Clover/corn food plot

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Iluv2hunt
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Re: Clover/corn food plot

Post by Iluv2hunt » Thu Jan 16, 2014 7:34 am

I have a creek behind my house. I had to go down in it the other day to get a roof panel off my kennel that blew in it from the storm. I found one of those little springs like that. Water was coming out of it about the speed of a water hose trickling. The ground was orange around it, like an orange algae. I guess the water is full of iron like my well water
I don't hunt turkeys because I want to, I hunt them because I have to. ~Colonel Tom Kelly

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treefarmer
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Re: Clover/corn food plot

Post by treefarmer » Wed Jan 22, 2014 3:04 pm

Clover/corn food plot Day 240

Got cold again, it was 27 this morning. 1st time I had been in the woods at daylight since opening day. The little 4 point we been watching on the camera came out of the woods, into the planted pines and to the edge of the rye patch for the last time this morning. He was on camera on the 18th, it showed 20 degrees on the picture, he was all fluffed up. This morning I let the air out of his bag with the .243. Boy did he stink! His tarsals were rank.

There are a lot of tracks in the Rye, even though it is very wet, still lots of does in the afternoons.
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Iluv2hunt
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Re: Clover/corn food plot

Post by Iluv2hunt » Wed Jan 22, 2014 3:09 pm

COngrats on gettin him :bbq
I don't hunt turkeys because I want to, I hunt them because I have to. ~Colonel Tom Kelly

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Triple Creek Reaper
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Re: Clover/corn food plot

Post by Triple Creek Reaper » Wed Jan 22, 2014 3:56 pm

Way to go...
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EST 2013

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Re: Clover/corn food plot

Post by M12Gunboy » Wed Jan 22, 2014 5:37 pm

Great job and great thread again Treefarmer. I look forward to next years thread and I'm in Maryland reading.

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treefarmer
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Re: Clover/corn food plot

Post by treefarmer » Wed Jan 22, 2014 10:03 pm

Thanks for the gracious comments! I enjoy keeping up with the ups and downs of deer management on small acreage, maybe some day I'll figure it out. :dtect
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sam03
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Re: Clover/corn food plot

Post by sam03 » Thu Jan 23, 2014 8:25 am

Nice work treefarmer! What time is lunch? :bbq
I like animals, they are tasty!

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Re: Clover/corn food plot

Post by 9dawgs » Thu Jan 23, 2014 12:53 pm

Nice! Great job man!

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Re: Clover/corn food plot

Post by Dirtroadz » Thu Jan 23, 2014 4:52 pm

Thanx for sharing your wisdom. Great thread!

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treefarmer
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Re: Clover/corn food plot

Post by treefarmer » Wed Jan 29, 2014 5:00 pm

Clover/corn food plot Day 247

Well today is quite a day weather wise in all the southeast! Rained about 4/10" late yesterday evening, woke up around 3:30 this morning and the sleet was falling. No snow like we seen a few times but it is cold! As I start this post it is 28 degrees at 3pm, this is the high for today, it was only 25 at daylight. There was sleet on the vehicles, the deck, the roof of my shop and around the trunks of of the planted pines adjacent to the food plot.

Last Wednesday, I killed the 4 point that had been hanging around. Dressing a deer has become a bigger job as I get older. So Thursday morning I was still "recuperating" and decided not to go to the stand. Should have went, another buck was on the camera around 8:30 or so. This buck looked like he had already shed on the right side, not a broken beam but completely gone. Those big boys that showed up a few months back haven't been around to have their picture made. Still hoping to see one. Added corn to feeder on the lease a couple of days ago and filled the one here at the house this morning. Love those On Time Feeder motors!

Monday night was the last time a deer came by the feeder, that was before the weather was beginning to change. Not sure where they lay up and for how long as we get these extreme weather conditions?

More pictures than usual today because of the extreme Florida weather. Lots of folks are used to this weather, but it always amazes me when we have such cold. Some of the pictures will show the condition of the Rye grain and how it's holding up in the cold and the wet. then some pictures of the sleet and ice from this cold snap. Y'all stay warm!
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Re: Clover/corn food plot

Post by treefarmer » Wed Jan 29, 2014 5:05 pm

Food plot pictures cont'd:
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Re: Clover/corn food plot

Post by treefarmer » Wed Feb 05, 2014 8:20 am

Clover/corn food plot Day 254 February 5, 2014

The weather has gotten a little more seasonal since last week. Still raining a little, lots of fog in the mornings, high in the low 70's. The bucks are rutting big time. Seems like every body except me has killed a good deer last week. Several evenings last week, bucks were chasing does in the pines or in the rye patch, too dark to see antlers but with the binoculars you can still see 'em going with their heads down , around and around.

