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Deer Salt

Started by mike_belben, May 03, 2021, 12:42:26 PM

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Walnut Beast

Looking pretty good Mike 👍. Keep the pictures and updates coming 

Walnut Beast

Quote from: Walnut Beast on May 12, 2021, 12:00:24 AM
Trophy rocks as they are called are excellent. They are natural and are only mined in one place. I think Utah 🤷‍♂️
You can buy these at TSC and other places. Here is a little interesting information about them. I've used them a bunch.     A "mineral rock," at least as I use the term, is a Trophy Rock.  Trophy Rock is simply a "rock" mined from a deposit of sea minerals in Utah.  There are only three such veins of salt sea minerals known in the world.  In other salt deposits, the minerals settled out and left just salt.  Each of the known salt sea mineral deposits have a slightly different composition.  I like the mineral composition in the vein that Trophy Rock mines in Utah.  It is 100% natural and a great blend of 60+ minerals that benefits deer.

Walnut Beast

Quote from: Jeff on May 07, 2021, 09:59:24 AM
My brother in law had  small deer mineral business back before it became a thing. Trapper Pete's Grow em big.  He never took it to the level he should have. The packaging thing for retail ticked him off and he quit. We use to deliver it in plastic milk jugs. I still have about a 100lbs mixed up.  I inherited the recipe and the cement mixer to mix it in.  


The Forestry Forum members did a wonderful thing for my best friend when he was dieing with all the cards from all over.  I know, he would not mind that I know give you that recipe he created.

@mike_belben



 
It needs some sort of anti predator ingredient in it for the cabin.:)
A big thank you for sharing that. That's a really good fix. It seems to have everything covered I was looking for copper. And yes it's in there👍. It's in the Kent bio. I'm definitely going to do the recipe.  Forget everything else 😂

mike_belben

penn state has a cutting edge deer study program and a really similar topography and dirt composition to my area.  our sandstone is referred to as "pennsylvanian era" actually.

anyways they trap and collar deer then compile data year round and have made some incredibly successful changes to the bag limits that have stabilized and improved the herd structure.  adult bucks went from 80% annual harvest rate and making up a very small percentage of the spring survivors, to being about a 50/50 mix of mature vs juvenile spring survivors.  their heard was in a crisis before the bag change.  

i like reading their blogs. this one shows the type of laurel thickets we get here in the hollars and its becoming very clear to me deer are the cause of laurel thickets so find the thicket find the deer.

https://www.deer.psu.edu/deer-crew-diaries-entry-21-10/



truth is, that is the best timber growing segment of most landowners property but due to laurel its not gonna grow a replacement stand of anything but maybe gum.  the extra moisture and nutrients,  and sunlight disadvantage of being down in a steep bottom means only the fastest straightest growing trees are found in a hollar bottom and are usually twice as tall and fully clear compared to the ridge top timber.  

i should start trying to sell a mountain laurel removal service by letter to the worst sites on GPS.  would probably get me into contact with prime hunting, stone and timber holdings. i imagine it would require a lotta corn feeders and food plots to keep the deer from eating all the regen once the laurel is removed.    
Praise The Lord

KEC

Dogone, I think you hit on an important factor with the parasites,good nutrition doesn't help an animal if it's all feeding parasites. 

mike_belben

i have really wanted to make permethrin paint roller feeders for a long time but its just never made it to the front of the list.  breaking up the tick life cycle on the deer would probably reduce the human misery they create too. 
Praise The Lord

mike_belben

Just deleted 151 trail cam vids since that pregnant doe i posted what, a week ago?  Maybe 10 vids lacked a deer.  I never thought i would be able to get tired of watching deer cam vids of my own but it happened.  Took 30 mins to blast through them. 











Does all day, bro's all night.  Find me more deer parked over $15 of anything. 
Praise The Lord

Walnut Beast


mike_belben

if i can keep it a secret from my neighbor buddies on the next ridge!   :D


the bachelors are self segregating into varsity and JV.  heres some little guys.






and heres the big boys.  a few vids had mature bucks running off young ones. 







the solo stud








look at the neck, shoulder and hams on this guy considering its spring and hes probably lost 20-30% of his rutting mass. 


big hocks







theres a bean field somewhere missing a lot of crop!
Praise The Lord

mike_belben

speaking of which, mine just keeps getting taller, thats a pick axe.  test plot with no fertilizer or lime is twice as high as any hay field around.  i feel like im finally starting to get things figured out.




