started warming up the turkey calls. This is going to be a hot turkey season with a lot of action so far this year! Stay tuned everyone

Tex

I don’t know about you guys and gals but i sure do have Whitetail Deer on the brain. We’ve been putting in a lot of hard work this summer getting all prepped up for the season this fall. One of the big things we did this year was put in food plots on several of our properties to help concentrate the deer and also provide nutrition.

Here’s a great video update from Tex on putting in food plots the right way. When it comes to growing food plots Tex is the man so if you are thinking about putting one in definitely give the video a watch. A lot of great info on prepping the food plot from spraying until the seed goes in the ground.

We used Frigid Forage to seed our food plots and have had great success with germination rates and growing high quality food sources that have been drawing deer from a long way off.

Opie

A Healthy Stand of Frigid Forage - Wild Game Buffet

Planting food plots on your land has numerous benefits for wildlife and can be used strategically to help increase your chances of success when hunting. There are many different ideas on the best times to plant food plots and what varieties of wildlife foods to plant to maximize the effectiveness of the food plot. One of the strategies that I am employing on one of our whitetail properties is to use a perennial food plot in a new area of the property to help modify travel patterns and provide a safe food source near thick cover for when hunting pressure builds.

This spring we spent a significant amount of time reclaiming a piece of land between a big swamp and a 50 acre field that is used for agriculture. The swamp is a traditional bedding area for Whitetails and is a place of refuge for them during hunting season. However, after the crops come off the field they have to expose themselves in an open field in order to access their food source. We have designated the first 60 yards into the field as a ‘buffer’ strip and the 30 yards closest to the agriculture is planted with a Pheasants Forever grass mix that is mixed with Russian Olives and provides excellent cover. The 30 yards closest to the fencerow and swamp we have designated as another buffer strip where we can plant food plots. In addition, we cleared ¾ of an acre on the inside of the fencerow even closer to the swamp for another food plot.

The 60 yard ‘buffer’ strip was planted 7 years ago and has proved invaluable as a tool for helping make the property more huntable. This spring we tilled up and the 30 yard ‘food zone’ and replanted it with a premium Trophy Clover mixture from Frigid Forage. The deer use this area as a staging area in the morning and evening as they move from bedding to the agriculture field. It provides them a good food source late into the year and they feel safe because of the tall grass between them and the field. Because they see this as a safe area they move into it well before dark and provide me an opportunity to hunt them.

Bucks Utilizing the Protected Interior Food Plot

The ¾ acre food plot on the interior of the woodline also provides a protected food source for the deer but it also serves another purpose as well. This small food plot is located in the southwest corner of the property and is furthest away from neighboring properties and deer hunters. It is also in a location that is easy to get in and out of without being detected by the deer. This spring we planted this food plot with Frigid Forage’s Wild Game Buffet which includes Mammoth Red Clover, Medium Red Clover, Alsike Clover, White Dutch Clover, Ladino Clover, Dwarf Essex Rapeseed, Perennial Ryegrass, Creeping Red Fescue, and Vernal Alfalfa. So in addition to providing a good food source closer to cover the deer are now establishing travel routes to get to this food source and becoming accustomed to spending more time in this area of the property. By creating a new and desirable food source we are encouraging the deer to develop patterns and habits that keep them safe from hunters and direct them to locations where we can selectively harvest them.

These are only two of many ways that food plots can be used and we will show more strategies for late summer and early fall food plots as we get closer to planting them.

See you all in the woods,

Opie

The New Food Plot After Initial Clearing

The border of the swamp was very overgrown and while it was good cover provided minimal food resources. So this February I decided to clear the brush back and make a small clearing between the fence row and the edge of the swamp, well I may have gotten a little carried away and ended up with almost an acre inside the woods, this area has now been cleared and worked up and is awaiting seed, what is being planted has not yet been decided. We also worked up the buffer strip that borders the woods and swamp, this is almost 4 acres of land that will soon be planted in Trophy Clover mix.

Since good things take time, we also decided to plant more trees, this piece of land has almost 1000 pines and spruces already planted and growing tall, but each year I like to plant a few more, so there are 50 more pines ready to go in as soon as this snow disappears. The 6 new apple trees went in before this snow hit, it will take them a few years to start producing fruit, but when they do Opie and Tex will be fighting over who gets to hunt “holy crap that is a big deer” corner!

The moral is that if you do not like the type of deer you land is holding, get out there and change it. There are many resources out there that will help you improve the quality of deer on your land. The main things that they need are food, cover and water. If you have these the deer will have no reason to leave your land, unless they are in the back of a Ford.

PT