Food Plots 2023 – The midsummer update.

Dry. Dry, dry, dry. That about sums it up.

After waiting for nearly 3 feet of snow to melt at the Midwest Monster farm near Hinckley, I thought we’d be in for a fantastic season. What could go wrong?

I loaded up the sprayer back in May to kill off a large Mega Clover Plus plot that had become too full of weeds to save (after full growing seasons, so good clover maintenance pays off). Well, that spraying marked about the end of the moisture we would receive for a month. Since I killed that plot off, we had less than an inch of rainfall. NOT enough to plant clover so that plot lay fallow.

Soybeans were a disaster this year as well. Emergence was slow and inconsistent and both Real World and Eagle varieties suffered in the drought and heat. The deer took no mercy on them and the poor survivors were mowed down quickly. Basically, a total loss and this will be the first year in the last decade that I won’t have any soybeans as I’ve now terminated the plots and I’ll move on to another summer planted crop. Sometimes you just have to remind yourself that you can’t win against the weather. Move on to Plan B.

Last week when there was rain in the forecast for Friday-Sunday, I almost killed myself getting that fallow plot planted in Mega Clover Plus blend with oats as a nurse crop. And it paid off. We got 1.3 inches of rain last weekend, it started about 3 hours after I got down working and 2 days after planting I could see little tiny clover plants everywhere in that plot.

Last Monday I got to work on teh brassicas planting. Too early? I don’t think so! With this little moisture, this is not a year to stand by and let the damp ground dry out. I planted 3 acres of Brassicas Bender and we got an additional .4 inches of rain on Monday night, so hopefully the plot is all germinated by the time I get to the farm this coming Monday.

I will keep the failed soybean plots fallow with spray until August 1 when I will plant Real World’s Deadly Dozen. This is a fantastic summer planted blend and it will be a good replacement for the soybeans.

How are all the food plotters doing this year?

Grouse

Cactus would grow better in our plots. Less than a tenth of an inch of rain in over 8 weeks

I’m going to hit my plots with gly this week (rye is about waist high from last fall) and get ready for my late summer plantings…it’s raining pretty hard right now and been fairly consistent moisture the last couple weeks in my area…the farm fields on the property we hunt look really sad from the terrible dry spring…

I’m putting a 2″ pipe with 1×1/4 cuts on the back of my 4 wheel flat bed that has 3 275 gallon totes on it. I have 3 plots 1 acre each with sorghum planted. I planted 3 weeks ago with very spotty germination. I hope my spray bar works so I can get some water down. I hope I’m not to late.

Update.

The clover I planted just about 2 weeks ago is doing really well. Of course the tall plants in the picture are the ollats that is planted as a nurse crop.

Clover should always be planted with a nurse crop in the northern tier. If spring or early summer plant in clover then use oats, if late summer plant in clover use rye. Use about 50 lb per half acre.

Getting seed planted right before a rain is everything this year. You’ve got to have your seed ready have your plots prepped and then watch the forecast like a hawk.

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One more picture to make a specific point. The picture attached is Midwest Monsters Brassicas Bender mix.

I want to show this to show food plotters what brassicas should look like when it is correctly planted and spaced. Time and time again I get pictures from customers of brassicas plots that are massively over planted. This will absolutely wreck a brassica’s plot. Brassicas hate to be too crowded and the plot will not be productive because the brassicas will simply be stunted.

If you look at the photo you can see there is 6 to 8 in between most plants. Obviously it’s not perfect but the point is that there is bare dirt between the plants.

Brassicas need that space. If they are planted cheek by jowl they will simply cannibalize nutrient and moisture from each other and they will not achieve any size.

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Very good lesson in this for anyone looking to get into plots. Moisture is the deal breaker even if everything else is done to perfection in plots. Have forgone a lot of the common wisdom to take advantage of moisture and moisture trumps almost everything else in a rational manner. Have had more success timing rain and utilizing moisture to it’s full extent possible. Nothings more satisfying than getting seed in the ground within hours of rain. The opposite can be said dealing with hoping and praying for rain after putting seed on dusty dirt that has no prayer of moisture for weeks. No amount of anything can produce good food plots on parched earth with no sign of rain.

Had a Kansas wheat farmer tell me plant in the dust and the bin will bust ? Not sure about that .

I am hoping to plant a plot on my grandmothers farm this year. There is a big creek bottom full of what I call marsh grass that I will spray with Gly a time or two then broadcast some kind of brassica/rape/raddish blend right before a rain. With there still being a creek running through I am hoping there should be good moisture held. The hard part I feel will be killing the grass allowing the seed to get good soil contact. It should be interesting. A couple years ago EHD wiped out all the mature bucks I had. I found 4 dead bucks. The biggest going well over 180″. So the area can kick out some big deer. Hoping a decent 1/2-3/4 acre plot can attract something worth getting the heart racing.

Jeff – Something to think about.

A lot of times, I don’t spray the grass with intentions of digging it up and then planting seed.
I’ll spray it and then plant the seed. The seed is not affected by the spray.
The grass dies, folds over the seed keeping it moist and will sprout right through the dead grass. That may depend on how much and type of grass.
Works great with less work.
The seed doesn’t need to make soil contact if done like this. Sometimes I even just run a cultipacker over the sprayed grass(after it partially dies) to cover the seed.

