Aldeer.com Forums Alabama Deer Talk Quality Deer Management Throw n Mow Q&A

It’s soil sample time. I always like to take a picture of my soil profile when I pull samples to show the visual results of “building soil”. If you’re plotting in a sandy field with zero organic matter then you’re plotting in something like that lighter orange soil on the bottom. I’ve tested that soil separately and compared it to the dark rich topsoil and the two test just as differently as they look.

The yuchi is not the only thing in the field growing under the rye that the deer are hammering. If you look close you'll see that nearly every stem is browsed. Healthy soil makes for healthy plants. Deer prefer healthy plants. I think this is where “Brix” comes into play.

Dropped my soil sample off this morning at the Auburn Soil Lab. Should have it back in a few days. While I was in town I went ahead and picked up some soil amendments based on an educated guess of what I’m gonna need. My 3 pt spreader finally bit the dust so I’m spreading it by hand with a bag spreader. What a pain in the arse! The 4 bags on the tailgate is what I’m putting out per acre. 1 bag of N…1 bag of P and 2 bags of K. It works out to be $50 per acre. We’ll see what the soil test calls for. It may call for a tad more P but I shouldn’t be too far off.

While spreading some of the fert I noticed several deer beds……..



Along with several other plants species being readily browsed on….even species that some folks would consider “evil”. Deer like healthy plants. You just gotta get your soil right……

They love them some pokeweed. Yea, what did the deer eat before we came along with our plots? Weeds!

Yuchi will tell you if you’re having any soil issues. Reds, yellows and purples are signs of stress. That can be from a few different variables such as drought, nutrient imbalances, lack of soil oxygen, etc. Deer do not like plants like this. When I first planted the yuchi a couple years ago there was a lot of this across the field. After that last lime application though I’m seeing very little of it….only just a few stray stalks. I should have added my P&K back about mid-March or so but I didn’t.



I do believe this is some of my teaweed coming back in. I like this stuff. The deer hammer it later in the summer. You can also see some ragweed starting to sprout around it. It’ll get browsed too but not quite as much as the teaweed. They’ll be a lot of diversity in this field. Likely 20+ different plant species.

I’m determined to prove to folks that you don’t have to beat your head against the wall trying to “farm” expensive summer seed mixes in your small food plots in order to keep the deer using them regularly throughout the year...all while improving your soil at the same time. There are other ways that you can manage them that are very productive…..maybe more in some situations.

I went ahead and flattened the rye down in front of the camera just so I’d get better pics. I may need to scuff it up a little later on. A thick mat pressed liked that can smother out growth. That’d be ideal if this was a huge crop field and I had a drill….but it’s not and I don’t…..so we adapt. Let’s see if we’ve got anything new creeping around this patch of yuchi.

To add to the post on color………Here is what you want to see from a plant color perspective. Dark green leaves with lime green growing tips. When you see that type color then the plant is growing well. Some plants or more finicky than others though….yuchi being much more finicky than say ragweed. Deer love the growing tips of healthy plants like this.

Soil test just came back…..significant changes. Calcium is up from 900 lbs/ac to over 4,000 lbs/ac……that’s Huuuuge! .....lime was spread a little over a year ago.

The pH is also now balanced, up from mid 5’s to dead on 7.0………K levels were a little low as expected and why we topped them off……P levels show good. I’ve already spread one bag of the P but I’ll just save the other one until fall planting. Likely all we’ll need at fall planting is a shot of N and maybe another little shot of K to keep levels up through the winter…….The N recommendations are just generalized recommendation based on how much yield they think you’re trying to produce.

I also had them test the %OM but they said it would take a week or so on that…..I’ll update when it comes back.

Also, one more thing on the soil test…..I tested the topsoil you saw a few pics back that extends down to 8-10 inches or so. I took my test samples from about 4-5 inches. The CEC of that topsoil on the current test is 13.16……that’s a representation of the soil’s nutrient holding capacity. The pure sand in the subsoil….and what you would have without the organic matter……is less than <2……I’ve tested it before. That’s where I was at before I started using different management techniques. This where I’m at now…….I feel like %OM is gonna show significant increases too. That's why CEC (holding capacity) went up....

