RE: Planting in strips...
If you need something to plant between strips, try Iron clay Peas, broadcast over a 40-50ft. strip. I planted a 40 ft. strip, 100yds. long a few yrs. ago and the deer used them for bedding. In fact they fed on them while bedding, and you couldn't chase them out of it. A darn sight better than a bunch of weeds. Some say you have to mow the weeds to keep them from seeding, but if you do that, there's nothing to bed in. The soil was quite fertile where I planted and they grew 3-4ft. tall.
Russ