Feedin’ ETX Bucks

[Sleepy]

I’ve never been big into the feeding game. Have thrown out hand corn here and there but nothing that would really hold deer so to speak. I’ve always just stuck to natural travel areas and funnels. I enjoy hunting this way, but by setting cams up on trails and things, I’m lucky to get 50 pictures in a couple weeks time. Well after both of my places got clear cut this summer, I transitioned myself back to the farm. I haven’t hunted there in 6-7 years, but after running cams I noticed the quality of bucks really got a lot better compared to back when I was hunting it before. All that being said, I’ve decided to start thinking about next year already and am really thinking about setting some feed stations up. A couple of feeders and then a couple of hand corn areas. I plan to fence all feeding areas off because the pigs are just ridiculous when feed of any sort hits the ground. My main goal is to try to hold more deer on my 90 acres of the farm which consists of around 500 total acres and to try to get more consisten pictures of the Bucks in the area. This 90 acres is about a 25-30 year old clear cut so it is pretty thick except down in a draw where a nice sized creek runs through it.

The feeders I plan to set up will not be hunted. They will be strictly for feeding and trying to hold deer in the area. I will also fence off a couple of stations for hand corn that will be hunted over or near. I plan to feed corn and rice bran. Not really into the protein stuff as I don’t know that it will have much of an impact on our size place.

- So my questions are do I go with gravity fed protein type feeders, or timed spinning feeders?

- Any other feed besides corn and rice bran out there?

- How big should the pens be? I plan on using hog panel.

I know there is a plethora of knowledge out there, so thanks in advance for any info or tips.

[DeadEyeB]

You should feed both corn and protein. Use gravity feeders for the protein your local feed store will have deer pellets I'm sure 16% protein or better. Use a spinning feeder for corn. You can put them in the same pen.

Make the pens as large as you can reasonably make them. The local deer will get use to a small pen, but you'll have a harder time convincing traveling deer to jump in if it's too small.

I also cut the top layer of the hog panel off with bolt cutters. This makes it easy for fawns to get in and I have noticed the deer prefer the shorter panels. They still keep hogs out just fine.

Feeding in Texas is definitely necessary because probably your neighbors are. If you can create a habitat that has food and water round the clock you'll hold a ton more deer than you would otherwise.

[basschsr]

Make the pens as large as you can reasonably make them.
^^^This^^^

They also tend to be less skittish and more deer in the feed pen at the same time. Also you don't want your corn to be thrown outside the pen unless you want the pigs hanging around and if you have them the cattle will come in also.

[Sleepy]

You should feed both corn and protein. Use gravity feeders for the protein your local feed store will have deer pellets I'm sure 16% protein or better. Use a spinning feeder for corn. You can put them in the same pen.

Make the pens as large as you can reasonably make them. The local deer will get use to a small pen, but you'll have a harder time convincing traveling deer to jump in if it's too small.

I also cut the top layer of the hog panel off with bolt cutters. This makes it easy for fawns to get in and I have noticed the deer prefer the shorter panels. They still keep hogs out just fine.

Feeding in Texas is definitely necessary because probably your neighbors are. If you can create a habitat that has food and water round the clock you'll hold a ton more deer than you would otherwise.

Make the pens as large as you can reasonably make them.
^^^This^^^

They also tend to be less skittish and more deer in the feed pen at the same time. Also you don't want your corn to be thrown outside the pen unless you want the pigs hanging around and if you have them the cattle will come in also.

Thanks for the pointers guys

[Antlers86]

No deer in East Tx. Wasting your time and money.

[Sleepy]

No deer in East Tx. Wasting your time and money.

That’s what I’ve heard