Food Plots in Clay

I mowed a strip on the power line for next year's food plot. The ground looks heavy. I plan to spray with Round up and disk in the spring. I'm planning to plant corn or milo. Will I have trouble getting crops to grow in clay? How can I improve the ground? Or should I just find another place to plant?

Larry in Michigan

Took me three years to get my clay in reasonable shape. Plant what ever and plow it under as a green fertlizer. Lots of lime and lots of disking but it looks good this year. This year I will plant wheat and finally use some 10-10-10 hope to get it in tomorrow. Hardest thing was to kill of the fescu grass.

See if you can get some old fashioned manure to spread on the plot. Also chicken manure works good I am told. Clay will grow good crops if treated right. Our farms in Ohio had lots pf clay but grew good vrops. Henry

I would suggest looking at it as if you were to plant a crop, get a soil test, get what you need, say like some organics, composted manure, rotted/decayed logs and till it in.

Use care around the power line easement or right of way etc., sometimes they frown upon use of their lands. I have one directly under a set of 115,000 volt lines, that tend to droop low in the heat/humidity, so I do not do any work when it's like that. The soils are also heavy clay, dark top soil, near a marsh, can't remember what the PH was but I have spread lime on it before.

I know some think it a thing that yuppy wanna be farmers do, but I get a lot of enjoyment out of planting several patches. It's a little different, as I work for a long time farmer/dairyman, though he may be having to retire, it was fun doing all the field work, spring planting, hay etc. so on a smaller scale with my own equipment, kind of an enjoyable hobby, and am thankful to have a place to do it.

I think it's also highly beneficial for the deer that frequent the area, because you only harvest a few, the rest keep eating some nutritious forage. There seems to be a lot of things you can grow for them too.

Seems the whitetail does like the young lush growth of many kinds of plants. The whitetail institute offers a nice selection of products, though some are a bit expensive, I think the $80 bag of No Plow, is a good deal. I over seed what they call for and it comes up thick. I plow/disc anyway and it comes up nice, just planted a bunch and though I won't get the height, little late, it still gets some traffic, nest year might switch over to some clover again, but that no plow will come up like crazy and grow nicely if you give it what it needs. I've also discovered that the whitetail around here absolutely crave the 2nd growth of oats, after the harvest, I've got one field in a valley that has been attracting 30+ deer, more like 40, which is unreal, I've never seen that many come in, don't think it's a population increase as much as a good food source, I've even planted some oats for the same reason, heck I've even got a piebald buck coming in, was also a doe, really enjoyable to watch em, though they can be a nuisance, nice to kmow there is some good quality venison to be had out there.

BillyNY;

I lease the powerline,aproxximately 8 acres, for $17.50 per year. It splits our 80. Leasing gives me some rights to keep quads,snowmobiles and hunters off. She told me I could use it for almost anything, as long as structures aren't permanent. It might be easier to plant the clay to green browse like alfalfa or clover. Some clover already grows there. There's also a farm that sells composted manure that I could disk in. It's only a small plot. I enjoy watching things grow too.

Larry in Michigan

Even better, my patch under the transmission lines was actually part of a pasture, was overgrown with a fence line that borders 7 acres of crop land, so when they came through with those log skidder chassis with super heavy duty brush hog/rotary cutters on them and cleared it, I kept it mowed, then plowed and disc's it, also had some 4"-6" hardwood stumps, but now is all clear. They are ok with an owner on both sides of their land keeping up the place, and now it just looks like it was added to the existing field, good thing is no houses will ever take its place and is a favorite hunting spot, real nice to look over ones patch while in the stand. Good composted manure and giving the soil what it needs for what you are growing, addressing PH, ought to get you a nice patch, mine is small too, about 75' x 200' but enough to provide some good forage, funny, last year they bypassed it for the 2nd growth of oats, something they like about those oats coming back up.