Those of us who have lived or hunted in the U.S. heartland all have seen the dew on the crop fields glisten with the first rays of sunshine and heard the distant sound of a combine's diesel engine fire up as a neighboring farmer begins his day. We admire this awesome image of fall in the Midwest as we sit on stand, waiting for the deer woods to wake up. If you're like me during those hours, you also have plenty of time to think about things and "solve the problems of the world."

OK, I might not have all the solutions, but I always have plenty of suggestions. For instance, one morning while on stand, I was thinking about how my father and I were going to plan next year's crops and set the farm up to save some money on the expensive venture of farming. I had gone to college and obtained a degree in Ag Science and learned the scientific basis for the practice Dad and Granddad had been using for years: that is, reducing costs through crop rotation.

Fertilizer during the past year had been on the rise, and herbicide wasn't getting any cheaper either, so it was starting to get a little tricky trying to figure the budget for the farm. As I sat back in my tree stand that day, I ran some scenarios through my head about how to save the farm money by rotating some of the different crops we already had planted.

Once I thought I had the farm half-way figured out, I began to think about ways to save money on a couple of food plots I'd developed on my family's CRP ground. How can I incorporate the same rotation method into those plots to save both time and money? I wondered. After an hour or so, I thought I had it figured out, and once again I focused on what I was in the woods to do: shoot a buck that had been prematurely harvesting one of our soybean fields.

A PLAN THAT WORKS
Wouldn't it be nice to be able to buy quality products designed for setting up a simple food plot rotation to save you time and money? Believe it or not, they do exist.

There are a lot of great food plot products on the market today. If you choose your seed wisely and use plots in conjunction with a proven mineral supplement and protein booster, you'll not only have healthier deer but also reduce your costs in time, fertilizer, herbicide and labor.

The idea is to select and use various crops that work in harmony with each other in an overall plan to improve your herd's nutrition. That, in turn, should lead to bigger-bodied, bigger-racked bucks, more productive does and higher fawn survival. In short, when all elements of a sound crop-rotation system come together on a hunting property, they work in a synergistic manner to improve deer health and nutrition -- and hopefully, your hunting results.

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