Brassica Food Plot

Hey Guys-
I’m looking to put a new food plot in this year. The previous land owner had one in this spot about 4-5 years ago and since that time, it’s been let go. It’s in a very very hard place to get at with an ATV(i got stuck twice last week). I was able to get it sprayed with the ATV.A tractor would be impossible to get back there. I basically cross a swamp for 1/4mile and reach a high ground ridge.
I don’t have any atv attachments(disc, harrow, etc). Would it be possible to plant this location without a disc? My plan is to spray it a few times and weed whip/rake all the dead grass(possibly burn off the plot). Hopefully I can get as much dirt exposed as possible. It’s only about 1/2 acre in size.
Would brassica’s do ok if the seeds were only broadcasted over the soil? Do they need to be raked in?
Let me know your thoughts.

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Brassica like clover is a very small seed so you don’t necessarily need to disc, but you do need good soil contact. If you can get the majority of the ground cover off the plot, then just broadcast and pack somehow. Even use the tires on the atv. Just run over the seed with the tires and try and cover as much as you can. With good sunlight and some rain you should be fine. After a few weeks of it growing if you can spread a high nitrogen fertilizer on the plot right before a good rain that will help big time. Good luck!

Cut a small log and drag behind the ATV as a drag to cover/contact the seed. Works great

You might look into a drag harrow as a way of breaking up the dead plant matter and scratching into the soil. You could carry it on the back of the ATV to get in there.

Otherwise, I like Randy’s idea of turning a log section into a roller. You’re in a tough situation there as far as getting exposed soil. So many seed types really rely on good seed to soil contact and where you can’t till, this is a problem.

Grouse

I’ve had decent results by spraying the grass, wait until the the green starts turning brown and then seed it down.

The dead grass acts to hold moisture and lays on the seed which makes it have contact with the soil. Almost a nurse crop in a way.

This works with the small seed stuff…kale, rape, PPT, clover, etc…

If you can get a drag harrow in there and log roll it after, like was already said, works too…depends on IF you get that stuff back in there.

Thanks for the replies guys.

Grouse-Which drag harrow do you have?
I’m looking at getting this one this week…
http://www.fleetfarm.com/detail/-multi-use-tine-harrow/0000000062231#
It’s made by Loyal Roth and I’ve heard good things about them. It should help drag out the dead weeds and scuff up the soil a little bit.

I don’t have a drag harrow, that was just my best idea based on your situation. I figure anything that scratches up the soil, but can still be carried on the back of an ATV would be beneficial in your situation.

But yes, that one you linked to is what I’d be looking at. Tractor Supply Co. has their own, you may want to compare prices.

Your plan is good. Spray it (essential!), mow it, rake the grass off, then drag it as much as possible to scratch it up. Bonus points if you can time the planting right before a good rain. Nice if you can do it, I know it’s not always possible, but if there’s rain in the forecast on a Sunday, get-r-done on the Saturday if at all possible.

Grouse

ranger777 wrote:

Thanks for the replies guys.

Grouse-Which drag harrow do you have?
I’m looking at getting this one this week…
http://www.fleetfarm.com/detail/-multi-use-tine-harrow/0000000062231#
It’s made by Loyal Roth and I’ve heard good things about them. It should help drag out the dead weeds and scuff up the soil a little bit.

I have one of those drag harrows and they do work very well. Mine is only 4′ long and 4′ wide, but it does a great job. You should be able to scratch the ground up pretty well with that. May need to stop every once in a while and clean it off as it will collect some weeds, but that’s an easy thing to do. This can be used on both sides, one is for smoothing out ground, flip it over with the teeth down and it will dig/scratch well.

I ended up picking up a harrow on Thursday and used it on two plots on Friday.
It worked pretty well to rip out the dead grass and lightly scratch the soil surface. Luckily I had a buddy with to help pull off all the dead grass. Going in circles helped bail the hay!
Attached are a couple pictures.
I sprayed it once more before we left and will be going back in a couple weeks to use the harrow again. I think after this spray that the harrow will be a lot more effective at ripping up the soil.
I’ll post some more pictures in a couple weeks once everything is planted.

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That looks perfect. Just pack the plot with your atv tires after seeding and you should be good to go.

Got all three of my plots planted on Wednesday. Just in time for the rain that went thru last night!! Talk about perfect timing.
Attached a couple pictures….

BTW-Where do the bucks go in the summer time? I had 2k pictures from 3 cameras during a 2 week span and only captured 3 bucks(shooter 8pt, 4pt, spike). Do they hang out in large fields during the summer?

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Those look great!!!

The bucks are probably very close to food if not in it. They bed near by and get up and eat then back to bed. Very limited movement during the summer. They also leave the higher quality foods for the does and fawn. My guess is they found a spot where there is a big bean field. Get up in the morning and eat, go 50 yards away and bed down, get up in the evening and eat.

I noticed the same thing. In the middle of the summer, the bucks and, in fact, the other deer as well, seem to show up less often on the trail cams.

I think Sticker is right, with so much food available, why would they move around and risk running into predators, etc. They need food, water, and nice cover to lay down in. During an average summer in a lot of areas, neither of these is particularly hard to find.

I find a lot of deer beds that are obviously actively used in the summer on high ridges with mature, thinner trees. My theory is the deer like to lay there in the shade, but still have a nice breeze to keep the bugs away as much as possible and they may also like the visibility of the thinner cover so they can see trouble approaching.

