By Joe Blake
Climbing aloft and belting into my tree stand in the pre-dawn darkness, I shivered, tried to retreat deeper into the warmth of my wool parka and waited impatiently for the sun to brighten my surroundings. Everything in sight was covered with snow: ground, trees and bushes. The standing cornfield and alfalfa strip directly in front of my ambush all bore the look of a winter postcard. In fact, the decoy 20 yards in front of my stand was the only thing in this winter wonderland devoid of snow, and I wondered what type of reaction it would bring from a cruising buck. I wouldn’t have to wait long to find out.
Looking north along the heavy timber, I saw a big deer step from cover and make its way purposely along the opening created by the strip of alfalfa planted between the woods and the standing cornfield. No feeding for this brute. Instead, he walked in the steady, stiff-legged gait of a buck looking for love, and I eased my longbow from its resting place and got into position to take the shot. Without question the big 8-pointer was going to see my decoy in just a few more minutes. I had placed my facsimile just inside the strip of alfalfa with its back end tight to the standing corn so any buck stepping out of the corn or trees would spot the intruder and investigate, which is what happened that snowy morning.
Looking west, the approaching trophy locked onto the decoy, and immediately, his ears laid flat and every hair from neck to rump stood at full attention. The deer side-stepped toward the decoy but was still facing me head on. I tracked the brute’s advance with my stickbow, assuming he would circle between the imitation and my stand and then stop for a broadside shot. Unfortunately, the deer had other plans. Directly between my heavy arrow and the decoy, he spun 180 degrees and charged full tilt, and hit the poor interloper with such force that it took me more than 10 minutes to find all the pieces in the aftermath of the encounter.
The upshot of the sequence is that I never even had time to raise the bent stick cradled in my left hand, and the 140-class buck escaped unscathed. However, the edge-hunting technique I was using had worked to perfection, and it will do the same for you this season.
Whitetail deer are crop-oriented throughout most of their range, and smart hunters learned long ago to look for deer and set up ambushes near fields of corn, sunflowers, beans and other row crops. Hunting the edge created where the crops meet the timber has put a lot of deer in the freezer and a lot of trophies on the wall, but I’ll wager the twist I’m suggesting will improve your deer sightings and success rate significantly. Plant a strip food plot between the row crop field and the woods, effectively creating a second edge — and that edge will increase your success in several ways.
VISIBILITY
One significant problem with setting up tight to a standing cornfield or other taller row crop is that it’s easy for your quarry to step from woods to crop or vice versa without presenting a shot. Heck, without even being seen in a lot of cases. Enter the use of a strip plot. By using a lower-growing food source such as Imperial Clover, Chicory Plus or Imperial Winter-Greens, the deer will immediately be visible and in position for you to shoot after they step into the strip you planted. The opening story shows this perfectly: Had the cornfield in front of me ran all the way to my stand, I would never have been able to use the decoy, I would not have seen the buck step out more than 100 yards away, and I would not have had one of the most exciting encounters I’ve ever experienced in more than 30 years of bow-hunting for whitetails.
This visibility is a boon not only during hunting season but also during your late summer and early fall scouting trips. Glassing for deer numbers and trophy quality around a standing corn or sunflower field is a lesson in futility, but if you have a 20- to 30-foot strip plot surrounding the taller food source, it is easy to see when the deer step out, and you will have plenty of time to get some glass on them for evaluation. Plus, by using a top attracting food strip like Imperial Whitetail Clover, Chicory Plus or any one of the many other fine Whitetail Institute offerings, the deer will be in no great rush to reach their main food source, allowing you ample time to size up antlers, assess herd numbers or line up that important shot.SLOWING DOWN THE PARADE
That brings us to a second major attribute of planting a strip plot adjacent to row crop fields. With the proper planting the strip plot will become a destination itself, with the deer spending considerable time feeding after leaving the woods and before entering the corn. The same is true in reverse. As deer leave the corn en route to the timber, they will linger for long periods of time in your strip plot, again allowing glassing or shooting opportunities. I used this technique in Minnesota a few years ago without actually even trying. I had a small hunting plot on a hilltop cul de sac between my oak woods and the neighboring farmer’s cornfield, and the results were amazing. Not only did almost every deer heading to or from the corn come through my Imperial Clover patch, but they generally spent considerable time feeding there before continuing their trek to the destination. I arrowed two fat does from a ladder stand in a small oak in the green field as they fed slowly toward the corn, and nearly anchored a trophy 8-pointer from the same stand — a Pope & Young buck that only escaped the freezer and wall because he fed so slowly across the small Imperial Clover field that I ran out of shooting light before he reached longbow range.
