Looking to plant a few kill (staging) plots off of green fields and funnels. I am looking to plant something shade and cold tolerant. I'm looking at winter wheat/rye. Any suggestions?

I would go with cereal rye/clover. Cereal rye grows really fast on poor soil and clover is shade tolerant.

I used to take my tiller for a walk through the woods and plant a few bow plots next to bedding areas. Always planted oats and clover. Threw in a little lime and fertilizer too. It all came up but it being such a small plot and fed on by deer all the time, it would be eaten down to the ground before November. It will be perfect for a bow hole early in the season though.

I like the idea of oats and clover for an early bow plot like this. Oats seem to be a little more preferred early in the season.

What clover do u use

The kind deer eat. Whatever I find in the feed store for a few dollars. They usually bust a bag or two and bag them up in small sacks and sell em for cheap. It is usually crimson I believe.

Crimson is probably the easiest to find, but yucchi arrowleaf and berseem are good annual clovers. Your local co-op should have some cheap co-op blends.

Cool thnx... I'll head over to Donaldson or whatever they're called now. Probably get enough for 2 or 3 30'x30' plots.

Why not just kill them in the green fields? Planting more plots will spread the deer more

This is for bow season... That's why they are only 30x30. They will be near the edge of already established green fields. And by the time gun season is in these plots are so small they'll probably be grazed down.

Why not Hunt the established plot?

So you can shoot an arrow 200 yds. A field that big hard to predict where they will enter the field. This is works as a funnel. Helps to narrow down

if you have a lot of deer , real small plots is a waste of time .

Judging trail cam pics not so sure... Plus first year hunting the property 1800 acres is alot of territory.

He's planting a bow spot, known as a kill plot. Deer will ease out into them before dark and then feed toward destination plots close to dark. Bowhunting destination plots, are a good way to educate all the deer, because when you come down with a field full of deer they all run off. Hard to pattern deer on a huge plot, unless you do a lot of hinge cutting. I like small plots for bowhunting because any deer that steps out is in range.

We ain't talking like a 4000 acre bean field are we as the destination plot? I think y'all may be making this to hard. A destination plot? Deer travel a lot and may hit 6 or 7 different food sources in a night there is no one destination plot in Alabama. If you shoot one 200 yds away on said kill plot it will spook deer on destination plot, wind blowing from kill plot to destination plot spooks deer in destination plot etc. If you plant a kill plot it will slow the deer down going to the destination plot and they may not arrive before dark. Sounds like a good way to add pressure and spread the deer out to me. Either way I hope yall kill a pile of em on either plot!

Ben, my experience has been, that deer will stop by kill plots an hour or two before dark. Feed a little and work their way to larger plots of an acre or larger. Its easier to kill deer on a small plot with a bow. If your in a stand on a 1 acre plot with 5 deer on it and their out of range and it gets dark, your going to scare the hell out of them coming out of your tree, because a bow stand on a plot is right on top of the plot. Deer linger in large plots, i've had them feed for over an hour before, sometimes longer. They dont linger in small plots. Usually they only stay for a few minutes. Destination plots are usually centrally located in timber and kill plots are close to bedding area's. I definately have both on my farm.

You made my point blumsden. These help to bring funnel deer within bow range. I decided to go with white\ crimson clover and winter rye. Thanks for all y'all input