East Kansas

Hey all! Excited to talk hunting with everyone! I hunt mostly in SE Kansas, in between Ft Scott and Pittsburg, and I married into a nice farm south of Ottawa KS that I hunted for the first time this year. There are 3 buck over 150 on this new farm, which means it got a lot of my attention this year. The farm in SEK got hit pretty hard with EHD and the drought.

I'm planning on getting a .5 acre food plot on the new farm this fall, and I'm looking for suggestions. I'm leaning toward 7 card stud. There will be 35 acres of corn on the west side, and about 50 acres of beans on the east, with a draw and pasture running through the middle. So I'm looking for something that will produce good food after the harvest and into the Winter and Spring!

I look forward to chatting with yall!

Drew

 

Welcome to the site!

 

Welcome to the site, that's a great area for big bucks....limestone country and scattered crop fields. A half acre won't do much, there are enough deer there that it'll be destroyed by the time season opens. Of course I don't know that doubling it will help that much either, lol. Do you have any crop fields on the farm or some of the crop you mention are on the farm? I'd do something to try to get some more food in there. If ag is no-go then talk to some of these other guys about hinge cutting and promoting natural browse all you possibly can because your deer are going to be hurting like now after a long hard winter. Bringing a supplemental feeding program into the farm gradually wouldn't be a bad idea either.

 

The surrounding farms where I hunt are almost exclusively farm land, primarily soy beans and corn, and a little milo. My farm is a quarter section, with decent timber and cover (something that is missing on all sides but the south), as well as beans and corn. I asked my father in law about leaving some crop standing, but no dice. He makes his money there, and could care less about a deer haha. My goals isn't as much to attract more deer to the farm, although that's never a bad thing, but more to provide some nutrition into the winter. The deer in this area basically live in a food plot after the planting season, and are healthy. There are multiple booners shot all over the county every year.

This farm is pretty tricky to hunt, and only hunting and scouting for one year, I'm still trying to figure it out. I believe that a lot of the bucks head to the land to south during the rut because is the the biggest block of timber in a 5 miles area, and I can only assume hold a TON of deer, but the south end of my farm does get some decent rutting action, there just aren't many stand locations in that area, especially with a north wind. However, the mature bucks call my farm home in early season and late season as the bucks move back onto my farm, I'd love to have an attractive late season food source in case I still have a tag... but really I'd just like the make them as comfortable as possible on my farm, and help the younger deer continue to develop. There is clear proof that the genetics are very good.

I'm kinda leaning towards a fall winter spring mixture just as add some variety to the beans and corn that are very plentiful, and good nutritious food for winter and early spring. Plus the deer really hammer my father in law's crops, so any pressure at all taken off the crop is good news for him. He had his lowest corn yield in years this past fall partly due to the deer. I'm sure that a half acre plot will more than likely get nuked by winter, but I'm ok with that. If a little makes it into the Spring, then thats a bonus.

 

Yeah I live in pretty much the same area and have basically the same environment except I have maybe a bit more cover and less rock I'm around Prescott. When I say you're short on food I'm talking about after crop harvest. Your father in laws combine is probably like mine and is the most efficient grain eating SOB in the last 100 years, lol. There just isn't much left after harvest and deer are living 99% on natural browse and 1% on crop residue. Chances are someone locally may even have a good food plot is why your deer travel off property.

Pity he won't leave any standing crop but a farmer I understand exactly where he's coming from. I'm not familiar with his practices but there are easy ways to take advantage of his fields and not interfere with his crop production though it may take some convincing. First off he needs to understand that you don't necessarily need or want MORE deer you want QUALITY deer. You may benefit from fewer deer with better year around habitat. He's probably cursing deer and anyone that wants to promote their numbers.
If he's in Bean/corn rotation, tillage for corn and no-till beans....the fall after corn and before beans, after corn harvest you can go in and plant winter cover crops in the next years bean fields and the only impact it will have is he'll have better beans the following year and they aren't too expensive to plant..can be broadcast over the corn stubble. Wheat/rye/crimson clover/brassica broadcast at higher than normal rates will come up and grow and make a great winter plot/cover crop and he won't have the winter annuals the following spring that he'd normally have. The species mentioned will actually capture most of the nutrients he loses anyway over winter, all the nitrates corn generally gets aren't used and when the organic matter is low (generally the case around here) they leach right out. Cover crops will capture and hold those and cycle them back into the soil in a more usable form the following year. Working wheat back into his rotation may also be a consideration.

Try to make a deal with him to bring the overall population down in exchange for some winter spring food maybe. Deffinitely put in all the food plots you can and that'll help take pressure off his crops. Durano clover is another good option, it is tough, takes a lot of browse, does will in dry weather and can be planted where conditions aren't perfect and it's semi-permanent.

Some things to think about.

 

Welcome to the site Drew, from what i've seen you have some monsters in Kansas, good luck to ya.

 

This is great info, that I wish I would have had this fall! I'm sure he wouldn't mind if I did something like that. The farm I'm hunting is in Princeton, so it sounds like you're familiar with that area. He really doesn't completely despise deer... he was a rifle in the pickup kind of hunter back in the day. I think since I came around and started pestering him constantly about hunting that he has actually came back around on it a little. He even helped me do a little shed hunting this weekend. He is aware that I'm all about harvesting mature deer, and is getting used to the thought that deer hunting is a year round deal. My nearly 3 year old son (my father-in-law's pride a joy) is already all about deer hunting!! So I think that has got Papa more excited to help me out. I'm sure as the years go by, he'll allow me to do more and more. I will definitely give you suggestion a try this fall, and especially next year when the rotation put corn back on the east side, which is much close to cover and bedding areas!

 

Welcome to the forum Drew!

 

It's part of a soil health initiative that he may want to investigate further that had broad reaching impacts and fits in very well with game management. I'm in zero-till with cover crops and diverse rotations and heavy residue. We're finding that cover crops were the missing link in no-till systems for nutrient recycling and compaction issues that negated the benefits of no-till like halting soil erosion. It also builds soil organic matter so eventually it really cuts down on required inputs like fertilizer and chemical. It's really intriguing stuff from an agricultural standpoint.

 

I will have to do some research! I am not a farmer. In fact the hardest part of my relationship with my father in law is that while he spent his whole life building, and farming, and in cattle... I spent my whole life playing sports. We both worked hard, but have very different skill sets. So I have a ton to learn about the world that he lives in. The good part, is that I'm very excited to learn as much as possible about farming and land management. My dream is to own my own land someday, and it will likely be managed to produce healthy whitetail! I'm always looking for chances to read, watch, and even jump in and get my hands dirty when possible.

 

There's a video on youtube that is an interesting watch called "undercover farmers". I had the pleasure to meet some of the gentlemen in that video in Jan of 2013 and it was a pretty neat experience.

It's not an easy sell to a lifelong tillage guy, I can tell you from experience. I was literally PO'ed at my landlord for steering me in that direction a few years ago so you'll need to handle the issue with kid gloves. Otherwise your FIL will feel you're just an inexperienced goof that is being duped into voodoo farming. It wasn't until I did my own research and listened to guys that had been in the practice for decades that I started accepting and realizing the scope of the positive impacts it could and would have.

 

If I remember correctly, he said that he started no tilling a few years back. I guess I'll find out here soon.

 

Awesome so he's ahead of the curve already. Sounds like you have things going your way.

 

Welcome to the site!