Food plots
- Thread starter Drake1
- Start date
Most of my food plots are milo {sorghum} planted with a drill with 7 1/2-inch rows. You get thicker canopy cover faster, which seems to hold the birds better than 30" rows. I only put down preemergence (like atrazine and Duall} chemicals down at planting. The number of weeds in the rows will depend on when you get or don't get rain. Nothing else far as spraying
With any food plot you are going to get foot races down the rows. To help this, at the ends of the rows and several mid points, I make a pass or two 90 degrees to the main row direction. This creates a wall of sorts that helps slow down the track meet, and an area of dense cover.
Far as varieties, I just use extra seed that is used for a cash crop. Just ask your seed dealer about other types. Some get 5-6 feet, others 3 foot or so.
Stay away from sudan grass and forage sorghum. It gets really tall (5-6 feet) and does not stand up to wind and snow.
Good luck!
With any food plot you are going to get foot races down the rows. To help this, at the ends of the rows and several mid points, I make a pass or two 90 degrees to the main row direction. This creates a wall of sorts that helps slow down the track meet, and an area of dense cover.
Far as varieties, I just use extra seed that is used for a cash crop. Just ask your seed dealer about other types. Some get 5-6 feet, others 3 foot or so.
Stay away from sudan grass and forage sorghum. It gets really tall (5-6 feet) and does not stand up to wind and snow.
Good luck!
remy3424
Well-known member
Corn is fine, but we are doing all grain sorghum now. It gets a couple feet high, easy for the birds to get to. I am not worried about hunting the food plots, I want a good yield to feed the birds. I do the same as WDH for herbicide. When you are at your local Pheasants Forever banquet in a couple months from now, make a point to find their habitat guy. That person can give you a bit of guidance and just possibly provide the seed....our local chapter does this. I use a JD 7000 planter 30" rows with the corn seed units in it. Yep, droughts suck, the pre-emerge herbicide doesn't work well and the target crop suffers....the weeds will still do fine and they are better than nothing. This is in Iowa, not sure where you might be....why don't people ad this in their bios????
It is a Pioneer brand., 8925, (off the top of my head). It gets about2 1/2 to 3 foot tall. There are a lot of other good varieties/brands available. I would talk to your local seed dealers? There are probably varieties designed for food plots that would work for your area. your
As I mentioned before, my food plots are planted with left over seed from my farmed fields. hard to throw away $250 per bag seed.
As I mentioned before, my food plots are planted with left over seed from my farmed fields. hard to throw away $250 per bag seed.
515wingshooter
Active member
Do the pheasants like the sorghum? It has been my observation they prefer corn over soybeans
KEOutdoors
Well-known member
Pheasants love it over winter, not so much early season when theres grasshoppers/worms and fields and fields of cut corn/beans. Jan/feb its prime pheasant habitat and food.
Its not a great plot choice for hunting, but fantastic for overwintering birds on your property.
515wingshooter
Active member
I've hunted it in Southern IA in 2018 late season. Held a few roosters and a covey.
KEOutdoors
Well-known member
I suppose if you planted it with a corn planter on 30-36" rows it would be okay for walking. Otherwise its a tangly thick mess, and you beat down half of it trying to walk through. But then you lose what its best at, being bird cover late season.
Where I hunt in Iowa I have never found it in their crops, always corn and sometimes beans found. Ive flushed them out of sorghum while rabbit hunting in jan/feb many times. And while ice fishing you can watch them run to and from the sorghum plots in flocks, in feb/early March.
We are planting it for winter cover next year, and doing millet plots bordered by blue stem for hunting.
Wind River
Well-known member
Dirty milo holds phez and quail. The birds appear to us to stay and hide. Clean milo are highways for them. My experience in Kansas. You never have to leave a dirty milo field for more productive ground.
You don't see much of it anymore, but irrigated milo was crazy fun to hunt. Most of those irrigated circles have gone to corn and beans.
It's been several years since I've seen a harvested dryland milo field that enough cover to hold birds. They are great food sources, but modern dryland milo in the parts of Kansas I hunt runs a little too short and too clean to be productive hunting.
One KDWP biologist attributed PART of the decline in Kansas pheasant numbers to the shift of acres from milo to other crops. The nutritional value of milo isn't that much different than corn, but the harvested fields have more cover (even today) and there's more waste grain on the ground. We don't have extended periods of snow cover, so waste grain on the ground is normally perfect.