The issue I have is this grass is very very thick and dense. My concern is getting a good kill. So my thoughts are to spray it, wait a couple weeks, then depending on the kill either spray again and wait to seed. Or hopefully spray and seed the same day the second time. Also this area doesn’t have access to any equipment. So it will be a sweat equity plot. But of course I am game for any advice I can get!

I wondered if it was the really thick stuff being next to a creek.

I would not use Roundup though. Get the stuff called Total Vegetation Control which has Gly in it too. Or an equivalent product.
Kill it off good.

If you can watch it every couple days until you see it’s all turning color, then throw the seed down. Will be a bit of a wait and see what happens type plan.

If you can burn it after it’s brown and dead, then put the seed down, even better. If you can get something to pack it down after seeding would be optimal. The seed you’re planting is so small, it doesn’t take much to get just a little cover on it.

Sounds interesting. Maybe somebody else will chime in too but let me know how it goes for you. Good luck!

Hey all you food plot experts. What would you plant this late in the season at this point. My buddy has a 3 acre field that he left for me to put a food plot in. Just now getting the time to get something in there. With how bad the drought has been at his place this field may end up being the best food source in the are this year. Its all disk up and ready to plant. Just not sure what to put in it. I have zero experience with food plots. In the past we have just planted it with corn or soybeans when he planted the rest of his fields. It just seems like most years they eat it all down well before the regular season and well well before the Muzzy season. Ideally I’d like something the deer would still be after in the Muzzleloader season. Thanks for any ideas.

Thumper – pretty sure you’re in the St. Cloud area.
Like Grouse same zone, I think.

Plant brassica now. Big leafy lettuce type stuff. PTT, rape and turnips. Maybe a mix of Grouses stuff.
Or wait a couple weeks. Then winter wheat, winter rye and some Rape thrown in.

Hope you get rain then. I’m in SE MN and we are dry as a popcorn fart.

Good luck!

haleysgold wrote:

Thumper – pretty sure you’re in the St. Cloud area.
Like Grouse same zone, I think.

Plant brassica now. Big leafy lettuce type stuff. PTT, rape and turnips. Maybe a mix of Grouses stuff.
Or wait a couple weeks. Then winter wheat, winter rye and some Rape thrown in.

Hope you get rain then. I’m in SE MN and we are dry as a popcorn fart.

Good luck!

I’m rather happy that I did not get anything planted this spring. The area this is at is about a Hr. North of Saint cloud. They have had Very little rain. My buddies farm crops are in really rough shape. If they don’t get a good rain soon it will be a crop insurance year for sure for him. I believe anything I would have planted on this food plat this spring would have been a total waste of time.

Well, you did say you wanted to plant it now, not back in the Spring.

Brassicas should be planted now in your area.
I’ll wait about 2 weeks here in SE MN.

It looks like a change in the weather pattern for the near future with fairly good chances of rain. We’ll see I guess.

It’s dam dry here too. AG crops don’t look good.
My corn plots look ok.
The mix I planted (Sorghum, peas, sunflowers and buckwheat), back the 3rd week of May look decent considering my lawn is crispy and brown.

Just started working on my first ever food plot today. Aitkin county. Mowed down about an acre on the back side of my hay feild. Going to try to spray it tomorrow. Then plow and disc next weekend. Was looking at this blend from tractor supply to seed it in a couple weeks. Seemed reasonably priced and suited to plant in the next few weeks. Any other thoughts on what I should be doing other than practicing my rain dancing?

Thanks.

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So what do you guys like for sprayers?

You’re fairly far North so you need to get that stuff in the ground asap.
The growing season up there is getting short. Waiting 2 more weeks will work but if you can get it in sooner would be better.

For an acre, a small ATV sprayer would probably work best and cheapest route.

I use a 25 gallon yard sprayer. I had it before I bought the land but it works for me.

Got our small food plot planted with deadly dozen this afternoon. Now I just need it to rain soon. I see they have some rain in the forecast for Wed. Morning. Sure hope we get it. I will be back up in the area in a few weeks. Sure would be nice to check on it and find it growing well.

Went back to check on the plots I sprayed a little over a week to see how it looked…most grass type stuff=dead….all thistles=laughing at me, looking healthy…round 2 coming next weekend…

Mix some 2-4D in your roundup. It will take care of the thistle and ragweed the roundup dont.

Jeremy- I will try that…only used Gly up to this point in my short food plot history…thanks for the advice…got my sons buck back over the weekend that he shot in the plot in 2021…good motivator…

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Every year I would spray and ragweed thistle and milkweed would wilt then pop back up and keep growing. Dont have that issue no more.

Thought I had a 2 bottom plow lined up for breaking ground on my plot. Wifes aunt had on that has been sitting in the weeds just off her property for 20+ years. Who knew that once it was pulled out into the yard it was all of a sudden a valuable antique. Got to thank the brother in law for that one.

Plot is still getting torn up one way or another next weekend.