What to plant

After the ph tests, get the book Ultimate Deer Food Plots. If you are new to planting food plots I would suggest that you start with the easiest to grow plants. These include rye, oats, turnips, and buckwheat. Make exclusion cages to see your difference in and out of the cage.

Are there crops in your area? This could be a big factor determining what you should plant. My area is all woods and it is incredible what an acre of turnips or rye can do to see more deer.

I plant field rye, not ryegrass. rye will not form a sod. If your soil is not very sandy and your ph is good, you can use winter wheat and oats instead of rye. If I had 4 plots each being 1/2 acre I would plant

1. Turnips in July (cheap route is purple tops and dwarf essex rape) or (more expensive route is biologic maximum for taller plants)
2. Mix of rye and oats planted the last week of August or the first week of September.
3. Clover if your ph is 6.2 to 7.0 and your soil is not too sandy. You could kill weeds with roundup a couple of times and plant late August or better yet use and oat or turnip field for a cover crop. You can also frost seed in March next year.
4. Either Austrian winter peas or something tall such as sorghum, sunflowers and corn.

Good luck and good hunting.