I have a farmer friend close to Wichita with quite a few acres. One chunk has several old hedgerows. The hedgerows are marginal habitat at best, but when milo was part of his rotation you could count on a couple of coveys in those hedgerows. It was a great place for a quick couple hour hunt 20 minutes from my house. 5-6 years ago he started having problems with sugarcane aphids in the milo. They don't attack other crops. Now there's no more milo in his rotations and I don't quail hunt out there anymore.
It's been several years since I've seen a harvested dryland milo field that enough cover to hold birds. They are great food sources, but modern dryland milo in the parts of Kansas I hunt runs a little too short and too clean to be productive hunting.
One KDWP biologist attributed PART of the decline in Kansas pheasant numbers to the shift of acres from milo to other crops. The nutritional value of milo isn't that much different than corn, but the harvested fields have more cover (even today) and there's more waste grain on the ground. We don't have extended periods of snow cover, so waste grain on the ground is normally perfect.
I have a farmer friend close to Wichita with quite a few acres. One chunk has several old hedgerows. The hedgerows are marginal habitat at best, but when milo was part of his rotation you could count on a couple of coveys in those hedgerows. It was a great place for a quick couple hour hunt 20 minutes from my house. 5-6 years ago he started having problems with sugarcane aphids in the milo. They don't attack other crops. Now there's no more milo in his rotations and I don't quail hunt out there anymore.
Wind River
Well-known member
The milo was replaced with soybeans, understood as more profitable.
remy3424
Well-known member
If you hunt near food plots of sorghum/milo, soybeans or corn in late season, that is what will be in their crops....assuming there is grain left in those plots. If you want to "hunt" in those plots, the plots need enough foliage (weeds and the target crop) to provide enough cover to feed and hide. Our 30" rows aren't the best at holding birds. I might try double row plant some of the sorghum this next season, not necessarily for the cover, but to hopefully produce more grain. We have an issue with something digging up the seeds once they sprout. With corn it was ridiculous bad, with the sorghum it still happens, but not as bad. I think it is thirteen line ground squirrels, but I am thinking I will set-up a few trail cams and find out for sure what is doing the damage. In Iowa, if you see grain sorghum, it is most likely a food plot for pheasants. I do like grain sorghum for plots, as it is easy for the birds to get to, much easier than corn. Pop open the PF Journal and you will get some ideas.
KEOutdoors
Well-known member
Remy, its either ground squirrel, chipmunks, or turkeys. All 3 are terrible about it and can go right down a row and ruin it all.
Milo is all we typically plant for our food plots, but this years stand is to clean and like others have said it’s a runway for birds. If it’s to clean they go in there to eat and don’t spend a lot of time in there. Drilling may be the best. The years it’s been dirty it has been a magnet for the birds.
remy3424
Well-known member
Someone told me pheasants could be the perpetrator...sure hope it is not them! I have only seen a couple turkeys there in the past 20 years, never seen a chipmunk there either...not the trees nearby that either of them need. I have always assumed it was the ground squirrels. What every it is, they do go right down the row....thus my desire to get more seeds into the ground. I thought about broadcasting corn out after I plant the plots to try to take the attention of the new plants.
remy3424
Well-known member
Unless the food plots are the only cover you have, I would not have any issues with clean food plots...nothing wrong with runways as long as there is enough foliage they aren't completely exposed. Our food plots are for food for the birds, not necessarily a place to hunt them. Maybe create some heavy cover close to the plots to keep them near for easy hunting.
Pheasants will dig up planted seed, both milo and corn. When seeds germinate, they give off a scent/ gas that pheasants (and other animals) can detect. Thats how they can go right down a row and get every seed. If you get enough birds, or slow germination. they can clean out several acres. Once the plants get big enough the pheasants move on to other foods.
If the holes are round/even pits, it is pheasants. Ground squirrels dig them out from the side, plus if you look close enough you can see claw marks.
Putting bird repellant powder on the seed is hit or miss. So is extra untreated seed on the ground, that just seems to attract more birds.
If the holes are round/even pits, it is pheasants. Ground squirrels dig them out from the side, plus if you look close enough you can see claw marks.
Putting bird repellant powder on the seed is hit or miss. So is extra untreated seed on the ground, that just seems to attract more birds.