Bowsnbucks
5 year old buck +
Anyone have experience with frost-seeding alfalfa in the above zones?? If so - must the plot be clean of debris?
There is no denying alfalfa's strong preference to the local deer herd. If it weren't for the fact that you need to hay it to sustain it I'd certainly give it more of a shot.I’m thinking of starting over on one of my clover fields this year and trying an alfalfa monoculture. I know it’s not easy and it takes regular mowing, but good lord do the deer love alfalfa fields in my area (Z3 WI)!
Look for grazing varieties as opposed to the more common "haying" varieties. Lower, more prostrate growth habit, designed for livestock grazing. May (not sure here) not be as dependent upon haying (mowing AND removing hay) and could persist a while from the deer heavily chowing and defacating on it.Does anyone know of an alfalfa variety that might be considered the best for food plotters? I usually just buy whatever is in the bin at my local feed n seed.
I'll have to try some alfalfa in a throw & roll this year, just to see what shakes out. Probably do it sometime in August with a little red clover at the same time. The plot that drew the most deer for us before was a plot of alfalfa and Starfire red clover. Deer were in it like flies on a roadkill. We started that plot with a clean seed bed, though. I'll see what a T&R does. Thanks for the info!Bowsnbucks, I don't really frost seed anything because every time I tried it, it failed. But I do TnM alfalfa often in both the spring and fall. I always have some plant in my plots. Due to TnM practices I never have clean plots to work with, in fact I suspect I trend to more debris than most. With that said I have no clue what my success rate would be. I go very diverse mixes so knowing if it worked, worked well, or just kind of worked isn't even on my radar. But to the point, I can get alfalfa to grow in debris. I suspect to get a great stand of it you'd be well off to have a nice clean seed bed.
IME, alfalfa doesn't do well when frostseeded. Alfalfa prefers to be seeded deeper than clover. It may do ok when frostseeded into heavier ground that really heaves with deep frost.