Food plot help and ideas?

[BolognaSniper]

I have 5.47 acers in West Virginia. Its in some what of a neighborhood. Everyone has 5 - 20 acers. 3 acers of my land is wooded and backs to and is sided on both sides by approx. 30 acers. I would like to clear a small area in my woods and establish a food plot. Any recomendations or ideas?

[1865]

I can't advise on what you should plant. (Clover is always good around here, but I don't know about your area) I can tell you how we've done it. Look for animal trails in your woods. If you find one, or more, try to find an area within a few yards of the trail that is naturally a bit more open than the rest of the woods. That's a good place to start. Decide how big you want your plot to be(it doesn't necessarily have to be huge, a few dozen feet per side can still draw in deer). The size will determine how you go about it from there. Start by clearing out the brush, trees and stumps from your chosen area(mine is about 100 feet by 30 feet). For us, once we had the ground clear it was still pretty wet, so we were able to do a controlled burn to get the last of the grass off(be VERY carefull if you do this! Check your local laws, your conditions and have enough people around to help control the fire) After burning we brought in a small disc on a little tractor and disked the ground in alternating directions. Once the ground was tilled we threw down a premixed deer food plot seed I picked up at Bass Pro Shop. Our deer love it, it draws them out of the woods(very important in our brushy mesquite/live oak woods) and encourages taking time to browse. It was quite a bit of work to get going, but very rewarding in the long run!

[BolognaSniper]

Thanks for the advice thats kinda what i was thinking. I have mostly red&white oaks with northern lob lolly pines. They alredy love the acors but i wanted a little more of a draw.

[RonM]

Bologna Sniper where are you located in WV. I have been over there a few times this year to different locations, I like WV. Set your computer to check back for 60 days or more and read all these posts with different ideas for different areas , for winter plots it's one thing for l summer it's something else, not to cut you short but there is a lot of info already on this board ......

[BolognaSniper]

Thanks Ron i will check it out. I am in between Martinsburg and Sheppardstown.