Thanks Tomr!

Anywhere that shows water temp?

Have they increased the amount of tags being given out this year? I’m in zone 45 and it’s showing it will take about 5 years to get a tag. We have a lot of bears in the area and nobody hunts for them.

We have a very high deer population as well. We tried turnips and they would get eaten to the ground before the gun season. The last two seasons we have planted winter rye, oats, and peas around the 3rd weekend in August. We add another layer of winter rye seed around Labor day, and another layer two weeks later. The layered approach really seems to help keep the plots lush.
These fields still have drawing power into muzzleloader as long as the snow isn’t too high.
Next year we are going to try turnips again. Plant in mid July and if the grazing pressure is too high, we will come in around the 3rd week of August and add winter rye and add a second layer a couple weeks later. That should provide plenty of lush green growth for sept/oct while protecting the turnip bulbs for Nov/Dec.

Hey Kyle-
Who did the work for you and where were the materials bought? That seems like a great deal.

It is still 80 square fee smaller than a standard 8×40 container though and you are probably having to pay property taxes on it.

castle-rock-clown wrote:

I’m a new owner of one, can’t wait to get another. I bought a solar powered vent fan that is designed for the roof of the container. It gives both passive and forced ventilation.

How much did it cost delivered?

DT-
It’s $15 a month, or $12.5 if you pay in full for the year. I like having pictures throughout the year, so we paid in full for two of the cameras.

Check out the new “wishbone” winter rye plot I did this year. I love a good carpet of green towards the end of October!

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DT-Pick up a Spypoint Link S solar cell camera. It’s so nice getting pictures sent daily to an app showing how my plots are doing. We’ve had one out since Sept 2018 on the same set of batteries drawing almost all solar power. These new cameras are amazing.

Looking great!
What size tractor do you have? I need to upgrade from using my ATV for plots.

Grouse- The property is located on the north eastern edge of Otter Tail county. My neighbor to the east is in Wadena county.

Yes, hoping to plant brassica’s.

2-4D will kill the horsetail???

He looks a lot like this 3 1/2 year old I have running around on my property in Otter Tail county. This one will get the pass for another year.

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I have three of these blinds and love them!
http://rmioutdoors.com/index.cfm/vantage
Bought them 3 years ago for $650 each.

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Are you using the road for stand access? If so, I would not recommend planting anything at all. I’m actually going to spray all my access trails this year to limit the amount of human scent left behind and to make the walk-in more quiet.
You definitely don’t want to draw attraction to stand access trails.

Great information guys. Appreciate it!
After thinking about it, adding more nitrogen is probably more important than keeping the weeds down. What would you recommend for that?

Grouse-I don’t know about the deer around you, but the deer around me start hammering the brassica leaves starting in September. Attached is a picture from a few years ago that was on 9/10. Look at the 2nd picture a couple months later(5 days before gun opener). In 2014, all of my plots looks like this and the hunting was sub par because they wiped everything out before the gun season. They don’t start eating the bulbs until it gets really cold and have snow on the ground.
Since then, I’ve made the plots bigger and added a few more. I still can’t seem to keep up with the browsing pressure. I did try over seeding winter rye into the plots around labor day last year and that seemed to help a little. However, most of the seeds did not germinate and likely were washed away with heavy rains.

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Did you use the groundhog max!!!?? Let us know how it worked for you.
Food plot looks awesome!
I would get the chainsaw fired up this winter and feather edge/hinge cut the edge of the food plot.

Grouse-Do you need to apply pelletized lime every year or is it effective for a few years without another application?

Sticker-You can’t manage the heard as a landowner unless you own at least 600 acres of contiguous land. You can definitely make an impact by trying to hold and grow bucks on your farm with less acreage, but you can’t stop them from jumping the fence to the neighbors. Have you talked to all your neighbors and know what their goals are?
I believe studies have shown that APR’s would protect 50-70% of 1.5 year old bucks. I’ve talked to numerous people that has hunted SE MN since the inception of APR’s and the buck hunting now is unbelievable. You can also look at studies in MO in area’s that implemented APR’s and hunter satisfaction went from 30% satisfied to 70%-85%. Same can be said for areas in MI, PA, NY, and NJ.
Check out this article by Jim Brauker(from MI). If you’ve researched deer habitat, you probably know who this guy is.

APRs: Why Do So Many Michigan Hunters Like Them?

Take a look at the harvest chart for yearling and 3.5 year old bucks. The statistics are pretty impressive.

APR’s would also help balance the buck to doe ratio. I would be willing to bet in our area that the ratio is 4/1. APR’s would decrease doe numbers, which clearly needs to be done in our area and likely in yours.

I don’t recommend that APR’s be implemented in all parts of the state, but it would sure work in areas with higher deer densities. It would only take one year for the hunting to go from good to fantastic.

Not going to beat around the bush. I’m a trophy hunter and landowner in Zone 241(3rd highest permit area for deer shot per square mile(8.6 per square mile) and 4th highest hunter density(14.9 hunters per square mile)).

Here is my ideal season:
1 buck per year. Bonus doe tag if the permit area supports it.

Youth Gun: Mid-September opener to Oct 1., MEA weekend, etc.

