Spring/Summer Food Plots - Seed Review

[Addicted to Antlers]

What is your preferred spring/summer food plot seeds and why? Do you plant any beans or peas? Do you put a protective barrier around the beans/peas field to allow time to grow? Are you factoring in the high temperatures and potential drought in your seed selection? Soybeans, alfalfa, peas and clover seem to be common.


Hancock's Spring & Summer Food Plot Seed Mix

• Cow peas
• Peredovic Sunflower
• WGF Sorghum
• Sunn Hemp
• Japanese Millet
• Dwarf Deer Corn
• Aeschynomene

Pennington Rackmaster Summer Mix

• Soybeans
• iron clay peas
• buckwheat
• sunflower
• sorghum

 

[Canuck5]

How many acres do you plan to plant? That is really the key question here. I am assuming, since you are looking at "mixes" that you're under 5 acres.

I quit planting cowpeas/soybeans after 5 acres would get wiped out. I did not fence them in, which some do, but with a limited budget, it wasn't worth it.

You could try Aeschynomene , buckwheat, millet and or sorghum, if you have a small acreage.

My greatest success is with a perennial white clover. I am on my 2nd try with alfalfa and pretty pleased so far, but it has it's own issues.

 

[Dbender]

Millet and sorghum are basically worthless for deer. Provide nothing for antler growth and unless you have a large acreage once it seeds out it won't last a week or so.

 

[Addicted to Antlers]

Total hunting property is 500 acres but the food plots are small. All of our food plots are less than 5 acres.

Are you suggesting if I had a 20 acre food plot then planting cowpeas/soybeans would have a greater chance of success from grazing? I would need to cut timber to expand existing food plots and not sure it is worth it. Smaller food plots and shooting lanes are what we are setup with.

I am attracted to mixes since it seems to give a higher probability of finding a few winning seeds for growth and what they want.

Do you transition to the fall/winter plots in early September to get the rain in. I heard October is in the records as the driest month of the year.

 

[Addicted to Antlers]

Millet and sorghum are basically worthless for deer. Provide nothing for antler growth and unless you have a large acreage once it seeds out it won't last a week or so.

What are your spring/summer seeds?

 

[Gut_Pile]

Best spring/summer seed is clover planted the previous fall

 

[Dean]

Any cowpea, bean, legume should be fenced or protected unless planted on much larger plots as noted. Depending on your herd/current carrying capacity, you will more than likely find that once the deer discover them they will stay on them until wiped out....especially if not planted with any type of cover crop. When/if we plant soybeans, iron clay, cow peas etc we often plant along with Sunn Hemp. Sunn Hemp grows quickly, high in protein and is a green manure soil builder. We find that the SH jumps and protects the peas against over browse and will grow up the SH stalks. The downside to SH is that it can be tougher to manage after it has reached 5', 6' tall and heavy stalk on plots that are in your Fall planting plans.

Personally I would not plant a 'pea only' plot under 5 acres.....we have moved more towards clovers - annuals (that do reseed) and perennials. We have moved towards no till, and throw and mow (no dirt turning) methods and found that buckwheat, while maybe not a preferred food source for deer, grows easily, provides high protein, and can be easily terminated without plowing for our Fall plantings....

 

[SRShunter]

Deer vetch, alyce clover, and of course the ice cream...iron clay peas. They don't make it long the icp's, but boy the deer love them and I love looking at all the sign in my plot! Hoping the other two feed them alot longer, and from the rumors I think they will. It will be my 1st time planting those two.

 

[shdw633]

My go to anymore is Alyce Clover, brown top millet, mainly it's the alyce, the millet only provides cover for the alyce as it's a little slow to get up while the millet jumps right up. After 3 months the millet dies and the stand of Alyce is up until the frost kills it in December (sometimes November but not as of late). I don't put alot of millet in the mix because I don't want it crowding out the alyce but just enough to jump up and keep the deers attention away from the clover. I plant it because it does well in my sandy soil. I am thinking of adding buckwheat to the mix...no reason, just because I want to see how it does.

 

[Dbender]

What are your spring/summer seeds?

If you have areas of desirable native browse the best bang for your buck is a ton or two of balanced fert and broadcast into these areas. You can't get any easier.

 

[Evergreen]

I have fenced in the past, and I have planted a honey hole every 2 weeks thru the summer for 1 particular buck because that's how long it took them to clean the beans out of that spot, just depends on the year and how much time I have. I typically don't mix thru the summer but if I do it's lablab, peas, beans in one mix and corn, millet, milo in another mix for a specific spot that can flood during heavy winter rainfall purely for the ducks, and even then it's not a mix rather than a staggered planting, dry winter the milo and millet get mowed out and a winter plot placed next to standing corn. I know I will have to replant but I usually do the bean mix strictly for deer areas

 

[pinus palustris]

I always, always add in a fair amount of buckwheat, great attractant for pollinators which helps everything else I have planted that needs insect pollination as opposed to wind pollination.

 

[Ihunt]

The problem with mixes is seeds getting planted at different depths and issues with chemical control of weeds. Yes, they germinate but imo you lose way too many seeds/plants.

I would choose one based on deer density and what you want out of the plot. Hard to beat alfalfa and clover when your soil is correct. Come fall, just drill oats or wheat through it. Rinse and repeat.

 

[XJfire75]

Focus on weed control and soil amendments as needed thru spring then some sun hemp and buckwheat. Seed into it and then smash it down in the fall with cereal grains and some clovers. Next year mow the cereal grains before they seed in the spring and leave the clovers. Over seed some more clovers and alfalfa into it.