"Z" shaped plot renewed for 2015-16

[treefarmer]

Though I'd go ahead and start my food plot adventures for this season.

Thinking about the up coming season is always on my mind. There are always things I intend to do but never seem to have enough time, even though I've been retired 6 years. I want to dig a small waterhole on our lease. Been thinkin' about that for years. Have the perfect spot, just need to take the tractor over on the hill and get started, probably wouldn't take half a day to complete. Only hunted the lease 1 time last season due to my hip replacement surgery. Miss Joy doesn't like for me to kill any of the does on our place so that is where I can kill a doe or two for the freezer.

Last years "Last Minute Plot" work pretty well and I will try to keep it going through the summer with a summer planting and then plant some rye or oats in October. I failed to get some pictures before I started mowing a few weeks back, but visualize lots of dead dog fennel stems, sprouting fresh green from the roots, other weeds such as curly dock already seeded out, last season's rye stems still standing and to my surprise quite a bit of White Ladino Clover under all this junk!

If it ever dries up enough, we'll disk the "Z" shape where the rye was last fall and then add a summer crop. Will also try to help the clover by mowing the patches each time they seed out.

Mowing also included the dead junk in the planted pines that did not burn when we did the controlled burn several months ago. This mowing is in the planted pines and is strictly for added visibility. The deer seem comfortable in the pines with the short under growth.

Got a few pictures off the game camera by the feeder showing some of the work going on. It may be dry enough to pull the off-set harrow through the Z shaped plot in a few days, if so I'll fluff it up enough to plant something that will grow into the fall. I really need to do it soon as I'm on the verge of having my right shoulder rebuilt and that shuts down everything for a few months as I found out twice last year, first with the knee then the hip.
Treefarmer
Sorry about the pictures not showin' up, I resized them using the "Paint" option that I've been using since last year but I keep getting some message about checking the URL, make sure it's correct? Greek to me, somebody will come by and straighten me out before too long. Last Friday evening the "big dog" IT man from our power company was visiting us, had I known....

[sam03]

Hell ya my favorite thread is back and kicking! Cant wait to see the pics and watch the thread unfold! email me the pics i will post them for ya. fote03@gmail.com

[treefarmer]

Well here we go again. Not being able to post pictures puts a damper on a food plot tale. I'm hoping everything works this afternoon. Once again my hat's off to sam03, saying thanks for the tutorial he supplied me in my computer ignorance.

One thing or another has prevented any seed going into the ground, the seed bed has been cut with the offset harrow then I went over it last week with the regular disk. I noticed this morning that there are a lot of seeds of some type sprouting in the plot, so it'll have the disk over it again before we put out any seed. I have an almost full 50 pound bag of low germination zipper cream peas that would do the soil good and be easy to cut in and plant a winter patch out in October.

We had some real weather yesterday, had wind up in the 30 mph range for a short time but only 0.9" of rain. At the Panama City Airport they recorded 68 mph winds, news showed a lot of trees down and a few roofs messed up. Add that to earlier rains and we've still got a pretty gummy soil to deal with. Conditions need to be just right to plant this plot. If it's too dry it's hard a asphalt, if it's too wet it gums up a planter or grain drill. It might come to broadcasting the seed and then disking lightly. That works but it works better with a drill or planter.

There is an old doe that has claimed the feeder for her own. Both her fawns are bucks this time. We saw them as spotted fawns a little before the season started last year. They're the ones that learned to lick the spinner plate and get corn to trickle out rather than wait for it to spin with the clock. Once in a while other deer come to the feeder but quite often she and her boys are there and the picture shows other deer standing back. However at least there is another buck that walked by and looked at the feeder, and that's all he did, look from about 10 feet and he moved on. One thing about it, he knows where momma lives! Really don't see bucks of any size going to an automatic feeder on our place. When corn was cheap, when you could pour out a bag every 2 or 3 days in the same spot we would see some antlers from time to time. Of course you had the fattest coons and squirrels in the country.

Hope to get this mess under way in a few days and will try to continue the posts as we have done in the past.
Treefarmer

[Cr0ck1]

Looks good man! I gotta put up some pics soon!


Sent from Mossy Oak Swamp Bottom.

