Deer Feeders

[bigorangmd]

Going to buy a game feeder. Wondering how to use it. I plan on putting out a few cameras and I primarily plan on using them to attract deer to the cameras. What I am less sure of is how beneficial they can be to the herds health. Is it enough to bother with working with the mixture for maximum nutrition or just use for camrea opportunity. I have 1000 acres of mixed beans, corn, and cotton (about 60% of open fields are in cotton). 20-30% hardwoods. Any other advice on how to maximize their use would be appreciated.

 

[BigGameGuy]

I have 1000 acres of mixed beans, corn, and cotton (about 60% of open fields are in cotton). 20-30% hardwoods. Any other advice on how to maximize their use would be appreciated.

Straight up honest advice...save your money. A feeder will provide little if any benefit at all if the above is true. The deer can be just as well positioned for a camera with a Trophy Rock or other mineral lick.

 

[TOW]

I have 1000 acres of mixed beans, corn, and cotton (about 60% of open fields are in cotton). 20-30% hardwoods. Any other advice on how to maximize their use would be appreciated.

Straight up honest advice...save your money. A feeder will provide little if any benefit at all if the above is true. The deer can be just as well positioned for a camera with a Trophy Rock or other mineral lick.

Maybe not this time of the year for mineral or Trophy Rock. Deer don't seem to hit minerals in winter. At least in southern Indiana. Tennessee might be different.

 

[BigGameGuy]

Maybe not this time of the year for mineral or Trophy Rock. Deer don't seem to hit minerals in winter. At least in southern Indiana. Tennessee might be different.

Absolutely correct, Tennessee is no different. The problem with providing a feeder during the winter-time when poor food resources dictate carrying capacity is that you artificially increase carrying capacity above what the land can normally provide. Over time this can create a huge problem especially if something happens to those feeders and they no longer support the winter needs of the inflated herd.

 

[BSK]

bigorangmd,


My views on this are highly biased, as I am very "anti" supplemental feeding unless absolutely necessary (and there are situations where supplemental feeding is necessary to see even decent performance from a deer herd).

Supplemental feeding has been shown in many scientific studies to produce a myriad of problems. Although some of those documented problems are greatly reduced in a winter feeding situation, others still exist or are enhanced by winter feeding.

Now I'll be the first to admit that a winter feeding program can benefit deer (extra high-energy food sources provided), but in your situation, with all of the cropland around, I question just how much benefit you would be providing your deer.

Now corn as camera bait is an accepted practice for conducting a winter census and should produce the results you are looking for this year and probably next, but I'm beginning to question corn as camera bait over the long term. I and others have noticed that over a period of years, corn loses its effectiveness as a census bait. For some reason, older bucks learn to avoid corn bait once it has been used for several years in a row. The first few years it is used, the census numbers look good, but by the third or fourth year, older bucks stop appearing in the baited census. To test whether corn was losing its effectiveness as a camera bait, a couple of years ago I ran dual camera censuses on the same property at the same time using both salt licks and corn (in a late summer census). I got very few older bucks over the corn but a plethora of older bucks over the salt, and the few older bucks I got over the corn where just in the background--passing through--not feeding on the bait. Now I realize salt licks won't work for a winter census hence corn may be the only option, but just be forewarned that corn as bait camera censuses may not remain effective over time.

 

[megalomaniac]

If you've got that much ag land, I'd leave several 2-3 ac blocks of standing corn unharvested and run the cams on the trails leading to the corn. As a plus, if you get a good buck on camera, you can still legally hunt him.

 

[CWT]

save your money. 50lb salt at the co-op $5.00

 

[buckdead]

waste of money. the squirrles and coons will benifit more from the feeders than the deer. watched a family of three coons run off a couple of deer during archery season couple years back.

 

[TOW]

Maybe not this time of the year for mineral or Trophy Rock. Deer don't seem to hit minerals in winter. At least in southern Indiana. Tennessee might be different.

Absolutely correct, Tennessee is no different. The problem with providing a feeder during the winter-time when poor food resources dictate carrying capacity is that you artificially increase carrying capacity above what the land can normally provide. Over time this can create a huge problem especially if something happens to those feeders and they no longer support the winter needs of the inflated herd.

I agree on the feeding problems.

I think way too may people think that the deer need a LOT of nutrition help when deer have done just fine for decades before food plots and feeders came into vogue.

To me the feeders and food plots basically do one thing - attract and hold deer on a property. The extra nutrition that they get from these sources is not all that great in the long run.

.

 

[bigorangmd]

Thanks everyone for the info. Never really felt the need to use it as supplement, just camera bait. Glad to know that salt blocks work just as well or better. I'll go with that option. This will be my first year to really try to do a serious camera census of the land. First year I tried didn't know that much about them and didn't get goo close pics. This past year Uncle Sam messed up my scouting plans. Going to try a serious push this year. Thanks!

 

[DBLAARCHERY]

If you hunt over or around crop land (corn) and you want to place a feeder for pics...It will have little or no effect on the herd around this area...I will add tho it is expensive and you can probably get the same results over salt or some kind of attractant at half the cost...

 

[In_my_sights]

Take the 600 you would have spent on corn and plant trees.

 

[BSK]

Thanks everyone for the info. Never really felt the need to use it as supplement, just camera bait. Glad to know that salt blocks work just as well or better. I'll go with that option. This will be my first year to really try to do a serious camera census of the land. First year I tried didn't know that much about them and didn't get goo close pics. This past year Uncle Sam messed up my scouting plans. Going to try a serious push this year. Thanks!

Just don't expect to get good post-season camera census numbers over salt. Salt licks as camera census bait works best in August. Salt lick usage drops off dramatically after early October and doesn't pick up again until March.

 

[bigorangmd]

So the question this begs is... Since I'm itching to play with my new toys, I was planning on using them as soon as season ended but what should I use to position animals close, or should I wait untill summer to start a camera census? I still need to get more camreas and am not very sure how many I will need since only about 200 acres are in hardwoods and that is mostly field edge creeks and depressions.

 

[BSK]

bigorangmd,

If your new toys are cameras, you can run a baited census as soon as the seson is over (or can be started now if you don't plan to hunt anymore this year). Your best option would be corn as bait for the cameras.

Or you can start running a non-baited census. Although I think the information you could gather this late in the season would be limited.

 

[TheLBLman]

Interesting discussion.

I have 1000 acres of mixed beans, corn, and cotton (about 60% of open fields are in cotton). 20-30% hardwoods. Any other advice on how to maximize their use would be appreciated.

Straight up honest advice...save your money. A feeder will provide little if any benefit at all if the above is true. The deer can be just as well positioned for a camera with a Trophy Rock or other mineral lick.

What if your "hunting area" consisted of about 2,000 acres of mixed habitat, mainly a mix of mature hardwoods in creek bottoms, pines on ridges, plus maybe 15 to 30% in clearcuts ranging from "fresh" to 5 years since cut?

Assuming financial cost was not a factor, if we placed several year-round feeders (and didn't feed during deer & turkey seasons), do you think the potential benefits might outweigh the potential problems?

 

[BSK]

Not me. But again, I'm not a fan of supplemental feeding.

 

[TheLBLman]

Supplemental feeding has been shown in many scientific studies to produce a myriad of problems.

Could you list some specific problems or potential problems please?

 

[Buck227]

With the rain we have had, it would seem to me that putting your cameras along trails would be more beneficial.

I used to dump a bag of corn over my salt licks to help them find the salt. It was consumed by other critters mainly coons. The salt was found by the deer anyway, later on. I salt the same spots every year and there is always a huge worn-down circle around the salt points by late summer.