BROWNSTOWN
When your mother told you to eat your vegetables so you would grow up big and strong, she did not factor in the possible trade-off of getting shot.
She might threaten to withhold dessert if you scorned radishes, turnips, peas or kale as part of your diet, but that’s as far as it went.
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Click here to purchase photos from this galleryFood plots for deer are a different matter. Those health food choices planted by hunters represent a buffet of goodies for whitetail deer, an assortment of enticing vegetables that may induce them to stay in the neighborhood, and yes, grow big and strong with monumental, record-book antlers.
“A stress-free deer is going to produce bigger antlers,” said Jeremy Steinkamp, who operates Whitetail Essentials Deer Products from his Brownstown home. “It’s very good for their overall health.”
Officially referring to himself as a “plot management consultant,” Steinkamp is a deer farmer of sorts, someone who tills the soil on demand for landowners who wish to grow crops that are favorites for deer.
Weeks and months of good eating can lead to a big buck conveniently hanging out during fall hunting season. The hunter who fed the deer may kill it with a bow and arrow, shotgun or rifle, and as turnabout, the deer meat may feed him and his family for months.
From the earliest of days, mankind was food-motivated in the woods, like the other animals roaming the wild spending their waking days on the prowl for their next meal.
Although people have evolved to mostly filling refrigerators with grocery store purchases, the other species out there have mostly the same old, outdoor options, staying on the move to find the necessary nutrition on the land.
If there is a 1-acre food plot of turnips or radishes for the nibbling, the deer do not have to search the forest for eats. The risk is on the back end. One day, the food suppliers become deer killers, and in a Russian roulette scenario, the animal may give up its life for all of that previous free food.
“An attractant is what it is,” Steinkamp said. “Hunters are going to put their tree stands off to the edge.”
This once again proves the adage that on this earth, there is no free lunch.
Food plots are a food plot
The fact is the establishment of a food plot is a plot, a clever development in the ongoing man-versus-deer hunting contest of the last century, the period of time when deer survival in the United States was threatened because the herds were so thin, to the point when they have proliferated to the point of being everywhere, hazards on the road, chewing on your flowers, loitering in your yard and eating all the crops you don’t want them to devour.
A recent issue of Outdoor Life magazine claims the origins of food plots really date back only about three decades.
One day, the famous Ray Scott, who created the Bassmaster fishing tour, was in the organization’s offices carrying some blue pellets and throwing around the unfamiliar term “food plot.” He said the pellets would grow clover and deer would flock to the site. “Plow, lime and fertilize a piece of ground,” he said.
Scott said if the seeds were planted, bigger bucks would result. Some of the listeners were skeptical. The then-editor, and Scott, though, teamed up on their own plot to provide interested readers with the seeds and establish personal food plots. “Food plotting was born,” the magazine recently wrote.
Whether that arrangement took food plots from ground zero to their current status of being widely used by thousands of hunters across the country, is a bold statement.
Still, much like hitters stepping into the batter’s box to face a pitcher’s 100 mph heat, hunters are always looking for an edge, a way to outsmart or out-flank prey, so they do not either go meatless or they have a reasonable shot at a deer of sufficient size to interest record-keepers of big bucks.
“It’s very big,” Steinkamp said of the trend of recent years. “Food plots are very big throughout the United States.”
The results, even in regions of the nation like New England, not known for its big bucks, provide evidence that seeds of different sorts, vegetables, clover, rapeseed, oats, are in great demand by deer and result in bigger antlers that give hunters a chance for a kill being entered by Boone and Crockett, or locally, the Indiana record book.
A few years ago, it was noted that Indiana was surpassing Michigan, one of the legendary havens of deer hunting, in the number of trophy bucks hunted. By the beginning of 2017, Indiana was recording roughly 20 record bucks a year, more than twice as many as Michigan.
In a different sport’s language, that is like an NCAA Division III basketball team beating Division I teams.
While that trend may have been transitory and other environmental factors can play a role, the introduction of food plots into the equation is something that differs from past practices.
