2014 - 2015 Deer Season Part 1 - Preparations

Going into this year, I knew things were going to be a lot different than last year. With a new baby on the way, I knew my time to do projects over the summer and time to hunt in the fall would be limited compared to 2013. With that in mind, I knew that I was going to have to pick and choose which management projects that I would complete for the year. The one thing that separated my property from the thousands of neighboring acres are the food plots that I plant, so I knew that food plots had to be my first priority. The second priority was to create thick bedding areas on the property hoping that deer would begin to spend more time on my property instead of just passing through.

In mid-March I headed to the cabin to put out my Trophy Rock mineral and do a little shed hunting. I found my first ever shed antler on the property laying in the middle of the big field food plot. It was a very large 5 point side. I found a second shed antler from a different deer the next day. It was sitting 10 yards behind one of our tree stands in the middle of the woods.

The 2 sheds that I found

In late January I met with Jesse Knox from Dbltree Habitat Services to look over my property. I ended up hiring them to perform Timber Stand Improvement (TSI) on 6 acres on the East side of my property. Timber stand improvement involves selectively cutting low value trees. The benefit is that crop trees, such as Oaks, are released and allowed to thrive with less competition for water, nutrients and sunlight. Also, more light is allowed to reach the forest floor allowing undergrowth and younger trees to flourish. This provides a lot of cover and browse for deer (as well as other wildlife).

Good TSI is suppose to look like tornado damage

They also completed 2 acres worth of edge feathering along the entire west boarder of the woods. The goal of edge feathering is to provide both a physical and visual screen along the edge of the woods to help funnel the deer into and out of the food plots. It also provides benefits to other animals like rabbits and song birds.

Trees dropped along the big field as part of the edge feathering

Edge feathering creates quite a mess along the edge of the woods

The timber work seems to have paid off already in year one. We noticed that turkey nesting was much more successful on our property this year with at least 2 hens with 5 poults each. We also had many more does with fawns on the property throughout the spring and summer months.

One of many pictures of hens and poults
that the trail cameras produced

Fawns don't get much smaller then this

The next project for the year was to plant food plots. One observation that we noticed with our food plots in 2013 is that there were large gaps in time when the deer seemed to not favor the foods we had planted. I went to work on figuring out how to provide different kinds of food that would hold deer on the property throughout the fall. Ironically I settled on a food plot rotation designed by Paul Knox of Dbltree Habitat (the same company that performed my TSI work). The goal of the rotation is to provide food for the deer year round in 1 food plot as well as to build up the soil through crop rotation (similar to rotating beans and corn).

Once things started to green up in April, I took a trip down to spray glyphosate on all of the food plots to eliminate weed competition. Then dad and I headed down the weekend after Bridget was born and worked from sun up to sun down on Saturday. The plan was to lime, fertilize, till and plant 2 acres in total. We left the original 1/2 acre of clover planted in the big field the previous spring but planted the remaining 1 1/2 acres to annual clover and oats. We also planted food plot screen across the north end and up the west side of the big field.

Tilling up 1 1/2 acres of the big field

Big field after spring planting was complete

1/2 acre of clover in the big field planted in 2013

In the small field we planted perennial clover with oats with plot screen across the north end. It had been quite awhile since that field has been tilled, so it really put our ATV and disk to the test. I think it turned out really well and it was this food plot that made all the difference this season (more on that in my 2nd post).

Dad tilling up the small field

Clover in the small field turned out great!

In mid-June I took a trip to the cabin with Abigail and Hunter. I don't think it could have been any more fun. She had fun running around playing outside, roasting hot dogs by the camp fire, and riding the ATV with me to check trail cameras. Weekends like that one are the reason I bought the cabin in the first place.

Enjoying the outdoors

Picking some flowers to take home to mommy

Weekends at the cabin make for one tired puppy

I was a bit short on help last summer because mom and dad had a lot of weekends filled up and my brother-in-law Mike had some unexpected events come up that prevented him from helping out as well so I talked my father-in-law Kurt into helping out for a weekend. (Ok...so it wasn't that hard to talk him into it). We headed down in the middle of July to mow off the oats that were planted and to plant 1/2 acre of turnips, radishes and rape.

Kurt manning the mower

With all of the spring and early summer rain, the oats,
weeds and grasses had grown 6 feet tall

A return trip in August showed the turnips and radishes
that Kurt and I planted were doing very well

With the good growing weather and no drought conditions this year, several of our apple trees actually produced fairly well this year. Any apples that fell off throughout the fall did not last long and one of the apple trees had a deer scrape open up below it.

Finally! A decent crop of apples

For the 3rd year in a row we were able to have a family camp out at the cabin over Labor Day weekend. Everything was very wet and muddy and we all left a day early due to more rain in the forecast, but everyone had a great time.

Grandma and Grandpa being silly with the grand kids

Erin brought Bridget down for her first visit to the cabin

The kids enjoying s'mores

Of course the weekend couldn't be all fun and games. Dad and I had a lot of work to do. When we got there Friday night, there was rain in the forecast overnight, so I hooked up the mower and stayed up well after dark mowing the yard and both clover food plots. By the time I was done I was exhausted and soaked to the bone. The next morning, dad and I headed to the bottom of the deep ravine to clear out the trees that fell as part of the TSI done in early spring. Miserable does not even begin to describe how we felt.

Soaked and operating chainsaws in a running creek

The remainder of the day was filled with extreme frustration as we tried to plant a 1 acre food plot of rye, oats, peas and clover. The field was extremely wet. I managed to get the ATV stuck 3 times while pulling the disk and ended up taking a break for a couple hours in hopes that the field would dry out a bit. We got back out after eating an early dinner and were able to get the planting completed just as the sun was setting.

Pulling the disk through the muddy ground caused the
ATV to overheat (notice the seat is removed to help it cool down)

Even with all the struggles, the food plot turned out great

Since the weather forced us to leave a day early, dad and I had to return the following weekend to finish placing tree stands. It turned out to be a great thing anyways because we had recovered from the previous weekend and ended up getting the work done much more quickly.

View from a new tree stand placed on the west fence line

I also took the opportunity to sight in the new barrel/scope combo that I bought for my shotgun (see the 2nd blog post from last year to find out why this was necessary)

Sighted in at 100 yards

I had planned to take Abigail bow hunting with me for the 1st time this year, but she was still struggling a little bit to walk through the taller grasses and woods on her own. That wouldn't necessarily be a big deal, however, the problem would be if I shot a deer and had to track it with her in tow. Instead, I decided to take her down the weekend before bow season opened to sit in a ground blind and watch for deer. We took our supper, chairs, and plenty of books and activities in a bucket to the ground blind on the small field. She had a great time watching for deer and reading books. We even saw a doe with 2 fawns!

Abigail watching for deer

Of course I couldn't end my first post without a mention of my best buddy. Hunter was disappointed at the lack of trips to the cabin this year, but he did take advantage of every single trip. It is still one of my favorite things to see his excitement when he realizes that we are getting in the truck to go to the cabin. It is his favorite place on earth!

Hunter exited to be back at the cabin

Check back in the next couple of weeks for part 2 of the 2014 - 2015 deer season. Thanks for reading!