Praise The Lord

Tacotodd

Quote from: mike_belben on May 14, 2021, 03:15:26 PM
if i can keep it a secret from my neighbor buddies on the next ridge!   :D


the bachelors are self segregating into varsity and JV.  heres some little guys.






and heres the big boys.  a few vids had mature bucks running off young ones.







the solo stud








look at the neck, shoulder and hams on this guy considering its spring and hes probably lost 20-30% of his rutting mass.


big hocks







theres a bean field somewhere missing a lot of crop!



That buck isn't even fully in his prime. I can only tell because one in the prime of life (or past) usually has some sway in his back. It's still looking to be a nice trophy, because a trophy is what I define as: a great challenge accomplished by the individual. You should have fun no matter what happens. 
Trying harder everyday.

mike_belben

Given the chance i will gladly make him prime rib. 
Praise The Lord

mike_belben

Wife wanted to go see my paradise so we checked on the foodplot and made sure camera was still there.  No big bucks on this batch but another 40 or so vids of healthy pregnant does and a few juvenile bucks pushing up antlers.    A deer popped up and trotted off after wed been there 40 minutes or more on a running quad.    


The lick is all rutted up. Pretty soon i will re-salt it then probably pull my camera for the summer and stay out until its time to seed in the winter crop.  Probably radish, turnip, winter wheat and rutabega.

Ive got another plot spot on a sunny mid-slope bench picked out.  Its below the lick, which is on a high staging area just a bit into the woods from the pasture edge.  The lick and both plots are basically in a line downhill to a year round creek in a deep bottom.  quite a few ways one could hike to it pending wind conditions.  Lots of good trees for a stand but also easy to hunt from the ground thanks to elevation.
Praise The Lord

mike_belben

young preggo.  





i fixed the timestamp and have seen a definite 7am and 7pm trend in the group movements.  middle of the night seems to be more solo deer.  my presence doesnt seem to be much deterrent.  theyre back on it 3 hours after i leave. 



Praise The Lord

mike_belben

so yesterday i finally got a huge cervid compliment ive wanted for a long time.


id loaded my poor tired donkey down with everything but the kitchen sink and headed out to the woods with new dog, pity.  being a wild dog, she disappears and reappears as she wants and i will let her back in the gate whenever she shows up, that sorta thing.  she takes off and im puttering down my logging road to cross my back 4 acres alone.  when i get to this mud hole that is presently a dried up winter creek, i get off to check for tracks, whether by 2 or 4 legged manufacture.  





i shut quad off and call for pity a few times, listening quietly.  then walk to the front of the quad staring down at the mud for tracks ...





when crash bam boom crunch slam RIGHT next to me.. i even started to blurt out "there you are girl" when i look up to see a big brown rump and velvet main beams darting out of the dry creek thicket about 15 feet over.  it took a minute to sink in.  i rode a metallic clanging quad down my main trail for about 3 minutes to get here.  the buck stayed bedded harder than any other deer bumping i have ever encountered.  nothing sticks to a bed like that unless it is really dang comfy. and IT WAS ON MY LAND.  4 acres in a thousand.. not even a postage stamp.  wow.  i am flattered.  


so i poke around a bit to find the exact spot hes been sleeping in, and its a bed i made myself thats never been inhabited before.  right there against the log at my finger tip.  i hinge cut the trash into a shade cathedral with 3 ways of egress, right next to a most of summer water feature, down in a trough with good cover all around, and now some very healthy little forage plots and some mineral salt within 200 yards i guess.  i rooted up and raked out the exact spot he lays in, and im in this area all the time now preparing a home site, yet he beds there despite me.  very cool feeling.  








i went out to the spot a mile away and resalted the mineral site, put down a sack of corn with 3lbs of alfalfa pelleted safe-guard dewormer.  $8.50 for the corn and $11.xx for the dewormer.  next round i will spray the corn with ivermectin for the next treatment approaching fall to help kill off the ticks and bot fly larvae as well as intestinal worms.

i watered and slightly fertilized my food plot seedlings that are struggling with hot and dry in a very thin topsoil over rocky clay.  then used a pulp hook to poke holes to interseed soybean i grew last year, and hydrated in a bag of water from that morning, supposedly very important for good germination.   AG research shows soybean yields are best when planted as early as possible after frost, and that 1.75" is the ideal planting depth to balance good rooting and a quick sprout time. i have low expectations but wont know if i dont try.


checked the camera and as always plenty of action, mostly at night and almost exclusively by pregnant does at this point.  no more bucks.  i dont know if its that they dont have the need for the salt or they just cant stand the obvious human interference.  all the does look quite healthy and ready to drop.  havent seen any fawns yet but looking forward to it.  eager to see what all eats the corn pile.
Praise The Lord

Tacotodd

Just get the camera ready, it's going to be a wild ride!
Trying harder everyday.