Steinkamp, who has a test plot in his backyard, but also establishes food plots on small patches of land owned by family members, in addition to having his tractor and roto-tiller for hire to other hunters, is passionate about deer hunting and food plots
Now 45, Steinkamp, features several deer head mounts in his shop, some mementos of his hunts, some deer taken by his sons.
“I hunt 90 acres,” he said. “I know what inventory is on it.”
Meaning the size and sex of the deer that frequent the property, that inhale meals on the food plots. Once archery hunting season begins Oct. 1 and firearms, this year Nov. 14 and running through Nov. 29, deer move around and many fresh animals appear in the area.
“There’s deer from all over,” he said.
A construction worker at state parks, as well as the mad scientist chemist of his own seed minerals, Steinkamp does come off as a mix of hunter-farmer-lab analyst.
He can march out to the backyard and rip out a 2-foot-long turnip that looks big enough to be a dangerous weapon. His little plot of demonstration land is practically overrun with deer footprints from animals that clearly have shown enough interest to slip in under the cover of darkness and munch.
That may be an endorsement, but he is more scientific than haphazard about products.
“All my seed has been tested at Purdue,” Steinkamp said.
Whether or not this is the Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval, it is apparent deer enjoy the stuff.
Henry Reynolds of Lexington, who has killed numerous record-book bucks and says his commitment to hunting during deer season is full time when not working, said he recalls food plots starting to become popular in the 1990s.
He has leased land on some small farms and installs food plots containing soybeans and corn on between 10 and 12 acres of land. He also believes in radishes, turnips and rapeseed being items deer would put on their shopping list. Some of the radishes, he said, are “bigger than softballs.”
Yet it’s possible the chocolate snack of the deer world is something else entirely.
“No. 1 is still clover,” Reynolds said.
All of this represents an investment.
“It costs, unfortunately,” he said.
There is no doubt hunters planting food plots offering vegetables catering to deer’s taste buds are wooing them with nutritional plants that are alternatives to what they might find in nature in the woods.
But not every person sticks to a hearty, healthy diet, Reynolds said, when his stomach rumbles.
“We go to the refrigerator or to some restaurant,” he said.
Call food plots upscale restaurants for deer.
Have machinery, will travel
Steinkamp makes house calls.
He does not merely sell seed packets for hunters to spread over their land. He provides advice, will tour the land, examine and test the soil and prepare the land for planting.
It is not unusual for Steinkamp to hook up his tractor and hit the road. He believes strongly hunters should have their soil tested to make certain it is suitable for the seeds. If no test is performed and the seeds don’t grow, it may be because the buyer did not take that precaution.
He instructs owners to “mow down” their land and then he will smooth it, fertilize it and “Pray for rain.” Once, a deluge soaked Steinkamp as he was in the middle of the job, turning everything to mud. He worried, but things worked out.
“It turned out to be the best-looking plot,” he said. “I like helping people. I like helping people to hunt and get what they want.”
Which is basically a big-antlered, snazzy-looking deer buck.
“A lot of people can’t do it on their own,” Steinkamp said.
Mark Maxie, 25, of Seymour has hunted his whole life and sometimes helps Steinkamp on food plots and goes with him to man Whitetail Essentials booths at outdoor shows.
He said it seems just about every hunting show on television these days talks up the value of food plots with every host raving about them. That was not always the case.
“It’s gotten easier to do them over the years,” Maxie said. “I never heard of them until I got into high school.”
His father and brothers hunt, and they seek out deer on relatives’ farms, though they are not as devoted as he is.
“Dad is very old school, but he always had good luck,” Maxie said.
Turnips, clover, radishes, wheat and rye are all succulent, mouthwatering selections to the deer taste bud, he feels.
“It’s like M&Ms for deer,” Maxie said. “I’ve been seeing the results. If you give them what they want, they have no reason to go anywhere else.”
That’s the whole idea with a food plot, Steinkamp said as he walked amidst his backyard plants, checking out the giant turnips, examining the green of the clover. He was asked if there were four-leaf clovers in the patch.
Yes, there surely was, he said. Just maybe, he mused, he should change the name of his seed product to “Four Leaf Clover.” As the old phrase expressing contentment or happiness goes, the deer already think they are sitting in clover when they discover some.
Maybe such a label would convince hunters they are, too.