Food plots

[novice]

Planted this weekend. I like this weather and hope it keeps up for a while. My dads place has an old orchard that has good traffic already. Not really caring about sitting on them durring hunting season.....just trying to add a little more protein and an easy meal....the game cam pictures that come from them are pretty cool!!!!. Anyone else dabling with food plots????
My brother actually started this a couple of years ago. I thought he was nuts. One early afternoon durring archery elk I was heading up the hill and there in the middle of the food plot was the biggest blacktail buck I had ever seen on the property. Since then I have been a believer.

[Hunt'nFish]

Oh boy, this is a complex subject.
But to answer your question...no, unless you count the mineral block in the ol'mans pasture.

1. fair chase?
2. baiting yes/no?
3. is it any differant than a ranchers alfalfa field? no.
4. legal? yes

Personally I can see where all the game can benefit, does as well as yearlings. Is it hunting? no. Harvesting, perhaps but not hunting. Sometimes we just want to put some meat in the freezer, nothing wrong with that.
Any pics to share??
Hunt'nFish

[novice]

HnF
I fail to see the complexity.
But I am a pretty simple person.
I planted...as I stated not to sit on and hunt....... but..I would not hesitate to take an animal that I came upon who was gorging himself on some apples and clover.
I'll work on pics...
novice

[sturgeonboy]

I have family members who grow and blend the seed for food plots. It is really amazing to see how much stuff they ship out. Mostly back east and down south. They have started some test plots on the Coast range and are doing well.

Not sure if it will take off as well here.

[bajadan2000]

I have hunted back east in W. Virginia and Pa. were a lot of the State land is planted with feed plots. Sure seams to help keep the heards healthy through the harsh winters they have.

Most of the plots I have seen are planted along closed, dirt, logging type roads. The plots alternate on each side of the road about 1/4 mile apart and about 200 yards in from the road.

Never took a deer in a feed plot, however, just outside, about 100 yds out is were the deer travel and hang up till dark.

With the winters we have, any feed will help the deer and elk survive.

[Hunt'nFish]

Complex in the regard that many people consider it baiting or an unfair advantage, and therefore tabo or frowned upon. Could you imagine some of the huge blacktails that could be grown in the lower end of the Willamette Valley? Much the same as they do in Texas and the midwest.
Some would whine that this corrupts the Boone&Crockett books for the state and puts a record buck out of reach of the average Oregonian. I can see both sides of the coin. But if the game benefits and is healthier otherwise, I have no problems with it.

So clover is your crop of choice?
Hunt'nFish

[in 'em]

oh boy...that'll be the day...when Primos starts putting tree stands in doug firs in Western Oregon...when a blacktail hunting video looks like all those whitetail videos you see nowadays...

Quite honestly, I don't have a problem with planting some grass in the woods...the wild...but if you're luring them into an orchard, field, backyard, etc., it just doesn't make for much of a fun hunt or a good story to boot IMO.

As far as just planting to give them a good meal...well, okay I'll give you the benefit of the doubt, but that'll be very tempting come hunting season when you drive up the road after a long hunt in some canyon miles away only to find a bruiser standing under the apple tree! Adam and Eve...temptation in the garden... :blush:

:grin: :grin: :grin:

I have actually thought of planting some clover or something in a meadow deep into the woods on my parents property...don't feel so bad about that...but I wouldn't be dumping apples there every night. I think blacktails are hard to pattern (except for some private property/farmland deer), so even with a food plot, if they have much feed in surrounding areas/clearcuts, they won't come in all the time anyway. Blacktails will never be easy cause they are so nocturnal and savvy.

[thehunt]

alot of thoughts went through my head while trying to think of the right thing to say here. I guess the best is, to each his own, within the law. The bottom line is supporting eachother in the pursuit of what we love so that the "others" don't use it against us to take it away.

[Swamp Puppy]

how many people hunt on WMA's? they are managed and planted to attract/hold/sustain wildlife.

who hunts in old farms or private lands where the animals are coming to non-naturally grown food sources..or man made water sources?

who fishes near hatcherys where "planted" fish are returning to?

who fishes in stocked ponds or streams?

it's a pretty broad brush you use to paint someone as a non-sportsman just because they are making good (not to mention LEGAL) use of the resources they have at their disposal.

[Gun Rod Bow]

alot of thoughts went through my head while trying to think of the right thing to say here. I guess the best is, to each his own, within the law. The bottom line is supporting eachother in the pursuit of what we love so that the "others" don't use it against us to take it away.

I see no problem with managing your land to support wildlife

Good on yah.

Everyone has their own level of "sport hunting" and "fair chase". If it's legal, go for it.

We need to stick together.

[GL2]

I've got a plot up at my pops place. We also have apple, cheery & pear trees. They have been pruned & fertilized.
I want every deer in the area too come in and feed. If I want to take one, I don't have to set on the plot. Game will be bedding near by and watering @ the creek in the woods.
My hunting will be else where, & my playing up @ pops. If I see a brute anywhere legal to stick & have a valid tag I'm gonna relase. But I just haven't seen it at his place.
I like to take my 10 year old out into the woods to find rubs, & bedding sites, read track, practice stalking. More deer, mean more fun. And more learning.
The old man will get his creaky old bones & big gut up in a stand and stick one right while it's feeding. He's a meat guy, and will stick a doe this year for meat if it's open & the shots there. He also digs watching bucks mount a does out the back window.
Sounds pretty terrible don't it. My old man shooting them while there on thier hind legs trying to get up at the apples & me harassing the poor critters in the woods.
Throw in the nieghbor who will fling at anything that crosses his back yard and ya got a bunch of hill billes.

[cwh]

GL2, that was quite the post. Reminds me of home :smile:

We used to hunt a place that had an old abandoned apple orchard that was grown up in blackberries. We never did get a deer there, but it was always loaded with sign and we killed several within a half mile of it.

I don't see anything wrong with it on your own property. Even if they did it on the public property I wouldn't care, I just wouldn't be anywhere around. Not that I'm above hunting it, I just don't like competing with the thousands of hunters that would be crawling all over the place.

[novice]

GL2
I think you are my twin... we must have been seperated at birth.
novice

[MORGANCREW]

how many people hunt on WMA's? they are managed and planted to attract/hold/sustain wildlife.

who hunts in old farms or private lands where the animals are coming to non-naturally grown food sources..or man made water sources?

who fishes near hatcherys where "planted" fish are returning to?

who fishes in stocked ponds or streams?

it's a pretty broad brush you use to paint someone as a non-sportsman just because they are making good (not to mention LEGAL) use of the resources they have at their disposal.

THAT IS THE TRUEST THING IVE HEARD ON THIS FORUM, THANKS FOR POSTING THAT SWAMP!!!

[baltz526]

if i had several hundred or thousand acres, i would be managing it for wildlife in general. type of terrain it is, would drive what it was managed for. flat grass seed fields next to a major highway, i would not be planting for deer, but phesants would work. in the foot hills where the brush is thick clearing and mowing might be a better soulution than planting

[QH's Paw]

THAT IS THE TRUEST THING IVE HEARD ON THIS FORUM, THANKS FOR POSTING THAT SWAMP!!!

...Again...I'll second that motion(or is it third). I any case, I agree. Very well put SP.