Archery: September 1st opener!!!! to Dec. 31

Muzzeloader: First Saturday in December to the 2nd Sunday in December.

Gun: (using 2016 dates)

All zones pushed back 1-2 weeks. For the people that say a lot of people from WI(or other states) hunt MN, I find that theory to not be true. Only 3.63% of firearms tags sold last year were from non-residents(most probably hunted SE MN-I’d like to find the data to support this). The state is simply not a trophy destination(except SE MN since the APR’s).

APR’s in zone 3 and the next 10 highest deer densities in Zone 2. (Public land is exempt).
I don’t understand land owners in high deer density areas that don’t support APR’s. If you own 600+ acres, than you can truly manage your ground the way you want. If you don’t then you are at the liberty of your neighbors not shooting small bucks. A bucks home range is roughly 1 square mile(more during the rut).
APR’s would increase the age structure and more mature bucks would be around. It would also increase your property values and put the state back on the map as a destination state. I usually hunt one or two other states per year for the trophy potential. MN is Sooooooo far behind compared to IA, MO, NE, SD, etc.
Hopefully at some point in my lifetime things change. In the mean time, I’ll be forced to buy more out of state tags.

I’ve got one in my garage if anyone is interested in purchasing. Used one time until it broke my yamaha trailer hitch. Apparently it does not work with yamaha atv receivers!

It’s a crying shame he was let off.
I’m sure he will poach again and hopefully next time he will be charged with a felony.

Those trees actually cut like butter, so now I’m puzzled.

If they are ash trees, I might as well start cutting as many as possible. I’ve heard the emerald ash borer does not kill the younger trees.

sktrwx2200 wrote:

master of the saw

I plan to cut more on Friday! I have another two acres left to get done before everything starts turning green and the area becomes alive with insects!

Ordered from here:
http://www.dnr.state.mn.us/forestry/nursery/pricelist.html

They sold out pretty quick after I ordered in January.

Sticker-Have you thought about accessing your stands via the perimeter of your property? Some of the access trails seem very intrusive and your wind will blow in multiple directions as you get to them.
I’ve been reading that human scent will travel 150 yards.If that is the case, you are definitely mucking up a lot of your property.
Do a lot of deer enter the large middle field in the evening? Accessing a stand during an early afternoon may be ok, but I’m assuming you bump a lot of deer walking through it in the evening on the way back to the cabin.
Just my two cents.

I actually moved access to one of my stands this winter(cut a new path). The new path requires a 100ft pallet bridge as well but will be a lot less intrusive to the area and on my west property border.

Hey Sticker-Looks good. Can you show where your current stands, access trails,
bedding areas, etc are?
It would definitely help to critique your plan.

I’ll see if I can post mine in the next couple days to get everyone’s thoughts.

Couple young bucks that survived 2015 gun season. Hopefully I can keep them around next fall.

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Fired up the stihl this past weekend. We cut the majority of the large trees around one of my food plots with the goal of steering deer to certain entrance/exit points on the plot. I think we accomplished the goal. They can only enter in 3 different spots now and are all within bow range.
The food plot should do better now with more sunlight and the edge should grow up a little thicker for a better plot screen. We only successfully hinged about 20% of the poplar trees(as expected though). The amount of food we dropped from the tree tops was amazing. It will be fun to watch trail cam pictures and see how fast they hammer them.
I was also able to move my bow stand further east and move the deer trail to the west. The trail to my bow stand is now a dead end.
I still have 3-4 more areas I’d like to get at this winter to start creating some better bedding areas and screening from the neighbors. Half our time this past weekend was clearing the trees that fell into the plot due to the direction they were leaning. As always, we never enough time to get everything done, but felt good to get out in the woods and not worry about spooking deer.

Here are a few before/after pictures. The box blind in the picture will be moved this spring. It’s not in an ideal spot for a clean entrance/exit and not good for N or NW wind(thought it was at the time we put it up). I’m always bumping deer walking in or out. It will be moved to the NE of the plot(off plot by 100 yards) and my entrance will be from the north with perpendicular access of deer movement. I’ll follow a swamp edge and the last 40 yards to the stand is a 15 foot rise in elevation allowing for a stealth approach to any deer that might already be in the plot. It’s a trap door entrance, so I’ll likely wrap the exterior 4×4’s with camo burlap or landscaping fabric to block my movement while entering the stand. This will be done with 3 other stands as well.

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Thanks for the replies guys.
I will definitely be picking up the proper safety gear.

Grouse-I’ve being reading that .25 acre to 1 acre hinge cut areas are ideal, and like sticker said, you want to space them apart from each other.

Sticker-I’m definitely going to go the biologic route! Seems pretty easy.
Thanks for the details!!

This comment is spot on about MN:

Much of the northern part of the state is public land with a good whitetail population, but suffers from what some people call the “Deer Camp” mentality which means not many bucks ever get a chance to grow a second rack before being turned into venison.

Read more: http://www.northamericanwhitetail.com/trophy-bucks/20-best-diy-whitetail-states-for-2015/#ixzz3pslEkszd

Hopefully at some point in my life time guys/gals in MN will start passing small deer.