Great video as always. Wish I owned more land then I do up in the U .P to plant food plots

I just planted rye like an idiot but my food plot looks like a golf course from a distance. I’m in central Virginia. Next year I will add oats, red and white clover, and a splash of radish in my mix. Hunted last night overlooking a rye field from a distance and did not see a deer. I’m going to put some cameras up this weekend to see what is happening. Thanks for sharing your experience.

Thanks for the video! Through the experience of failure and avoiding failure, here is what I have learned. I would classify my soils as sandy and my context as big woods (Northern Half Cass County). I have failed at many spring plantings of various sorts due to drought, over browsing, and weed control. Here is my current best practice. I like to do a one and done planting in the late summer. I do a mixture of winter rye, tillage radish, and red clover. All of them are hardy and take my poor soils well ( Rye comes from various local co-ops and others from Northwoods whitetails). I have yet to hit the too early time frame (as in crop gets too mature). I started many years ago planting labor day (way too late) and my next move will be to try late July or early August. With the mixture, here is what I see on my game cameras. Early, I can watch deer searching out the tillage radish ignoring the rest. After the radish is gone I get a big push on the rye, that push can wane some with a healthy acorn crop. When the woods browns off, the deer pour into the green rye until eaten down or covered in too much snow. The following spring the deer are desperate in the rye food plots with bodies almost touching each other from end to end (one deer zone so not a high deer density but rye must be the biggest draw in town in the spring before green up). Once green up hits, I can see the deer quickly passing on the maturing rye yet I can see them seeking out the red clover the rest of spring and summer. When I see a favorable planting forecast in the window I am looking for (historically early to mid august) I head up with my Dad and we do the following. First I spread the cereal rye. Then I glyphosate the food plots which now have a 3-6' stand of brown rye with a fairly clean seed bed below (some free rye seed as well!). There are some weeds, but not too bad. After the glyphosate dries, we disc lightly, and then I spread the smaller seeds. After that we do a pass or three with the drag. The bio trash is left on the plots and acts as a mulch. I have tried not spraying and not doing soil disturbance but that has led to disappointment for me. Except for spot repairs or fertilizer application, I try to stay out of my plots the rest of the year. I used to try layering but was never happy with germination. I now apply at higher rates with a one and done go. My rates are: 100-150 pounds per acre rye (plus whatever volunteers I get from the standing rye plants), 8 pounds per acre red clover, 5 pounds per acre radish. In the future to rotate out of the above I might try a chicory white clover blend (Or just do a radish application and just hit the early season hard!). My other to do is to do more soft mast for the rains did not hit my area until October and though the forest greenery was limited due to drought (except for bumper acorn crop!) my apple trees also had a banner year and are essentially free once they get going. Good Luck and thanks for sharing.

Very nice! I am going to try more winter rye this year! Great job!

We planted 4.5 acres of winter rye in northern MN in four plots in August and had fantastic results. Some brassica, corn and oats too. Harvested multiple deer including a large buck. Passed on many more. Rye is still green and growing December 29th in this crazy 40 degree weather.

Thanks for the information. I'm in northern NY where the first frost is normally in late sept. I planted a brassica blend in late july and next to it 1/2 acre of rye in mid august. The brassicas are all down to the bulbs now and deer nibble on them but haven't dug many up. The rye looks like your plot and is mowed down but is still attracting deer

All looks perfect, very smart concept. I have winter rye on my sandy soil in central Wisconsin. It does the job, We have warmer weather here too. I do not believe in the In global warming hoax. In the 1970s we were supposed to freeze?

Rye did awesome for me this past winter in nw Michigan. Planted around labor day. Almost lost it to the drought though.

Same here in northern PA. I planned a mix, all is now gone except the rye, the clover will return in the spring on its own. The rye is a marathon not a sprint and consistently runs the winter race very well!

Good job

This year I planted a clover mix that had some brassica in early August. I then drilled In a rye oats mix before Labor Day. This was one of my best attracting food plots. I plan to then mow down the grains and the clovers should do very well. I’m not sure when I should mow the grains.

I'm up in Northern Minnesota also. The deer on my property won't come out till after dark even now. The wolf pressure here i think has taught them not to show themselves till dark. I'm not the only one experiencing this. My radishes are still green also. 👍👍

Of all the stuff I've tried, cereal rye seems to be the best at providing all season attraction that can can stand up to the browse and provide food well into winter and be the first plants to provide food in the early spring when deer need green. Other food plantings seem to have a window when deer prefer them and then they get browsed out, die out, or get too woody. Do you feel the deer have a preference to oats over rye? I imagine the oats died out after a few frosts while rye kept green?

Can the browse blockers be used on pear trees that are 24 to 36 inches in growth? I habe some coming in the spring.

What type of oats are you planting?