Summer is here, the kids are out of school, the first swarm of mosquitoes has arrived. All you bow hunters know that deer season is right around the corner. I am trying to get all my outdoor home projects done before it gets too close to hunting season. The food plots are being started. The mineral Licks have been made. My summer bow shooting schedule is starting. We have a lot going on.

We have started working on our food plots. The first step is laying out where you want the plot and big you want it to be.

Once that is complete it is time to spray herbicide to kill the existing vegetation. We completed our spraying last Saturday. We sprayed for two new plots and sprayed one existing plot because it was full of weeds.

On a plot we planted last year. We used a high end seed mix from a major seed company. when we checked the plot this spring, it was full of weeds.

I thought that the yellow weeds were coming from the surrounding fields in the area, what I didn't realize until yesterday was that the yellow weeds were coming from the expensive, top end seed that we planted.

We planted the food plot in a 1/2 acre square. Look at the picture; it is a square, 1/2 acre of yellow weeds. The weeds didn't come from other fields; it came right out of a bag of food plot seed!

The year before, we had planted a small 10 x 10 clover patch from a cheap farm store mix which had a very small percentage of inert matter. The next year we planted the big 1/2 acre plot around it. As you can see in the picture there are no yellow weeds in that small patch, only in big patch.

We now have to spray all of our food plots and kill off everything and start all over to get rid of the weeds. We will then reseed with our own, high quality, AWH seed.

To make a long story short, read the label before you buy food plot seed. The seed we planted had 29% "inert matter" in the mix. Well, we all found out what "inert matter" is: "weed seeds"

All of our own AWH Seed contains less then .5% inert matter. AWH seed mixes will give you much better results then the so called "high end" seed mixes from the big guys.

Have you created a Mineral Lick yet? Ours are in and the deer are hitting them like crazy!

If you want bigger, healthier deer, make a Mineral Lick

With our food plots and mineral licks in place, we now wait on the Iowa DNR to see if we drew tags.

It is also the time to get shooting. I have shot just a few times since last fall. I will be starting to practice more now that summer is here. I will go over everything on my bow. I will check the rest, string, sight, quiver, arrows, broad heads, everything. This will give me plenty of time in case I need to replace things.

Send me an email and let me know how the mineral licks and the food plots are going.

Good Luck,

dale@advanced-whitetail-hunting.com