mike_belben

well. im learning a lot. 

 i finally got the quad back together and went out to pull my cam.  sort of a big surprise.. most of a corn pile sitting right there sprouted over from the rains i guess.  i made the initial decision that they must not have been willing to eat it because of the pelletized safeguard intermixed in the pile.   knocked the sticky pile apart and scattered it around hoping they eat a bit more and maybe even that a few volunteer stalks take root. it was fermenting and hot and moldy.  the top layer was rooting in the lower layers like a growth media.  ive seen this before in a box of soybean that sprouted too. 

so i grabbed a clump of hearty green sprouted seed and figured what the heck, planted it into my struggling young food plot then went home.  


checked the cam and was surprised again.  130 vids in about 10 days. when the coons, crows, wind and nothings were deleted id say there was 70 deer vids.  no fawns yet, one or two big fat preggers, one or two new does looking pretty ragged and scrawny, one might have mites thinning its fur.  then a pile of bucks, day and night.  definitely getting chewed up by face flies and various pests.  caught a few good dominant buck runs other buck off segments, and nearly one fight.  also a lot of bucks eating side by side with a coon.  that sorta stuff.  

their antlers are growing fast, id say over an inch per week.  the biggest ones are presently around 3inch of main beam and a cluster at the tops looking like a knuckle or a twig bud, ready to branch into tines.  theyre all still taking in salt and quite a few picked over the corn pile even as it turned green with sprouts.  but yet at least 3/4 of the sack remained. 


so i guess theres a bunch of factors. the safegard pellets may have been one turnoff.  then the constant click of a camera right in front of it probably unsettled another contingent of them from staying very long.  add in the smell and maybe poor flavor as the pile sprouted and fermented.  and finally the thousand or so acres of massive, massive lush browse, both forested and ripe in pasture.  theres just so much other food. 


so $20 ventured and i got my moneys worth in education.  adjustments i will make from here are switching to ivomec sprayed onto the corn instead of the safe guard pellets.  now i cant say they didnt eat the pellets because i didnt find any but how do i know they werent cherry picked by the crow or coon or ants? or that they didnt melt in the rain.  the deer may have eaten them but i cant be sure either way.  with spray treated corn there is no question, if its eaten there getting it.  also the ivomec/ivermectin will kill arthopods, ticks, chiggers, mites, bot fly larvae and worms of the intestines and heart so thats a lot of relief if youre a deer. 


i will not feed corn again unless the foliage is gone, and i will not pile it to ferment so fast again either.  ill lay it out in several long thin rows. thatll help more deer get in on it too, rather than just the dominant one crowding the pile for itself.   

will get some pics up later. 
Praise The Lord

mike_belben





This is the worst looking deer ive seen on my camera and im thinking it migrated in solo based on it being alone and never seeing before.  All the regulars are in good health. I hope it got some dewormer.  I suspect its got mange,  zooming in on the laptop shows the same patchy dry skin that the new rescue dog was suffering from.  These are just pics of the laptop screen to save me the grief of importing. 






I guess thats what hydroponic corn sprouts look like!  I brought a glob home and filled the empty space in my garden with the heartiest shoots.











 




















Note the coon bottom left.  I bet that little fatty is free of worms cuz he hit that pile constantly!







Praise The Lord

mike_belben

Theyve excavated about 6 inches of salt flavored dirt so far.



Praise The Lord

Tacotodd

Don't worry Mike, I've seen them dig it down fairly consistently to about 1'. Your hole is JUST beginning 🤨
Trying harder everyday.

HemlockKing

Quote from: mike_belben on July 20, 2021, 11:30:01 PM
Theyve excavated about 6 inches of salt flavored dirt so far.




Should try putting some salt on a old stump see how they do, make some chainsaw slits into it so you can dump salt into it, wonder if they could be natural stump grinders lol
A1

thecfarm

They will do some damage to a stump!! I have not put one out in years.
Model 6020-20hp Manual Thomas bandsaw,TC40A 4wd 40 hp New Holland tractor, 450 Norse Winch, Heatmor 400 OWB,YCC 1978-79

mike_belben

Excavation update. 

Late July




Early September



These guys are serious about mineral!
Praise The Lord

HemlockKing

I'm definitely trying to drill some holes in stumps now and pouring that stuff in
A1

mike_belben

i personally would ring it around your stumps so that the deer excavate the root system out and make a bowl around it.  then the rainwater will be pooled around and let the microbial action weaken the main roots so they can just be snapped off with a winch and choker cable.  

deer can eat dirt a lot easier than they can eat wood. ive been using the little backhoe to dig little pool rings around big stumps and its pretty fast that they turn punky.   
Praise The Lord

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