We have finally removed the hay and cattle farmers from our property so I will be planting much more in the way of summer plots. The pastures are about 350 acres on the north end of property. I am considering planting two plots (12-15 acres each) in cowpeas and grain sorghum. I also want to plant about 8-9 acres of brown top millet and sunflowers for a dove field.

The unplanted areas of the pastures will have the hay cut and removed by a man off the property.

Does anyone have any other crops that they have had success with? I am in west central Alabama (Sumter County).

We don't have your kind of acreage but we had good luck with iron clay peas this past summer. We will plant them again. You might try some sunn hemp.

I also plan to sling fertilizer on some natural browse too. Game cam evidence has shown that deer still feed in the plots that were not planted throughout the summer. I plan to do some testing and fertilize a few sections of the plots we don't plant. I'm curious if we will get some increased activity. Good luck.

Plant a few different things and let them tell ya what they like.
We planted soybeans and they mowed them down.

I've planted many different spring/summer crops but my best and most used are iron and clay peas if you can plant 4-5 acres or more. Grain sorghum is another go to that I plant in smaller plots since the deer will leave it alone until it matures, but if it's a small plot they will work it over as soon as it matures. With that much acreage, I'd plant a variety and see what is most successful.
You can double crop a sunn hemp plot. Let the hemp grow for about 60 days, mow it down and plant something else after it and you won't even have to fertilize. You get more nutrient value from the hemp than it costs to plant it

If I had that much land to work with I'd certainly have soybeans. Hard to beat.

I was looking into planting a summer crop for deer and the best thing I've found is the Whitetail Institute blend of soybeans, iron clay peas and sunflower

All those are good ideas.

I had another friend mention planting alfalfa in the pastures. Does it make good hay and will it reseed?

I would plant sunn hemp with soybeans or clay peas. Alfalfa makes great hay, but depletes the soil if you don't rotate crops.

There are numerous weeds in the pastures (prior leasors did not do a good job, thats why they are no longer there).

Would a roundup ready crop be advisable for at least a few years until the seedbed gets a little better?

I have planted RR corn and soybeans, but does anyone know if clay peas or sunn hemp is available in RR?

There are RR clay peas, but not sunn hemp. Sunn hemp fixates a ton of nitrogen, and is very good for the soil. Sunn hemp also provides great cover for fawns.


I would spray and disc, then plant whatever I was going to plant.

Yes on the RR stuff. If they let a bunch of bad stuff go to seed then you can do a lot to the seed bank by staying with RR things like corn and soybeans the first few years.

Bull crap there aren't RR iron and clay peas.

To the OP plant RR soybeans. They're easy to maintain, easy to grow and deer love them. Get your soil right and plant RR alfalfa. You'll have deer running out your kazoo and the rack improvement will be amazing. You MUST have the pH in the correct range when it's planted.

I misspoke on this one. I was looking at RR soybeans and for some reason read them as clay peas.

With that much acreage, it would be hard to beat beans and corn.

I’d take look at the bigger picture of it first and design a layout for the whole area. I’d take into consideration how the other habitat around it is laid out and design it to fit with the surrounding habitat. I’d take some big portions of it and plant it in Native Warm season grasses, etc for the base understory. I’d put in at least a couple 10 acres fields that could be used for “crops”. I’d have other lanes maybe toward the perimeter for strategic hunting setups. Those would be planted in cereal rye and clover. If I didn’t have hogs then I’d probably use on of the 10 acre fields to plant corn and I’d overseed it with cereal rye in the late fall. The other 10 acre fields I’d have planted in cereal grains and clover as large destination food plots.

Soybeans would be the way to go. With round up weed control is much simpler, also many other chemicals can be used to control tough weeds. Only concern would be that if Grazon has been sprayed in the past 12-18 months it can cause damage to soybeans and possibly kill them. Corn is also a good option but cost a good bit more to plant and grow.

So do you own the property and can do anything you want out there or is this a lease?

I think CNC's advise is the best course of action if you own it. I have a place I own that had some very large fields that I let fallow for a while and today I've got them divided up into connecting sections that I rotate planting every couple years. Basically what I've got is an interconnected maze of CRP out there. The hunting is real good. Use to be a sod farm.

I'm not sure it matters what I plant.... Beans and peas are hard to beat. Corn left standing is real good obviously into hunting season.

I do not own it but the owner has given me permission to do whatever I want with the pastures as long as he makes the same amount as the old lessors ($3500 per year) on the hay. I have had the other 1000 acres leased for hunting for the last 10 years.

Last year the former lessors took 800 rolls of crappy hay off. About 150 acres never was hayed, but had cows on it. These guys never sprayed or fertilized the hay, but even with the poor quality hay they could get $25 per round bale. That is $20,000. The guy we have agreed to cut the hay only will cut, roll, and sell the hay. We will not have to find buyers or do anything. We are planning on fertilizing the best pasture (80 acres) and using the profits from that to start spraying everything and fertilizing all the pastures. The guy who will cut it will get 66% and we keep 34%. Out of our cut will come the $3500 for the lease. The rest we will put back into the property. As we start cutting more acreage and have a better quality hay we will have more money to spend on the property. So instead of getting $25 per roll on 150 acres we will hopefully get $40 or so and more like 1500 rolls per year.

I am hoping in a few years time we can have about 75-80 acres in corn, beans, peas or things for the wildlife and basically no out of pocket costs. Just a lot of labor, but I need something to do.

Do you have hogs on this place?

In the 10 years we have had it we have killed 4 hogs. So they are not a problem now, but that may change when we plant corn and beans...