I visited my land in the town of Almond, Portage county WI today. There is still snow in the shaded areas and the ground is real greasy. I wanted to see my winter food plots. 5 acres of RR corn is gone. Small RR ag soy bean fields are gone. However, my 6 acre large RR ag soy bean field is almost untouched. The pods are just thick and hanging like in December.
Two things happened different this winter. My land was not the only food source. A local farmer left up about 40 acres of corn in two areas to the West and North of my land. Next, I did not see ANY turkey sign on my land. Last year there were two different flocks of 40+ birds that just lived in the soy bean fields. One theory I have is that I believe I have a serious coyote problem and they are keeping the turkeys out of the soy bean field. Possibly the turkeys are in the standing corn fields as they are adjacent to great roosting areas. I believe the standing corn kept the deer from migrating to my land, as last winter I had 50 to 60 deer yarding on or just adjacent to it.
Here is my question. What do I do with this field if it is not eaten by the time planting season arrives? I was thinking of rotating it into a dwarf Essex rape seed food plot, so that would give the deer and turkeys until late July or early August before I planted it. Even then there might be a whole lot of soy beans left. All my food plots are usually totally gone by the end of February in the past several years so I have never had this situation arise. Should I just disk it under in May and spray it with Roundup until I decide to plant rape seed in it? The soy beans would be volunteers and I would use them as a cover crop and soil builder plus keep the weed under control for the rape seeding. There is no chance of it getting picked. Too small and wrong time of the year.
The 5 acre corn field is due to be rotated to no till RR ag soy beans this season. I have kicked around not planting any corn if that much is going to be left up in my neighborhood, which is always a guessing game.
Any suggestions are welcome.
Two things happened different this winter. My land was not the only food source. A local farmer left up about 40 acres of corn in two areas to the West and North of my land. Next, I did not see ANY turkey sign on my land. Last year there were two different flocks of 40+ birds that just lived in the soy bean fields. One theory I have is that I believe I have a serious coyote problem and they are keeping the turkeys out of the soy bean field. Possibly the turkeys are in the standing corn fields as they are adjacent to great roosting areas. I believe the standing corn kept the deer from migrating to my land, as last winter I had 50 to 60 deer yarding on or just adjacent to it.
Here is my question. What do I do with this field if it is not eaten by the time planting season arrives? I was thinking of rotating it into a dwarf Essex rape seed food plot, so that would give the deer and turkeys until late July or early August before I planted it. Even then there might be a whole lot of soy beans left. All my food plots are usually totally gone by the end of February in the past several years so I have never had this situation arise. Should I just disk it under in May and spray it with Roundup until I decide to plant rape seed in it? The soy beans would be volunteers and I would use them as a cover crop and soil builder plus keep the weed under control for the rape seeding. There is no chance of it getting picked. Too small and wrong time of the year.
The 5 acre corn field is due to be rotated to no till RR ag soy beans this season. I have kicked around not planting any corn if that much is going to be left up in my neighborhood, which is always a guessing game.
Any suggestions are welcome.