BenAllgood
Well-Known Member
Could it stand on its own without them or does your property require them as a major piece of the puzzle?
Pigs actually changed the way I manage my food plots - for the better. I used to plant a lot of beans - but the pigs started preventing that crop from happening. I started utilizing clover for a spring and summer plot and wheat for fall and winter. Those plantings are much easier to manage than beans. Hogs will graze all of it - but not bad to root. I didnt even pull the trigger on a deer last year - even though I could have almost every hunt. I am still shooting a hog or two every other week. The hogs actually provide more opportunity - for me - than deer. Cant go out and shoot fifty deer a year and expect to have any deer left. No matter how many hogs I kill - there will soon be some more. I might go as much as a month without an opportunity - but usually not that long. It has been four days since I shot one.I’m sure there would still be some deer on my place when acorrns fall or in spring when the browse is tender, but not near as many as are in my wheat plot on any given day in the fall. The same can be said for the lease I’m a part of. Before I started growing food plots the deer sightings, especially does, were few and far between. Lots of planted pines, a veritable desert as far as deer food. We all know to have bucks in the fall you have to have does. They are as important as food plots IMO. I plant in the spring to help the does with milk production and the bucks with antler growth, as well as overall herd health. Spring plots are not always successful depending on moisture, but my fall wheat is usually outstanding. Just ask these four legged buzzards !View attachment 24047
And I always thought it was the OLD barns!!My plots are definitely a draw, but the mast trees (especially persimmon, chestnut, oaks and apples/crabapples) are the biggest factor in the fall. It’s nice to have both - and the necessary cover as well.