Fertilizing native browse?

[BlakeJ]

What's the best way to go about fertilizing native browse for deer?

I'm getting a soil sample done for adjacent food plots, should I use the same fertilizer? How do I pick the areas, and when should I fertilize?

[PapaBear]

I would check with your local county extension agent. sometimes the native plants don't respond well to fertilizer. They are designed to operate off of how the leaf drop breaks down. if you add extra fertilizer, you may need to find a way to add extra water so you don't do more harm than good. a good soil analysis will tell you quite a bit about your soil composition, you may also want to do a plant sample to see how much the plant is actually getting from the soil. Soil may be extremely rich in certain nutrients but if they are not in an available form it does you no good.

[GarGuy]

I have honeysuckle all along the edges of my food plots. We throw chicken manure with a spreader truck and make sure we get plenty on the honeysuckle. deer love it..

[Top Of Texas]

That will be of little benefit.

[texashunter56]

I have a friend who fertilized native plants back in the late 90's into early 2000's in Kinney County. He did some cutting/shredding on one side of the road and not on the other and compared usage of all plants. He did another section of a road where he fertilized one side of the road and not the other. Both locations had the same vegetation on both sides of the roads. He saw more usage of the plants that were cut/shredded than those that were not across the road. On the fertilized side he saw more usage of like plants than the side not fertilized. He also saw usage of plants that had been fertilized that were not used across the road. Some the plants used were consider low end browse/forbes that were now being used after the fertilizer that weren't used across the road.
I was at a seminar back in the mid-to late 90's were Forest Armke of the Ford Ranch gave a talk on a study he was part where the used fertilizer in the study on a ranch. He had pictures and data from the 3 yr study(funding ran out) with pics and data about how the usage, quality and amount of forage changed from the fertilized study areas vs the natural areas. They were seeing better usage of the plants with fertilizer also.

[lovemylegacy]

What's the best way to go about fertilizing native browse for deer?

I'm getting a soil sample done for adjacent food plots, should I use the same fertilizer? How do I pick the areas, and when should I fertilize?

Places where you are gonna hunt. Don't forget to fertilize the oak trees. Same fertilize you use on plot will be good. I usually fertilize in Feb

[lovemylegacy]

I have a friend who fertilized native plants back in the late 90's into early 2000's in Kinney County. He did some cutting/shredding on one side of the road and not on the other and compared usage of all plants. He did another section of a road where he fertilized one side of the road and not the other. Both locations had the same vegetation on both sides of the roads. He saw more usage of the plants that were cut/shredded than those that were not across the road. On the fertilized side he saw more usage of like plants than the side not fertilized. He also saw usage of plants that had been fertilized that were not used across the road. Some the plants used were consider low end browse/forbes that were now being used after the fertilizer that weren't used across the road.
I was at a seminar back in the mid-to late 90's were Forest Armke of the Ford Ranch gave a talk on a study he was part where the used fertilizer in the study on a ranch. He had pictures and data from the 3 yr study(funding ran out) with pics and data about how the usage, quality and amount of forage changed from the fertilized study areas vs the natural areas. They were seeing better usage of the plants with fertilizer also.

Back in the 90s I hunted a lot of public land. To sway things in my favor I would fertilize the browse where I hunted and the oaks also were fertilized. had tremendous use from the deer population. Not only would they use it they would hang around. Took a lot deer there.

[Aggiebush]

If you have some good oak trees around your stand, fertilize them out to the drip line this spring, and the deer will flock to them next fall.

[IkemanTX]

A little on the topic from Management Advantage.

https://youtu.be/TjwNkPk9TwA

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