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The Farm

SWBUCKHNTR

SWBUCKHNTR

Member
I have been reading a lot of dbltree's post on here and found them very helpful and thought I would volunteer my new farm as a learning farm for everybody to watch as the progress of turning it into a whitetail heaven slowly happens over the next few years. If you guys are intrested in this, post a reply and if there is enough popularity I will show before during and after pictures of everything I do on the farm.

"The Farm" lays out as follows: 95 acres of timber, roughly 83 acres of hardwoods and 12 acres of a thick ravine that is all hedge trees pretty much. The other is 100 acres of grass. 80 acres of crp and 20 acres of old pasture that has a few locust trees in it.

I will be doing all my own work. I have a lot of ideas that I want to do but will be open to suggestions on other parts.

I think this would be a great way for everybody to see what a mediocre farm like mine could turn into with a little bit of sweat. I will also post trail pics and harvest pics so that you can see the progression of the deer on the farm. I have given everything a free pass this year because there was a lot of 4-wheeler traffic and kids on this farm with the previous owner. I wanted the deer to get used to being able to live on the farm without constantly being harassed. I do however want to shoot a few does because I have seen a few does with button buck fawns and I would love to make those fawns orphans.
 
I will be doing all my own work.
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a man after my own heart! Looking forward to following your progress, take pictures before and after. Share the before pictures to get ideas and thoughts on each area and then go to work!:D

95 acres of timber
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Start by walking that with your forester and mark crop trees then when you start to cull cull trees you have a choice between girdling and hinging to create bedding areas.

100 acres of grass
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I'm a fan of all types of native grasses and you may consider different types in different areas. Check the switchgrass and NWSG threads for ideas and different possibles but don't plant the whole place to one species or one mix of species...;)

First step is to protect your property from neighbors and road traffic by planting screening cover where it is needed.

I encircled my entire property with shrubs and red cedars so that no one at anytime of year can see deer on my property. Where shrubs are still small I plant Egyptian Wheat for screening cover.

I plant my food plots in the center in a hidden field where deer feel most comfortable in daylight hours and then used hinge cutting to create bottlenecks in timber leading to those feeding areas.

I rarely hunt near food plots but instead choose travel corridors leading to them where deer are likely to stage before dark or return too at dawn.

Hinged trees in areas you want for unmolested bedding area should be away from your travel routes to and from stands. Check the edge feathering/bedding thread for more ideas on this subject.

Keep us posted on progress :way:
 
It is a great idea!!! As Paul stated, post up the pics before you start anything and get some pointers if needed. I also agree that I would not plant then entire 80 acres into one type or mix. There are tons of NWSG's available that will fit ideally in certain situations. For wet areas look at switch grass, eastern gama grass and prairie cord grass. There is also, big blue, indian grass, prairie dropseed, side oats grama, tall dropseed, june grass and little bluestem for example. Try to add as many species for diversity as you can and not only the deer will benefit, but lots of other wildlife too!!
 
Sounds like not only a great post for our current members but also a post that can be looked back at year after the fact to benefit people.

Several things "I" would like to see come of this if you decide to share ALL of your information with us:
Arieal photos, before and after photos, details details details, soil test results, fertilizer, seed choices, costs, all those are things that a novice food plot person is going to want to see. Alot of explanations why did certain things the way you did them. If you do decide to do this (which I hope you do) I really look foward to it.
 
Aerial

Here we go!! I thought I would start by posting aerials for everybody to see what we are working with. The first one is just of the farm.
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Sorry for the big white spot I am not an expert with computers at all.
The second pic is the same thing just with the boundaries added "red" and also the one food plot that already existed the "green". It is about half and acre and it is just a standard clover mix. The areas outlined in orange is the old pasture ground. It is grown up with a few locust trees and cedars trees. It is not rented out so I will be able to do whatever I want with that and not have to worry about it. The rest of the open feilds are all crp which I can put 10% of them into food plots. The east feilds are pretty good stands of grass with the middle and west feilds being pretty rough. It stays wet down along the creek and they got flooded out pretty bad in 2008 so they are mostly tall weeds and are in pretty rough shape. The timber to the north is all one big south facing slope. It is a mixture of oaks, hickorys and a few walnuts with the normal junk trees mixed in. All and all it is a pretty wide open mature timber. The ravine on the south east side of the farm has some big oaks in it along with a ton of thick bedding cover. The farm is almost completley blocked by the trees along the road except for a few spots that I will add some cedars in the spring.
5677-arial1.jpg

That is it for now. I will begin the work once deer season is over. Let me know what your suggestions are.
 
Looking forward to hearing your progress. I started to do the same thing a couple of years ago. But I got lazy and didn't take as many pics as I should have. Stay the course, post those pics; you'll enjoy it more with the praise and input of the guys on this site.
 
Looks like a great piece of ground. Plenty of pinch points and funnels. You've got be pretty excited to have the opportunity to turn it into your own whitetail paradise.:grin:
 
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