Budget Plot Strategies You don't have to break the bank to create great plots and better hunting

By: Doug Howlett

I look back at those wasted years and want to kick myself. My dad and a hunting friend finally went in together on a piece of land our families could call our own. Only the owners and their sons would be allowed to come and go as they pleased. Through time, those sons — myself included — were able to buy into the dream and help expand our holdings to nearly double the size.

Through the years, we had plenty of good hunts, but it wasn’t until just eight or nine years ago that the quality deer management philosophy settled over our collective minds. We knew the land held potential we hadn’t even begun to tap, and in a fit of determination, we decided it was time to let the little bucks walk.

We also understood we had to do something to increase the nutritional value of our land to grow and hold bigger deer. The problem was cash flow. To keep planting costs down, we were satisfied initially with simply sowing a few inexpensive bags of surplus soybeans, corn or peas into open areas. However, we didn’t really lime or fertilize, and the end product was what you would expect: poorly growing plants that did little to attract deer. Those were the wasted years. For just a little more money and effort, we could have made strides that would have put our management goals much farther along than where they currently sit — years ahead, in fact. That point became painfully obvious to me after I began talking with Steve Scott, vice president of Whitetail Institute, for another assignment I was working on, and he began offering ideas on how to get the most out of our limited land-management budget. His suggestions really helped my group’s efforts. In fact, what Scott had to say can help a lot of land-managing sportsmen looking to minimize the costs of maintaining quality food plots.

THE BEST $10 YOU CAN SPEND

One mistake we made for years was not testing soil samples of our plots. Even though we decided to plant quality seed last year, we overlooked that one important detail, and there wasn’t time to get the information back before we needed to put seed in the ground. We simply planted. It was a big mistake that would cost us more in the end to try to fix. Without a soil test, a hunter is simply flying blind when he begins planting. There is no way a person can know what their soil needs in order to help plants achieve their maximum potential without one.

“The best way to save money is to spend ten dollars for a soil test on every field you intend to plant,” Scott said. “A soil test can be the difference between your best food plot ever and total failure.”

The results of a quality soil test can guide you in knowing how much and what type of fertilizer the field requires, how much lime is needed and any other soil requirements. For example, sometimes soil is low in potassium, but phosphorous levels are fine. In that case, the sportsman would simply be wasting money by putting more phosphorous on the ground. In other instances, some soils might require a lot of lime to bring their pH up, while soils in other fields might require much less.

Although quality seeds can cost a little more, the associated costs with planting — lime, fertilizer, herbicides, tractor, fuel and time — make seed look cheap. No need to pay for unnecessary things.

DON’T UNDERESTIMATE LIME

So much emphasis is often placed on fertilizing, that most guys don’t even realize the most important aspect of creating fertile soil is putting lime in the ground. Most soils in the whitetail’s range are naturally acidic. Lime helps transform those soils to a more neutral pH — a definite requirement for healthy plants. Absent the benefit of a soil test when we began planting on our place, some of my fellow landowners speculated that several of the quarter-acre plots we were planting would be good with 100 pounds of lime to start. After observing that several of our plots were woefully behind the curve just a couple of weeks after planting, we realized we had grossly underestimated the amount needed. If we were to benefit from our efforts at all, some of the plots would have to be disked, limed and replanted right away.

In speaking with good friend and Primos pro-staffer Tommy Barham about the situation, he just smiled.  Barham’s family has run a business in Capron, Va., for generations spreading lime among many other agricultural services. He explained that a rule of thumb for the amount of lime required to establish a newly created field is 4,000 pounds per acre the first year. Additional lime sometimes is needed in the next few years. By then, you’re soil should be pretty close to neutral. Planting existing fields generally requires as much lime. For that reason alone, it’s definitely worth the cost of a soil test so that money isn’t wasted on unnecessary lime. And for that lime you do need, there is a pelletized variety and a powdered form. The latter is much less expensive — about a quarter of the cost of pelletized lime — so go that route if possible.

When given the choice of having to spend limited funds on lime vs. fertilizer, focus on meeting your lime requirements first. Without it, you’re likely wasting money on fertilizer. “You can put the best seeds out there with all the fertilizer you want, but if the soil has a low pH, it’s like going to a huge buffet with your mouth wired shut,” Scott said. “It’s hard to overemphasize the importance of lime.”

FOCUS YOUR EFFORTS

One of the first things we did wrong when we first began planting is attempting to spread seed a little farther to cover all of the plots and fields on our property, or to buy cheaper seed in order to plant all of the available acres. “A lot of guys make that mistake, believing it is more important to have every available area planted,” Scott said. “While you certainly want to take advantage of making open areas the best they can be, you have to be realistic about what you can do, either from a budget or an equipment standpoint. “If a guy has four acres available to plant and he is working with a limited budget, he is much better off if he just plants one or two acres and plants them right, rather than spreading his resources out over the entire four acres and doing everything haphazardly.”

GO SMALL

Along those same lines, if your property is crisscrossed with logging roads and small openings such as old log decks, focus on planting those areas before clearing out more forest or planting large fields. Such areas are ideal for sportsmen on a budget or hunters who simply lease a property and aren’t permitted to create additional open areas. “Two guys can take a rototiller or a spiked rake and/or some Round Up, go into these holes and within a half a day, can clear out enough sticks and expose the soil sufficiently to plant a good plot with Whitetail Institute’s Secret Spot or No-Plow seed mixes,” Scott said. A 10-pound bag of Secret Spot XL can plant more than 10,000 square feet of ground. “If you’ve got a couple of spots that are 70 feet by 70 feet in size, you can plant them both for less than $10 each in seed cost,” Scott said.

Secret Spot and No Plow varieties were created specifically for budget-conscious and time-constrained sportsmen. They each have a mix of seeds created to grow in a variety of situations and soil types. In many cases, these niche plots can actually be more versatile stand sites than those on large open areas.

“You can catch both feeding deer and crossing deer,” Scott said. “A road or narrow type of field can be a good morning, as well as a good evening stand, whereas more open plots tend to be better in the evening.”