This is why I plant Sugar Beets...

[Steve Oehlenschlager]

Because shed hunting only takes 3 minutes. 8 sheds from 7 different bucks. And of course one wolf casualty that I found 100 yds off the field. Actually found remains from 3 different deer that were killed. Two of them were only yards apart.

 

[phil@thesidehill]

thats one heckuva haul....now you just need to match up those singles!

 

[bwoods11]

Nice shed hunt!!

 

[Steve Oehlenschlager]

I looked for a while in the surrounding area and could not find one. Kind of strange there were so many singles.

 

[phil@thesidehill]

I looked for a while in the surrounding area and could not find one. Kind of strange there were so many singles.

If you have a handle on the bedding area/s I'm sure a nice little cruise from the plot back through the staging area/s into the travel corridors leading to/from bedding would produce the matches. Any ideas on how long they were laying on the ground? Only a few of the matches i have found were laying together (withing sight of each other), most were usually several hundred yards apart.

 

[tooln]

Nice finds.

 

[Steve Oehlenschlager]

The problem with my land is that it is virtually all a bedding area. We find beds pretty much anywhere. Also the place where these fields are is surrounded by a small 5 acre piece of woods and then more field. So if the deer were not bedding close to the field, then they came from 400 yds away. But like I said before, the cover is nice and thick that we have very few areas that are not bedding areas. At deer thirty they will show up from all sides of the fields at once and all at the same time.

 

[j-bird]

I have a question - do you have any exp with other brassica's before you went to sugarbeets? My deer essentially refuse to eat brassica - too many other/better options is what I tell myself. Obviously your deer like them - I may consider sugarbeets, but Iam affraid they will be ignored. I will have to look into it.

 

[Steve Oehlenschlager]

I have planted other brassicas, but really don't as much anymore because I am looking for tonnage. If you plant your brassicas late, then you run into rainfall issues for growth. If you plant them early, then you get weeds. Sugar beets fit the bill. I figure based on commercial fields that get about 20-25 tons an acre of beets. Mine were in the ball park of about 10-15 tons an acre. I had .4 acres. That is 4 to 6 tons of feed. I had some isolated beets that were over 10 pounds each! That is feed they use after the corn and beans are gone that can't be replaced by anything else. They will and do dig thru 2 foot of snow to get to them.

 

[Freeborn]

I have a question - do you have any exp with other brassica's before you went to sugarbeets? My deer essentially refuse to eat brassica - too many other/better options is what I tell myself. Obviously your deer like them - I may consider sugarbeets, but Iam affraid they will be ignored. I will have to look into it.

Do a test plot like I am this year. This year I am planting my Brassicas seperate but next to each other so I can see how they compare. This will be my first year with sugar beets and I am planting about 1/5 of an acre of them.

 

[Steve Oehlenschlager]

They do start eating the leaves about mid sept, but only nip at the beet until later. Normally it is my early season kill plot, but my deer did not touch them until later last year. That was fine with me though. I had 14 acres of food and wolf issues so my food got saved until later in the fall and winter. Of course my deer all came back in mid to late December. My woods were devoid of deer from Oct 20 to Dec 15th from the wolves. Yet people down the road were seeing deer like crazy. Normally it is the exact opposite. We normally suck in and hold 40-50 on 250 acres during the fall.

 

[Da U.P. 'eh]

Steve,

When do you plant your sugar beets?

 

[Steve Oehlenschlager]

Plant them early in the spring like corn. Might plant some beets tomorrow or Tuesday. Definitely within a week. They need all season to thrive. They start off soooooo slow and then take off. Just remember that the mass of the best doesn't start until late July or August. They need to get big so they can make the beet later.

 

[sandbur]

Steve-are you adding lots of lime for those beets?

Was that a dead wolf or a dead deer from wolves?

 

[Steve Oehlenschlager]

I lime virtually everything I have to a PH of 7. That way I can plant all my areas with virtually anything and not have to worry my soil is not good. Everything I start with is at 5.3 or lower. I had a major wolf problem last October into November so it was dead deer from wolves.

 

[Steve Oehlenschlager]

We found 3 dead deer from wolves in a 2 acre area. Not sure how many more out there, but considering every deer in the neighborhood lived in my woods and ate all my food, that this is where the wolves would find them.