[treefarmer]

There is an ol' saying "The road to Hell is paved with good intentions". My intentions were to run a weekly report and add some interesting pictures concerning the "Z" shaped food plot and I failed to follow through . I've got several, what I call good excuses but the one that is probably most valid is I'm gettin' old and having trouble doing what I did just a year or so back. I have a good friend that comes by on Fridays and gives Miss Joy and I a helping hand with some of the heavier chores.
Back in August I was working on the dryer vent and was crawling around on my knees, the next day my right knee just failed me as we were cutting and loading some brush that had gotten out of hand. Had it "scoped" on Sept.2 and I'm getting around pretty well, still with a cane though.

The peas that we planted back in June were utilized by the deer even though we didn't have a real good stand, every plant appeared to have been nipped by deer. It made a few peas which they also enjoyed. On Sept.18, I was able to bush hog the food plot since one tractor was still hooked to the mower and the following day was able to disk in the mowed pea vines and crab grass as the disk was hooked to the other tractor. October 3rd, I disked it again and one final disking on the 8th. Friday the 9th my friend helped me un-hook the disk and hook up the old antique grain drill. We promptly planted the "Z" shaped plot with Wren's Abruzzi Rye. The soil had some moisture but it could use a good shower or two. I'll try and get a picture of the planted plot and then keep going as it develops.

There have been some real interesting pictures the last month or so that I'll try and post. Twin fawns from last year are staying close, one is a spike the other is a tall 4 point, there are a couple of pretty good 8 's that have shown up a few times and there is an old doe that appears to have triplets.
Treefarmer

[sam03]

The deer are looking good. I was starting to get worried Miss joy had taken away your computer.

[Bossman]

Farmer I know the feeling with the pics, cause I can't load any from the computer. I have to type my text on the computer then load pictures with the smartphone. Makes for a pain sometimes but I just try to adjust and go with it... Looks like you have a good deer crop this year and might have a full freezer

[treefarmer]

Is being old and ignorant an excuse for screwing up? I noticed some of the pictures I posted earlier and also one of the ones I posted Sunday evening are gone. I just discovered since I have to go through Photobucket, I must keep those particular pictures in my Photobucket library or they will be deleted from the FOHAF site. Sorry about gettin' rid of the earlier pictures. A knife forum that I participate in recently quit allowing pictures/images to be posted through such a site because so many pictures/images of historical value of rare, special, unusual pocket knives were disappearing after being posted through a Photobucket type account, that was closed or just the image deleted. Live and learn. It was so much easier when we could resize the image and send it directly from our personal computers. Seems like when the wind blows something on my computer changes and then I'm usually up the creek for a while. Enough venting for now!

Planted rye on October 9th and this morning, the 14th it looks like it all germinated! It is still in the red/straw colored phase but it sure surprised me this morning when I rode down to get the card from the camera. We were blessed with a small shower yesterday afternoon, only 1/10 of an inch, but it was mighty welcome!

One of the bigger bucks showed up right before daylight a day or so back. Also the doe with the triplets is still lookin' good. Several little bucks are there everyday, maybe they'll hang around till Thanksgiving afternoon when I hope to take my youngest grandson to the stand. If I go that morning, I'll go to the lease so I won't mess up the possibility of seeing them at the stand here at home.

Noticed too that there is quite a bit of clover showing up where we mowed a few weeks back. I got a picture of it but I think I'll limit my pictures so as not to run out of space on Photobucket. I did notice you can purchase more space for your "library" on Photobucket but I'm an old tightwad and will try to manage my attachments.

One picture shows one leg of the "Z" and the other shows a "close up" of the Rye before it starts turning green.
Treefarmer

[treefarmer]

This is day 12 since the plot was planted with 50 lbs. of Wren's Abruzzi Rye. We've had a tenth of an inch of rain on Oct.13 and would love to have a little more. However there is cotton picking, peanut harvesting and hay making going on and these ol' boys probably aren't on the same page as me. Dry is good for them and their livelihood at this time.

In spite of the dry weather, what a difference a week makes! Still about 5 weeks till opening day, we should have something for Bambi and his momma to browse on.

