Top_Heavy's World

I started writing about a food plot, the lay out, the use of natural movement, the needs for security and even the tree that I would hunt out of, I am going to tie into that information tonight and expand on some concepts and ideas.
I called my planted area a "food plot", but it was clearly a "Killing Plot". In todays vocabulary, everyone talks about food plots, a small area of land planted with high nutrition plants for the deer to eat. These locations are hunted over and usually the plantings are something that attracts deer during the hunting season. This would actually be a kill plot. There is seldom enough material grown to truly feed the deer for longer than a few weeks, and the setting is usually for getting a buck to show itself during legal shooting hours. These plots are important in the concept of Quality Deer Management, they give the hunter time to properly evaluate age, size and desirability of the deer. These traits are important to ensure only the best genetic traits survive on the given property.
High nutrition, on a year round basis, is another requirement for reaching the full potential of your deer herd. Far too few people have enough desire to provide seasonal feed materials for the entire year. Those that do try, usually end up just planting clover or chickory, and maybe they leave some corn or beans at the end of a field they farm. I have a friend, a true steward of the land, who knows no limits in his pursuit of the perfect deer. This friend has a fair amount of land, not 85000 acres like the King Ranch in Texas, or 50000 acres like the Smith Ranch in New Mexico, but he has a modest spread. This friend makes the Quality Deer Management of many of those other ranches look like part timers. He plants 100's of acres of materials that are never hunted over. The layout of the fields is for different materials to be at optimal usage and nutritional value as the last plant reaches the end of it's usefulness. Legumes, grasses and grains are all planted to offer a variety of flavors and textures. These feeding areas all have water in close proximity and sheltered from visibility to most roads or other areas of possible harassment from less than honest people. These fields are left in complete peace, usually as a refuge except during the required planting season. My friend is proof that you don't need huge amounts of land to do better for the herd than just kill plots.

I touched on several things here, the definitions of certain plots, the idea of year round nutrition, the idea of security for a deer herd, the idea of protecting you deer herd from poachers. Soon I will touch on the idea of predator control, shelter and bedding areas in proximity to food plots and ideas for planting trees and understory plantings to help improve habitat and funnel deer in desired ways. These are sort of loose writings of my ideas and what I have learned over the years of farming, hunting, animal husbandry and formal training at the college level. I would appreciate any additional ideas from anyone who reads this.