FOCUS YOUR EFFORTS
If you live in the Midwest like I do, you know that rowcrop fields can be vast, and planting a strip plot and hunting the edge around a cornfield that is several hundred acres in size can be a losing proposition. Instead, plant your edge only where you have the best setup for hunting. Maybe you have a heavy stand of timber that offers preferred bedding cover and is adjacent to tillable land, or a wooded drainage that deer naturally use to access the local farm fields. These are perfect areas for hunting the edge and planting your strip plots. Since I bow-hunt exclusively, I always consider prevailing wind directions for any potential setup, and these food plot edges are no different. Try and set up so that the wind is blowing parallel to the woods and row crops. That way, you can plan an ambush site up or down wind of the most heavily used trail or trails passing the location.
Another good bet to sweeten the pot, if it’s legal in the state you hunt, is to establish a mineral pit with 30-06 Plus Protein or Cutting Edge close to your ambush site and adjacent to your strip plot. Even if your strips are small — and they should be generally no more than 20 or 30 feet wide and less than 100 yards long — the deer can pretty much filter out of cover all along the strips.
Establish a well-maintained mineral pit, which will focus the whitetails on an exact spot where they will enter and exit your Hunting Edge and offer excellent shot opportunities. I have always used Whitetail Institute’s 30-06 Plus Protein. Deer pound this product to the point of excavating deep holes in the ground where I place my pits, and the size of local bucks’ antlers and the overall health of the deer herd in the area have seen obvious improvements.
THE CROP-SAVING ADVANTAGE
One big plus to this strip food plot technique really has nothing to do with hunting these edges. It can save crop damage for the farmer. As every hunter that has ever spent time chasing whitetails adjacent to crop fields knows, these fields take a beating wherever they meet cover. Generally, the first 10 to 30 rows will be virtually devoid of corn, beans, or whatever crop was planted there by the time harvest rolls around, which is not only a source of frustration for farmers but a serious loss of income. By replacing those crop rows with a hunting strip plot, you are giving the deer something they crave even before they reach their intended feeding destination. And if the herd’s bellies are already at least partially full, they are less apt to wipe out the farmer’s crop, making this management strategy a win-win situation for everyone.
PUTTING IT ALL TOGETHER
Now that you’ve decided to give hunting the edge a try, how do you get started? If you farm yourself this technique is a simple matter. Till and prepare your seedbed as usual, but don’t plant the areas you have chosen for your strip plots with your usual row crops. Instead, take your soil samples, do the required testing to decide which Whitetail Institute products will work best in your area, and then plant accordingly. These narrow hunting plots can be planted with whatever type of seeds you like, so long as the soil supports your attempts, and annuals or perennials are good bets. I think annuals are the best option because the adjacent ground is going to get worked up every year anyway, so redoing your strip plots annually is not a problem.
But what about most of us that don’t actually farm? Can we still benefit from this hunting plot strategy? You bet. In fact, talking the farmer who actually owns and works the land you hunt into helping you with this technique is usually not a problem. Explain the benefits you will experience to help you harvest more deer, and he's likely to be on-board immediately.
If he needs a little more convincing, explain that this technique can actually help alleviate crop damage and if it’s appropriate, point out that he seldom has any crop left to harvest in these areas anyway. Finally, offer to provide compensation for time, effort and fuel to plant these hunting edges and for potential lost income, from losing 20 or 30 feet of crop field, and your landowners should be all for your strip-plot strategy.
Whitetails have always been described as edge animals, and looking for and hunting these beautiful and challenging critters where crop land meets wood land has always been productive. Creating a second edge will only make the situation better, so look over your hunting property or properties to see if you can’t figure out a way to start hunting the edge next season.
