I want to plant a nice little plot at our ranch in Jackson county, a little north of Edna. ( 25 miles or so north east of Victoria). I have planted oats and clover at our place in the hill country, but never anything down here. Any suggestions for me? type of seed or mixture? or when to plant? I will definantly be fencing it off to keep hogs and cattle out. Thank for any advice!

Winter oats is always a good choice...it is the main seed in what i use along with vetch and weat.

If it was me, contact your local biologiest, TPWD, and see what they recommend. It's free if you get on their program and they are usaully dialed in on the local area food.

You can also take a soil sample and send it in to your local co-op of biologist to see what would work best and which fertilizer to use if you need to. I would think that area oats would be fine. are you planning on discing then spreading or drilling or just broadcasting?

all good info... i have a disc/ground prep tool that i can pull behind my honda atv that i was planning on using, then broadcasting seed. looking at a plot of maybe 1/2 an acre.

That should work well. if you got some old tires to make a drag or that disc would work to. dragging the top of the soil to cover will help to. just gettin a little soil over it keep seed loss to a minimum

1/2 acre will not do much for you if you have a lot of deer. 3-5 deer eating every day will keep it mowed down. I would plant it heavy with oats if you are going to try. 100#/acre rate. I would get something to roll the seed in if I could in sandy soils. Check ph and soil test and lime/feritlize accordingly. One word of caution army worms have been bad just north of you in 3 of the last 6 years. I would not plant till Oct 1st.

If you're planting half an acre I would just over seed with oats. Can you add some smaller plots in the area?

I'm about 45 miles north of Victoria and have had good results with crimson clover, bob oats, dwarf essex rape and purple top turnips. I try something different every year but those are the seeds I plant every year.

I would do a soil test asap, the 10-20 dollars you spend will repay you back the first time you fertilize.

Here's a small plot with oats, clover, turnips and rape.

Turnips are always a good choice but can take deer a while to learn what they are. Clovers work great also just not sure what his deer numbers are and if they will allow it to even get started well. Army worms loved my clover the first year and wiped it out along with oats and all I had left was Austrian Winter Peas. If you can put up an electric fence to keep hogs and deer and any livestock of the plot to allow it to establish it will do much better also. Great looking plot if that was last year it looked really great Payne.

I like to use turnips/rape as a border plant in the plot. Plant oats then T/R then wheat/clover/rye/etc and so on.

Hate army worms almost as much I hate hogs.

Clovers are hard to maintain but they are a magnet. I've had pretty good luck with them up here.

That plot has a fencer on three sides but the hogs can come up the branch. I have a cot in the blind.

What clovers you had the best luck with? I love to add them in the fall but like winter dormant varieties that start grow in late Feb or early March and then they grow till heat of July or so if does not rain. Madrid and Hubam are my two choices for that.

I like crimson, I tried apache it didn't work as good.

I have handseeded crimson on Hill Country rocky soil and got it to grow really well the first year and then it reseeded itself for a decent second year then a spotted 3rd year. It was done like burr clover by April though. The Madrid will grow to late Aug. Hubam can reseed itself very well. Both are taller growing clovers also. Madrid will get to tractor fender height in August with good rains.

That's good info to know, thanks. That's the problem I have with clover, no rain. I'll test those this year.

Well then I am glad to know that I am not the only one who misses the rains. The lack of rain in Dec or Jan is not that bad with Madrid as it has put its roots down when planted in Sept by then. It is just not growing much foliage till later.

Guys, excuse me for jumping but are you saying I can plant clover with my oats & Austrian WP in Late Sept/early Oct and the clover will come up in the late spring on it's own with no additional discing or tractor work? We have had a cool summer until the last 2-3 days with spotted showers. If so how many lbs to the acre?

Depends on how the plot is takin care of...if those oats are huge and not manicured they will smother out the clover...i use arrowhead clover and it comes up durrin the winter if its mild and they ware down the oats fast

I used to plant 100# of oats, 6# of purple top turnips and 20# of madrid clover per acre in my food plots. They all came up in the fall with good rains. The clover was more dorment till early March then it started to grow and continued into July. It was a good mix. They ate the oats first and left turnips till first frost then worked on them. Ate both till clover took off. If you can set a shredder to a height of about 12" and move the tops off everything in late May the clover will really jump. If you plant a cool season clover then it will grow well in cool months. You might cut back on oats to 70# per acre and 3# of turnips.

I've planted turnips 3 years in a row,this is n.e.wood county.Then watch deer walk thru them and pay no attention to them,Then same with rye grass,The best i ever got was with oats and wheat .
I have tried black eyed pea's,BUT they break ground,They don't get a chance.

I want to try peanuts next.

Iv watched our deer paw turnips out of the ground...i couldnt figure out what in the world he was doin untill i walked down there after the hunt

Turnips work awesome up north when mixed with wheat or oats. The deer usually start eating them after the first freeze (a chemical reaction occurs with the plant making it taste better). I will not use them in Texas because it usually doesn't freeze until after thanksgiving. A good rule of thumb is when your bell peppers die, it is time to start hunting the turnips.

I planted oats, turnips and clover for a several yr in the Hill Country and the last 2 yrs clover and turnips only and deer at the tops before we had a freeze. They did like them better after a freeze but still ate them before.

yeah, I am sure they have modified the turnips these days to taste better before a freeze. And, it might also depend on what else is available to eat. Up north, I have watched deer tear up the turnips a couple days after a hard freeze. I mean not even touch the wheat/oats and only tear up the turnips. It is fun to watch from the stand.

Almost everything I learned as a kid growing up farming has changed. They can make stuff grow on concrete now a days.

I used purple tops and this was in the early 90's. They would eat the tops first then work on the turnips itself around Jan. or so. Any rain and they were all over the new growth. With a freeze they are supposed to get sweet tasting.