Help with food plot - 2026

[Pezboat]

Help me plan my 2026 food plot.

I’ve recently acquired a new parcel of land in the bluff country of Minnesota. It’s mostly wooded bluffs, but there is a 4 acre field that’s always been farmed at the top of a bluff. The field is currently planted in corn. What should I do with it going forward? Fruit trees, alfalfa, corn, convert to bee habitat? I’m open to suggestions. Appreciate your input! Thanks!

Black = road
Yellow = 300+ acres of corn
Green = trees
Red = nearly impassable ravine

 

[acooper1983]

Id plan on planting a late season food source to draw deer in. im across the river from you. Id give John at Grandpa ray outdoors a call. Do your soil samples and ask for his recommendations. Ive had very good luck for a hunting plot with his Frosty Delight. Plant middle of july and pray for rain, if you get it it will be covered up during gun/muzzleloader season.

 

[tt_johnsclist]

Acquired as in own? Contact your local soil and water office, USFWS partners biologist, or state biologist for some cost share assistance and planning advice. I’d be looking at some wide warm season grass strips along those roads for cover and about 2 ac of plots inside that. Sounds like John at Grandpa Ray Outdoors is your guy.

 

[HoosierHunter07]

I'm with tt_johnsclist. If I owned it, I'd shrink it down to approx 2 acres by surrounding the edges with switchgrass, and miscanthus scattered throughout the switch. Try to screen off the road. Make it odd shaped. You could also add pockets of shrubs and conifers in the switchgrass for more cover and some browse. In the fall I'd plant the 2 acres in a mixture of cereal grains and brassicas.

 

[wind gypsy]

I'm on the same page as the other guys for the most part. I'd look into screening the roads with miscanthus. I'd still want the plot 3+ acres if possible to have better odds of having lots of food left come late season.

I almost always plant blends for diversity and nutrient cycling. If you want primarily brassicas to be a late season forage, plant them late july-mid august but I'd add some medium red or fixation clover as well. Between labor day and archery opener, i'd broadcast cereal rye over everything. If brassicas are thin or heavily browsed in portions, rye will fill in the gaps. The following spring you'll have a clover and rye plot. Clover will fix nitrogen, rye will fight off weeds and build biomass for your soils. Mow or spray the rye before it's seed is viable and plant the same brassica clover mix into it again the following year. Rinse and repeat.

Another option is spring planting beans and late summer planting the brassicas directly into the beans. This worked great for me this year but in a 1.5 and 2 acre plots, the deer kept the beans browsed down pretty good and there was plenty of space for my fall mix to grow and get sunlight. If you use enlist beans you can keep your plot clean with roundup/2,4d before planting in july/august. It's just a bit more costly and time consuming to plant twice.

 

[sniper61]

I like to plant a clover and or alfalfa, a brassica and a winter rye plots next to each other separated by a 20' strip of switch grass between them. You will need to rotate the rye and brassica every year to keep from poisoning your soil with the brassica. I like about a half acer each . Set it up for the wind and acsses. I have 6 set up like this on 250 acres.

 

[MallardSX2]

Plant it September 1 in this:

Wrens Abruzzi Grain Rye Seed

Wrens Abruzzi Grain Rye Seed - Rye is the small grain most widely used for winter grazing for cattle and wildlife in food plots. Grain Rye is more cold tolerant than oats and generally produces more forage than either oats or wheat. If rye is planted very early in the season, it is often hurt by...

hancockseed.com

It will grow on a solid rock.....literally. The deer absolutely hammer it and it lasts until late in the spring and they turkeys and does and fawns love to eat it in the spring.

Rinse and repeat. EVERY. SINGLE. YEAR.

It's $20 a bag locally. I till, disk, and broadcast spread it at 150 pounds/acre and don't even put fertilizer on the field. I drag the field with a draw and simply walk away.



This field (Planted Sept 6th) just got POUNDED by 4" of rain and it popped right back up....Deer are smoking this field right now....

You can thank me later.

 

[sniper61]

Need to take better photos of the set up