Grouse

Looks great. I love hunting over brassica plots.

Couple updated food plot pictures……

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This plot did not turn out to well. The edges look good, but the middle not so much. Not sure if it was too wet? Anyone have any ideas?

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This one came out pretty good again this year. This plot was basically destroyed by gun opener and I need to make it larger next year.

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Your plots look awesome! Your timing for planting was absolutely terrific, you were putting in those plots exactly when I would have liked to be putting in mine.

The plot that wasn’t quite as good, that could be any number of things. If the ground is damp and low there, it certainly could be too much water. I know on my property we had a 12 inches of rain in the last 3 weeks, so it’s totally possible you got a little too much of a good thing.

Also, did you fertilize at all? Whenever I see yellow leaves, it gets me wondering about if the nutrients are there? You could run a soil test, or you could just spread some 10-10-10 and see what happens. You have enough growing season left that you’ll see improvement if nutrients were the issue.

What was in the blend you planted? If turnips or radish were in there, how are the bulbs looking?

Grouse

Thanks for the input Grouse. It was pretty damp when I checked it two weeks ago. I have not fertilized or even checked the soil in this plot(definitely need to next year!!). It always seems I never have enough time to get everything done.

The blend worked very well in my first plot last year(the deer absolutely destroyed it), so I rolled with it again this year and planted it in my two new plots as well.
Its 46.7% Giant rapeseed, 21.7% turnips, 21.7% dwaft essex rapeseed, 10% radish. It was a custom blend a buddy mixed up for me. I believe he buys it from RJ Hunt Seed company.
The bulbs in two of the plots are looking good(about a quarter/golf ball size), but the bulbs in the bad plot were only about the size of a dime(if that).

ranger777 wrote:

It always seems I never have enough time to get everything done.

Amen to that, brother.

I didn’t get my brassicas in until a month after you did, so obviously mine isn’t nearly as full. I’m hoping with some fertilizer and some luck as far as when the first frost comes, mine might still amount to something. I knew I was way behind, but with all the wet weather, I couldn’t pick rock fast enough to prep the plot.

Your experience with the size of brassicas plots was exactly the same as mine. Last year I had a tiny plot about 1/4 acre and the deer mowed it like a golf green. But the good news was that that provided me with good ideas as far as the size of plots I’d have to have to keep ahead of grazing pressure and also the importance of planting a variety of crops so that the grazing pressure is spread out so the deer have something to move on to when their favorite is mowed down.

Grouse

Eh, you should be ok if you put fertilizer down. Let’s hope the first frost is not until October!
What did you plant this year? I’d love to plant beans or corn, but my plots right now are not big enough. Also, the neighbors all around me already have corn/beans, so I wanted to give them a variety/late season food.

Whoever believes deer won’t touch brassicas until the first frost is lying! The deer on my land start eating it as soon as its sprouts.
See the attached couple pictures…by the end October last year the plot was toast.

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Yes, I too had read that idea that deer won’t touch brassicas until late in the year. I suppose as with anything, that all hinges on what else is available in the area. If the brassicas is suddenly the best tasting thing available, they’ll eat it no matter what.

Your plots look terrific. You’re right, hopefully we still have a 3 weeks or more of growth left to take them even further.

Sticker gets a lot of traction with beans and I’m going to try them someday. I don’t think I’ll ever have enough time, equipment, and acreage to plant corn and from what I’ve seen the input costs are really high for the volume of food it produces. Not sure about you, but even if I planted an entire plot (4 acres in my case) in corn, the deer would have that stripped in 2-3 weeks and corn does not regrow ears, so it basically becomes a dead plot at that point.

My brassicas blend was rapeseed, radish, and turnips. I would have liked to include forage peas, but I couldn’t find enough seed late in the season, so I skipped them for this year.

I have two plots that I had cleared last winter out of 100% woods. I have the south plot which is roughly 4 acres about 1/4 cleared of rock and worked up. In the ground so far in the south plot, I have about 1 acre of clover with oats as a nurse crop. I also have a strip of brassicas planted next to the clover, in the same plot.

The clover has done very, very well. I’m sure the deer will be all over that once the ag crops disappear. I have a lot of silage corn and alfalfa near my property, so right now I see the deer wearing out the path between the beds and the silage corn. That’ll all be going away within the next 2 weeks.

Mission #1 for the rest of this year and early next year is to try to clear the remaining half of the south plot and get it into production for next year. Not an easy task with the amount of rain we’ve been having, but hopefully I’ll make progress.

So that means that I will still have the north 4.5 acre plot lying totally fallow and awaiting rock picking and workup at some future date. I’ll keep spraying it to keep the weeds down and keep it open, but like all things it’s simply a matter of getting to it when I can and keep chipping away. I’ll probably get into that plot in late 2016 a little and then go as fast as I can until it’s all clear.

Grouse

I agree with Grouse, the yellow of the leaves is most likely lack of fertilizer mostly Nitrogen. Brassica loves N just like corn. I usually plant my brassica in mid July then around September 1st I hit it just before a rain with urea. It’s amazing how quickly the brassica will respond to the N. 34-0-0 or 46-0-0 will do wonders to your brassica. I actually forgot to pick any up for last weekend so I will be putting it down this coming weekend.

My plots are doing about the same as yours Ranger, golf ball sized bulbs right now. Here is one of mine as of last weekend. You can see I also need to get some N on it to boost it for the fall.

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