Food plot ?

[jpv]

Has anyone on here had any luck growing turnips for a food plot?

 

[Bacon]

They can be grown. Are you asking if the deer like them? I would guess so. Cows go crazy over them.

 

[Allen]

I've seen them being used as a cover crop before. Seems like they do ok.

I know a couple stray seeds in a food plot I put out 2 years ago got left behind and sprouted last spring. I had a handful of turnips that were about 12 inches in diameter.

 

[LBrandt]

I know some ranchers in southeastern nd plant turnips in their wheat stubble for fall nibbles for their cows. Have seen a lot of deer grazing this as well. Deer also like sugar beets.

 

[jpv]

They can be grown. Are you asking if the deer like them? I would guess so. Cows go crazy over them.

Both. Will the deer leave them alone and let them develop or eat them as soon as the tops pop out of the ground?

 

[Vollmer]

Good way to put some natural nitrogen into the ground.

 

[USMCDI]

They grew for me and the deer weren't mowing them off but the rabbits raised holy hell. Am I the only one with a major rabbit problem? I know I've shot well over 50 in my yard alone this summer. I waited until they were up and going until I fertilized them and they took off along with everything else in the food plot. Moisture was my problem this year, everything just hung out kind of like my beans and corn and with these two wet weeks it's really made a comeback.

 

[NDwalleyes]

I planted about 2 acres of them last year as an experiment. Two separate plots, both surrounded by corn on 3 sides. It was interesting, the deer were in them early. It was common to see 5 or more deer in the plot at a time during July and August, but come september...nothing.

We had turnips the size of softballs with huge leaves so I was hoping that come november they would move back in and eat the leaves once they dried down, as their leaves get quite sweet late in the year. Rifle season came and I never saw a deer in them. Even watched to see if they would paw at the turnips during the winter months...nope.

Always heard they were great for deer, and maybe they are, but I'm thinking they like corn better at this point.

 

[Fracman]

Deer are funny one of my baits last year they loved sugar beet could not keep any beets in there. Then in another bait they would not touch them.

 

[USMCDI]

I've tried about 20 different varieties of food plot mixes and they all grew really well but the best I've ever seen in late season and winter were standing soybeans. Had some flowers get hailed out and we tried to seed beans pretty late then it was uncommonly dry like this year and they weren't worth combining so we left them all winter and on any given day in the winter there were over 100 deer in there, found shitloads of sheds that year. That was a half section down the shitter.

 

[Auggie]

Turnips don't fix nitrogen in he soil. Bacteria that nodulate on legume roots do. Turnips are great nitrogen scavengers though. They decompose easily the following year and mineralize the scavenged nitrogen.

 

[Tikka280ai]

Soybeans are what you want to plant to put nutrients back into the soil. I mixed Soybeans and corn in the planter this year and it is looking really good considering I didn't plant it until the middle of June

 

[LBrandt]

I think the trick for getting the deer into the food plots is later planting so the greens are tender when everything else is getting rank and tough. Corn is corn they will always like for the protein.

 

[Auggie]

I'm trying winter wheat in my deer plots this year. They need the winter to vernalize, but I thought if I plant it as a full season thing, there will be ample amounts of biomass and it will stay green late into the year. It will also be the first thing to green up next spring and provide good food for the deer then. I'll terminate it then when I plant the rest of my plots in June or early July next year.

 

[bucksnbears]

turnips CAN work good . seems deer take a year to really get accustom to them though.
a deep tilled seed bed should be done. they seem to be favored as a late season food source. never had much luck with them as an early season attractant.
i plant mine about July 20-25th and hope for a good rain.

 

[Davey Crockett]

Beets are another thing they adapt to if you can get bulk beet seed. Last year or the year before in our garden they went down the row and ate all the tops off and I thought that was a blessing till I went back out a few days later to dig a couple beets for supper and all but about 5 feet of a 50' row had been pawed out and eaten, Bet they crapped red after that for a while.

 

[jpv]

Thanks for all the input. I think I'm gonna give the turnips a try and see what happens. Just looking for something short to surround my 2 acre plot of corn. Want to try something that isn't available for the deer to eat around the area I hunt so I don't know it could go either way for me but I'm willing to give it a go and see what happens.

 

[NodakBuckeye]

There was a guy who planted the equalivent of a little under a section in giant radishes, like a daikon. There is a guy in Ohio that promotes cover crops and uses no fertilizer, etc... anywho those things will grow in Ohio until after Thanksgiving at least. Deer loved them. After we saw temps into the teens, all that would die and the surrounding country would smell like a sauerkraut factory for days and days.