Again, I'll try to keep pictures coming and not loose them through Photobucket procedures and another BIG THANK YOU! to sam03 for his help a while back.
Treefarmer

[treefarmer]

Not a lot going on in the plot, just a little growth. We have received about 1 3/4" of rain in the last couple of days which was really needed. The Rye is growing, still about a month till Thanksgiving Day, they ought to be hitting it pretty soon.
My On Time feeder had a malfunction on day last week. One of the "wings" on the spinner plate decided to give up the ghost and fouled the motor. Freed it up and the motor seems ok, replaced the damaged feeder with a spare. Will make a trip to the hardware store that does the warranty work in a day or so.
The camera that is set on this feeder only had 8 pictures on it this week. The last was picture was taken on the 23rd just before midnight. Seems very odd as we usually have between 200 to 500 pictures each week. It may be coincidental or it may be related to the feeder having trouble. We'll check it in a day or so and see if things are back to normal.
Just one picture this week, showing the growth for the past week. The dog is interested in what's goin' on in the plot.
Got an interesting PM from CrOck1 Monday, he was in our part of the world but we were not able to make connections for a visit.
Treefarmer

[treefarmer]

Short update on "Z" plot: Rye is growing, deer have all but abandoned the corn feeder according to the game camera. Acorns are thick in the woods, soybeans are available but there are lots of tracks in the Rye grain plot. Computer died and I'm still trying to figure out Windows 10 and how to import pictures. About the time I half way figure something out concerning pictures on the computer the whole thing changed with this new system. We only had a raggedy lookin' spike and a bunch of coons on about 30 pictures this time, quite a let down after averaging several hundred per week for many months.
Treefarmer

[treefarmer]

The weather is coolin' down in the panhandle. It was 56 this mornin'. Been hearin' of a few archery deer being taken. Parts of the Z shaped plot are under water as we experienced around 9 inches of rain during the past week. The Rye usually can't take much standing water but there should be plenty for Bambi and company.
Pictures certainly make our forum posts more interesting and I have run into several snags in the last few months. Learning a different way to post pictures, then tryin' to learn, as I mentioned last week, Windows 10, no progress . Will return the new PC and have a new hard drive with Windows 7 put in the old computer, then hopefully back on track with pictures of what's goin' on. It's difficult to be so hamstrung when it comes to such things as computers and other important things like knee surgery, etc. Being a maintenance foreman for over 25 years you feel like you can fix about anything that comes up. I found that it ain't so anymore.
It's only 15 days till the start of our short 4 day rifle season on Thanksgiving Day. Maybe by then I'll be back up with some deer and food plot pictures.
Treefarmer

[jtcmedic]

Going to put in plot next year

[treefarmer]

The plot is doing well, the card from the camera showed there is still a decent buck back in the area. Having only set 3 afternoons during the short thanksgiving season, I saw no deer at all. I didn't feel like going with the M/L last week and of course this mornin' I should be in the shootin' house but this sciatica thing has me kinda' hamstrung. Maybe I'll feel like going in the afternoons for about an hour, kinda' like I used to do before retirement.
Still don't have my PC repaired and am running Miss Joy's laptop and don't know how to do pictures on this device.
Got a doctor's appointment on Jan. 5 to see about all this fun I've been having on my left side.
Treefarmer

[treefarmer]

Here's a quick update on the "Z" plot. Haven't felt like climbing the ladder to the shootin' house, but the sciatica issue is much better, maybe in a few days I'll go sit and see what's happenin'. I had a a great idea but Miss Joy wont cooperate. In the past , I've had her raise me up in the bucket on the tractor that has the loader. I have cut a lot of tree limbs like that but some how she thinks it would not be safe to raise me up as high as the loader will go and let me step off onto the shootin' house ladder, might even lift high enough to just open the door and step in. So much for that idea, she muttered something about "an ol' fool" when she walked away .
My camera is still on daylight saving time and the deer have been there just a little after 4 most afternoons. Haven't had any of the "good" ones in the daylight for a while but there are several shooters that are showing up. The rut usually brigs the big boys into the open when the does are present, or have traveled to the feeder or across the rye patch. They'll trail 'em like a hound dog.
These were there the other evening.

Treefarmer