I am pretty young but have been hunting my entire life, and the progress from when I started hunting until now in terms of game cameras, feeders, stands, etc is astonishing. This got me thinking, when did people start planting food plots solely for wildlife? I'm thinking it is a pretty recent thing, but was curious.

I was doing it in the early '80's. Old John Deere MT tractor and disk. Spread it by hand.

not much of it going on in the 60's. We hunted over huge winter wheat fields that were ag fields.

I'd guess that deer plots pretty much started with the widespread use of rifles in the 70's.

I'm sure there were people doing it before this time frame but I'd say the main stream craze probably started in the late 80's on into the 90's.....

I remember it being done in the 70’s but not a whole lot since most everyone used dogs back then

Food plots have come a long ways. But it wasn't for deer. There are institutions, like Auburn, Texas A&M, etc. that made every thing easier from soil prep to better animal foods to what to plant and when and where. The trial and error was done for the deer hunters. Even with that it didn't stop me from making plenty of errors.

For history, I believe in my simple mind, if I would have known how to hunt cutovers back in the '70's and early '80's like I do now, I could have killed some HUGE bucks. No one else was hunting them here.

Welcome pineapple! Many are getting too lazy to plant good plots now. They just want to cut corners and expect the same benefits. Never work tho. Game cams have come a long way the last few years. When you talk about money,I remember Camtrakker was one of the best on the market with a 35 mm camera. They were $360. Once you made the investment, you still had to buy film, batteries and developing. I can tell you I ran 10 a couple of years and it was expensive. Not to mention fuel to and from Walmart to drop them off, then pick them up. There were many guys building homebrews. Home made camers. Anyone still around building?

First plots I ever saw was mid 70's.

I used to have an old aerial photo book of Dallas County from 1978. You saw 0 food plots and almost 0 planted pines. The aerial view around Molettes Bend could be mistaken for an aerial photo from Indiana.

we started in the 80's in Macon and Barbour when log landings created openings in the woods, and in areas around the pine plantations that sprang up as less and less folks were row
cropping.I hated trading soybeans and peanuts for pines, but it no doubt pushed food plot revolution where we hunted.

Who you calling lazy you crossbow hunting tofu farting fairy

I’d say that plotting probably made a huge jump in popularity when companies like the Whitetail Institute started marketing clover back in the 90’s.

The internet and access to knowledge has been another game changer in recent times.

Back in the 90s (In Choctaw county) all we used was cereal rye and the deer would freaking hammer that chit! Ole cousin of mine planted his plot with bio logic and that chit grew to be nearly 4' feet tall and the deer wouldn't touch it....

I remember my first game camera had film and only worked one time. That was around 98. That item alone has come an extremely long way over the years but so have cameras in general. Food plot seed may not be much better now but it sure has increased in price. Lots of gimmicks out there to. We first tried plots in 96 on an old farm that wasn't used anymore. Had no idea what we were doing. Disced up a few places and threw out some seed. Deer didn't care much for that either. We have gained a lot of knowledge over the years and if I have the time, can make some jam up food plots. Location plays a large part in a productive food plot but planting what the deer want to eat is more productive. imo Some folks put food plots down, as if to say that you're not a real hunter if you hunt over a plot. Kind of like old time farmers looked down on other farmers who had cab tractors. I enjoy hunting every aspect of the land that I have. Plots, roads, woods, fields and even were we park.