What’s more valuable for holding/producing/hunting deer? Crops vs crp?

[Hawk32]

35 acres of crops. All but an acre or two are harvested. 3 fields. One bottom field is about 15 acres. Another bottom is only 2. Hilltop field is about another 15 acres.
I can try and post a pic. 2 main blocks of timber are very open and provide very little cover. Working on that clearing trees

 

[Obsessed]

35 acres of crops. All but an acre or two are harvested. 3 fields. One bottom field is about 15 acres. Another bottom is only 2. Hilltop field is about another 15 acres.
I can try and post a pic. 2 main blocks of timber are very open and provide very little cover. Working on that clearing trees

Deer will gravitate to crop fields prior to harvest, and will graze picked crop fields at night, but it would work a lot better for you if you left more acres of those crops unharvested. Modern harvesting equipment doesn't drop very much grain on the ground, and it obviously destroys the cover that the standing crops provide as well. I used to prefer hunting by corn, but have switched my preference to beans. Deer disappear quickly in standing corn.

 

[Obsessed]

Personally, unless you're interested in upland game birds, CRP is overrated. I log many walking miles bow hunting in a season. Very rarely do I encounter deer out of thick CRP. If they're in it, they're usually right on the edge of a timber or draw type structure. The best deer action I've encountered related to CRP has been in the narrow buffer strips between crop fields and timber edges. Easy food, thin strip of CRP for transition, cover, bedding, and then timber for deeper cover and browse. Perfect setup. People who convert productive crop fields to CRP are making a huge mistake IMO.

 

[Snail3496]

Impossible without actually seeing your farm, access, area etc. I personally bought 55ac of sub-par tillable in the middle of open prairie Ag where I live in spring 2020. It has a brushy ditch that splits it down the middle but only makes up a few acres. Rest is corn/bean rotation. True BLANK CANVAS. I have access from a few different sides. COVER and FOOD after Nov 1st are the limited resource in my area. Miles of corn and beans, but its all gone and turned over by Halloween.

I carved out 3 different sizeable plots in thought out, advantageous spots. Got the rest all enrolled in continuous CP2 (BB, Indian, Switch, some forbes). Its paying WAY more than any local farmer would ever pay, and was prime cover in my area in a couple short years. Hunted it for the first time this fall and killed a 6.5yo 168". The deer just migrated to it. That was the original idea buying it, but still is a relief to witness.

Surely if I was in a higher timber/habitat area, it wouldn't have near the drawing power it does. That's why the answer to your post, IT DEPENDS.

 

[Hawk32]

Layout. Tried labeling things but hard to see. Arrows mean up hill

 

[smithhunter1975]

Looks like a nice farm! I am very interested in the responses as well. I posted several months ago that i am converting a rolling hill pasture into hunting habitat and debating on planting natives or trees/shrubs. More than likely it will be a combination of both, just not sure what mix. Natives will be 3 years until good cover whereas trees/shrubs will be a long time.

 

[Hawk32]

Honestly I think if I could afford it I would to some south areas in tree planting and others in crp. But not wanting to loose income and cost of putting it in.