Looks good crimson. Numbers don't lie.

Thanks Blum!......Something else I found interesting is that I had actually added lime to this field two years prior to this last application but it only brought my Ca up from 300 lbs/ac to 900 lbs/ac and the pH didn’t get out of the 5’s from a low of 5.0 in the beginning. It was like it barely made a difference. I think that maybe I just hadn’t built up enough organic matter yet to hold the Ca back then….. but now I do.

You gotta get yourself out of that initial hole of having zero organic matter in the soil. That’s where all of your holding capacity comes from with a sandy plot. Without it... nutrient usage is very, very inefficient. My original OM% was less than 1%....You just need to grow biomass and not burn it up with heavy tillage. Most of these improvements was built on the backs of crabgrass and cereal rye. The field is now transitioning over to a much more balanced mix of summer broadleafs and legumes. Oh, you just don’t know how much I wish now I would have re-seeded my clovers last fall. Damn drought….

Something that will be interesting to watch but will probably take years to play out is how well the soil holds onto that Ca over time. That’s a big deal for folks because liming is one of the most cumbersome things we have to do. My soil is definitely holding onto nutrients much better now though. Also, instead of losing all of our P&K between every planting…..we’re just adding small amounts now to bump it back it up. I actually didn’t need any P this time and only a small amount of K. This is why you’re wasting a lot of money if you’re just blindly throwing out 300 lbs of 13-13-13 every time you plant or 0-20-20 to "fertilize the clover", etc. We're not fertilizing the plant....we're balancing the soil nutrients.

The yuchi that’s been able to escape the browsing pressure is now starting to go to seed. It’s not quite as showy as crimson clover but I’ve always thought it had a pretty seed head too. This is why you don’t mow or terminate the field at this time if you’ve planted clovers like this…..free seed.

Part of working with Mother Nature is waiting to do things until she’s ready instead of doing it when our excitement to plant something gets the best of us. I’ve been the world’s worst about that…..chomping at the bit to do something at the first sign of warm weather or the first hint of fall. I’m slowly learning though that there are many benefits in being patient. Hopefully, more and more seed heads will begin to appear on the browsed plants. The browsing is actually setting back succession and prolonging the plant going to seed. The rye has done a good job of protecting some of the plants and not letting it all get devoured. If managed correctly I think you could grow clover like this from year to year without the cost of having to buy it every time.....or maybe you cut your seeding rates way back.

Update on the rye and vetch field. I turned the cows on it and they were targeting the top 8 inches of the young Bradford pear chutes. Then primarily hitting vetch and Johnson grass. I don't have a brick meter yet but I'm guessing those had the best readings.

Peas, beans and brown top are starting to shoot up in my fields.

Y’all take some pics so we can see what y'all are working with. I hope everyone’s fields do well this summer. I really hope we don’t see more drought like last year.

I saw what looked to be a decent buck with a little age on him stand up out of the rye in the back of the field and trot into the woods yesterday evening. I was playing Frisbee with Shelby and didn’t have time to get a pic. He just had the initial growth of main beams but body wise he looked to maybe be a middle-aged deer. I had to move my camera from the basket because the wind was setting it off too easy but I put it back up on my mineral lick. Maybe we’ll catch him using it and get a better look.

A lush salad bar of plants is really beginning to burst through the rye now. All kinds of stuff in there representing each……grass, broadleaf, and legume. Lots of browsing taking place on the tender, young shoots too. I’m really happy with how things are transitioning…..gonna pour the clovers to it this fall…….

Shelby had to help me check things out. She’s made big strides in blood tracking on her mock tracks over the last couple months. I’m looking forward to getting her on the real thing in a few months.....It ain't that far away!