Friday evening the rutting activity was really intense, so I left my rifle and binoculars in the shooting house and knew I would be there before daylight on Saturday. Kinda' slow at 1st, a little button buck fed up to the feeder and was standing under it watching something when it went off! He ran down a pine row and stopped about 50 yards from the feeder. He was still looking at something. Finally spotted another deer and it was a legal buck. He was probably close to 175 yards away in the planted pines and he was trailing. I gave 3 grunts on my tube and he disappeared. Saw him about 10 minutes later and grunted again, he disappeared again. A few minutes later I spotted him coming at a fast walk around the road on the east side of the food plot. He had his head up and was really looking, never stopping. I didn't want to shoot at him while he was moving, so I made a little noise with my mouth, (like the big boys on TV) he stopped and I put one through his lungs. He took off running and he hit some thick stuff and water and disappeared. I listened but couldn't hear him, my being old and about half deaf don't help much.

Climbed down and went back to the house to get my helper, Flossie. As we were nearing the spot she had her nose in the air, winding, when I stopped the cart and told her to go, she took off went in the thick junk and came right back to the road and started to back trail. I hollered at her and back she came, back in the water and thick junk and she just stopped. Peering through the junk I could see the deer, he had run and hit an old fence line that used to divide the pastures back when we had cows. Got to looking around and there was a blood trail that a blind man could follow. He was a cow horn spike with little brow tines, call him a 4 point, nothing close to the 4 big 8 points that were on some camera phones the following morning at church!

The deer are still feeding on the rye that is doing well on the higher/dryer side of the food plot. Monday evening I went to the plot and a little before 5pm I spotted a deer walking through the pines, it was a buck. He went directly to the feeder and stayed around it for 20 minutes, then here he comes out into the rye and feeds across the full width of the plot. He was a 6 point. I called my wife and asked if we need more meat and she said unless he's a big one don't shoot him. He walked right passed the shooting house and the last time I saw him he was heading toward our house. (OK, were heading to Atlanta for a grandson's b'day later in the week and just finished processing the deer from the 22nd, still got another one in the cooler to do next week.) Most of my buddies are reporting the bucks are really doing their thing this season. Maybe a big one will come by before it's over!

Pictures this time show blood trail and the dog and her little buck.
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sam03
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Re: Clover/corn food plot

Post by sam03 » Wed Feb 05, 2014 8:34 am

More meat for the freezer.
I like animals, they are tasty!

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treefarmer
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Re: Clover/corn food plot

Post by treefarmer » Thu Feb 13, 2014 8:13 pm

Clover/corn food plot Day 262

Checked my camera yesterday around 11am and jumped a bunch of deer that were at the feeder, tails going everywhere! No pictures of them or the 6 pt last week, only 12 pictures, new SDHC card, so I changed the batteries, they were showing 79%. Don't know squat about what they do, thought fresh batteries might help it? Last season a tech from Moultrie said they should be changed when they get to 50%? Still have several days left of rifle season, then a week of ML. Went this afternoon, nothing moving, full moon tomorrow. Hadn't been since last Tuesday evening when the 6 point showed up. We spent 5 nights near Atlanta and left Monday morning before all the fun started, again. Have one venison ham left to process, then it will be sausage time if I don't kill another this season. Sorry no picture this time, but this evening the frogs were calling and anything that walk close by you could have heard them wading in the water!
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Re: Clover/corn food plot

Post by treefarmer » Wed Feb 19, 2014 11:58 am

Clover/corn food plot Day 268

The season is almost over, haven't killed a big buck yet. However we did get a few pictures of some good ones a while back. Don't get me wrong, we are thankful for the two we did kill on this plot!

The food plot has been very disappointing this year, too dry, then too wet and then it has continued to be wet for the past 7 months or so. I don't put any store in the political issue of climate change that's being brought up again by Kerry, but I do believe in weather cycles. When we bought this place over 40 years ago, this food plot acreage still had watermelon beds on it. Watermelons don't do well in standing water. We used it as pasture and also planted pines on part of it. For the last 10 years we have planted it as a food plot with pretty good results till this season. Dry spring killed the clover, wet summer didn't help the corn and rye grain just doesn't do well with wet feet!

Depending on the season, the location of the food plot may have to change. There is some high land over on the east side with 30 year old pines that can probably be utilized. Further from the house and I would have to build a new shooting house. And the fact that I'm getting older, the next shooting house may not be quite so tall. Several of my "older" friends have hunted on the ground this season.

The deer have quit moving or must have moved to another location according to the lack of sign crossing our roads and the lack of pictures on the camera. Mentioned camera problem last time, changed the batteries even though they read 79% and it then took pictures at all times of the day and night. No pictures of them ganged up under the feeder but about a dozen shots of deer or squirrels. The last deer picture was Monday morning, so it tells me the deer are doing something different at our place. Sat Tuesday morning for a couple of hours and had hawk put on quite a show for about a half hour. Afternoon hunts produced the same, no deer moving. Last week was the full moon, that made have had something to do with movement, but they still have to eat. After this week, I'll probably hunt the lease property for the last week of M/L season, lot shorter shooting distance at that stand. Several pictures this week of the plot and what it looks like in the water and what I would have preferred it to look like.
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