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Bigger Bucks Every Year with Pro Tools
By J. Wayne Fears

J. Wayne Fears

Pottstown PA --(Ammoland.com)- My brother Terry and I decided that if we wanted to take big bucks every year, we had to find new and better places to hunt each year, or we had to make the site that we hunted more productive, Mark Drury, a friend of mine, told me not long ago.

Mark and Terry Drury of Drury Outdoors and the hosts of “Wildlife Obsession,” “Dream Season” and “Bow Madness” on the Outdoor Channel, and each and every year, they harvest big whitetails.

Their secrets to buck-hunting success include, according to Mark Drury, that they;

• “define the feeding area and the bedding region;
• “set-up our green fields, so that we know where the deer will be feeding in relationship to where they’ll be bedding;
• “create stand sites on the trails the deer take from their feeding site to their bedding area;
• “put-out trail cameras along the trails the deer travel from the feeding area to the bedding region; and
• “create small green patches on the sides of the trails where the deer travel to give the deer a place to stop-off and eat a little bite of a different type of food before they reach their primary feeding area. Those small green patches are where we set-up our tree stands to take deer with our bows.”

Hunters put in long hours for bigger bucks.

Perhaps now you think this game plan is one for the pre-season that should occur in July, August or September. However, you can make the land you hunt better for big deer right now in the dead of winter.

Here’s why – most of the foliage has disappeared, and the sap’s down in all the bushes and non-commercial trees. You can take your Woodman’s Pal and create a place to plant those small green fields next fall. You also can pick-out the trees where you want to hang your tree stands and clear-away most of the limbs and brush that may interfere with your shots next year during hunting season.

Also, clear a path to a tree to put your trail camera to get photos of the bucks left on the property after hunting season.

To increase your property’s ability to pull and hold deer, put-out a feeder where you intend to plant your little green patches. Because food is scarce during the winter months, that feeder will start drawing deer to your land. With your trail camera, you can see the buck potential that property will have the next year. To increase the drawing power of that feeder, add a little C’Mere Deer powder to the product you’re feeding.

As Mark Drury says, “You either can find better land to hunt every year or improve the land where you hunt.”

Using the Woodman’s Pal, you can prepare your land and your hunting sites for deer-hunting success next season. For more tips and tactics on how to better manage your land for wildlife and to learn more about the Woodman’s Pal and its many-different uses, go to www.protoolindustries.net.

Filed under: Hunting News by Ammoland No Comments »

How To “Go Green” With Vita-Rack Seed Mixes
Hunter’s Specialties Wildlife Biologist Rodney Dyer Explains.

Hunter's Specialties

Cedar Rapids, IA – -(AmmoLand.com)- Rodney Dyer, certified wildlife biologist and consultant to Hunter’s Specialties®, recently explained how consumers can save money and reduce the amount of chemical fertilizer needed to maintain healthy food plots.

“Hunter’s Specialties believes strongly in conservation when it comes to wild game and the environment,” said Dyer. “They have developed a crop rotation plan that reduces the amount of fertilizer needed for optimum growth. Using the Vita- Rack™ Nutritional Plan for your food plot can not only help you grow a healthy deer herd but save the soil and the ‘green’ in your wallet.

By rotating the three Vita-Rack seed blends: Vita-Rack Velvet™ Whitetail Clover, Booming Beans™ High Protein Mix and Winter Forage™, you can cut the cost of needed fertilizer by as much as 40%, depending on your location in the country.”

“In the fall, prepare your food plots as normal (follow the directions on the back of the bag). Then plant a plot in Velvet Mix (Plot A). Velvet Mix consists of several highly attractive clovers that the deer will find irresistible. Plant another plot in Winter Forage Mix (Plot B). Winter Forage Mix is a blend of turnips, rape, Alsike clover and sugar beets that provide tons of fall and winter forage for deer. Winter Forage Mix is also full of carbohydrates to help deer maintain their body temperature through the toughest winters. Plot A and Plot B will need to be fertilized with the proper fertilizer recommendations (on the back of the bag). After the first planting you will not need any other fertilizer but 0-20-20, because the Velvet and Booming Beans Mixes are both legumes that fix nitrogen from the atmosphere and deposit it in the soil. Winter Forage Mix will use up the added nitrogen in the soil from the legumes in the Velvet and Booming Beans Mixes.

In Plot A leave the Velvet Mix growing for about three years. During that time rotate Plot B using Winter Forage and Booming Beans each summer and fall. The Winter Forage Mix will use the nitrogen up that the Booming Beans Mix makes so you don’t have to use a Nitrogen fertilizer each time. You will however, need to use a 0-20-20 fertilizer at the first of each planting to replace the Potassium and Phosphorus used by the plants. Don’t forget to fertilize your Velvet Mix in Plot A with 0-20-20 fertilizer each spring and fall.

After three years, swap the plots. In Plot A, switch to planting the Winter Forage Mix and Booming Beans Mix in rotation and in Plot B plant the Velvet Mix. Plot A now has plenty of nitrogen from the clover (a legume), fixating it in the soil over the past three years while it was growing. The Winter Forage mix will flourish on the added nitrogen.

Rotating the different Vita-Rack mixes works well because too much soil nitrogen will actually slow plant growth and cause diseases. Keeping the nitrogen levels in balance by rotating the crops eliminates using extra artificial nitrogen, which is great for the environment and produces up to a 45% savings in fertilizer investment for consumers.”

For more information, log onto the Hunter’s Specialties website at www.hunterspec.com, write to 6000 Huntington Court NE, Cedar Rapids, Iowa 52402, or call a Consumer Service Specialist at 319-395-0321.

Filed under: Conservation News by Ammoland 1 Comment »