Brainstorming a new food plot. Recently had some mature timber cut on some of our property

[rstallings1979]

and they harvested the pines and hardwood down a draw that separates two thick bedding areas (7 year old planted pines). I am thinking of getting a dozer and clearing up the 2.5 acre area right down the draw that separates the two planted pine areas. The area is straight and I feel like it will make a nice food plot. What are your thoughts? Worth the expense? It will probably cost me 2K to get it cleaned up. I will have to hire someone with a dozer to get the stumps out for sure.

 

[Gator89]

Sounds like a dandy idea. You could hunt from either end, depending on wind direction.

 

[mallardsx2]

2.5 acres of stump removal is going to cost a heck of a lot more than $2,000.....You'll be lucky to have it done for $5,000 in that and another 1000 in lime if your soil PH is low as I imagine it will be. If you rent the dozer yourself you can likely do it much cheaper to the $2000 number. But it better be a big dozer to pop stumps and you better know how to use one efficiently to remove stumps on 2.5 acres. Thats a lot of stumps.

You wont get much sunlight into there to burn stuff up so it might make a great clover plot!

Personally, I would plant it in corn/beans/corn/beans/corn/beans. Deer are WAAAAY more comfortable coming out into that when the shooting starts than a clover plot.

 

[Gut_Pile]

Looks like it would be a great place for a plot.

 

[bilgerat]

its a lot easier to push trees down roots n all ,its tough to dig stumps out after the trees are cut, I agree with Mallard, gonna cost you a lot more than 2k, I just paid 4k to clear 2 acre of woods for a food plot

 

[GeorgiaGlockMan]

Go for it.

My dozer guy won't even come out for jobs less than $5k....about 5 days of work with transport to/from.

 

[ChattBuck]

Go for it.

My dozer guy won't even come out for jobs less than $5k....about 5 days of work with transport to/from.

I'm sure the overhead for equipment, maintenance, fuel is steep . . . . but for that kind of money, playing on a dozer every day sounds like a decent gig! Beat the heck out of office work.

 

[GeorgiaGlockMan]

Yup

 

[ddgarcia]

I'm sure the overhead for equipment, maintenance, fuel is steep . . . . but for that kind of money, playing on a dozer every day sounds like a decent gig! Beat the heck out of office work.

Take it from a guy that does it for a living, it ain't all you're makin' it out to be.

 

[crackerdave]

Take it from a guy that does it for a living, it ain't all you're makin' it out to be.

I was a wildland firefighter/dozer jockey for the last ten years of my working life.I would hafta say...it's a rough way to make a living,but I much preferred it to office duty.

 

[sportsman94]

With the age of those pines, I would consider managing it in old field style with fire and herbicides where needed. When those pines age out of bedding you would have 2.5 acres of bedding with food included. I would strategically put smaller food plots around that it try to create travel routes coming to and from food back to the old field. You’ll also be able to hunt it and the deer should feel comfortable using it all hours of the day

 

[Jim Boyd]

Good luck.

IMO, tillable acreage is king.