The second year of tests has proved the practicality of a seed mix for white-tailed deer feed plots in East Texas, said a Texas Agricultural Experiment Station scientist here.

The recommended mix is 40 pounds per acre of forage cowpeas, 40 pounds of oats and 10 pounds of arrowleaf clover.

"In our (first year) trials, this triple mix resulted in over 3,000 pounds per acre of cowpea production by Thanksgiving; over 5,000 pounds per acre of oats by April, better than 3,500 pounds per acre of arrowleaf clover in April – with even higher yields possible in May," said Dr. Ray Smith, Experiment station legume breeder.

Planting supplemental winter feeding plots for wildlife is not an unusual practice in Texas, but most involve planting a single small grain variety such as oats. But in East Texas, oats do not start producing until November, so these plots had nothing to attract deer during archery or managed lands deer permit seasons, according to Dr. Billy Higginbotham, a Texas Cooperative Extension wildlife and fisheries specialist who partnered with Smith in the project.

The seed mix shows more promise for success than any single small grain or forage variety alone, he said.

"With fall-planted cowpeas, there's a narrow window of opportunity from Sept.1 through about Sept 15," Higginbotham said. "After that, you'll see diminishing returns. What we needed was a warm and cool season combination to enhance the potential to attract deer early in the fall, then hold them through the winter months."

Arrowleaf clover is planted in the fall for pasture in the following spring. Because of moisture limitations, the clover didn't produce as well in early fall in 2004 as in 2003. So yields in the spring of 2005 were not as good as in 2004. But the philosophy of not putting all your eggs in one basket proved itself, Smith said.

"Even with the dry conditions in September 2004 that prevented the early establishment of arrowleaf clover, the triple mix again had over 3,000 pounds per acre of dry forage (2,385 cowpeas + 671 oats) available by Thanksgiving," Smith said. "The larger seed of the cowpea and oats were planted deeper and better able to withstand the hot, dry fall conditions compared to arrowleaf clover. Oat production continued through the spring and increased to 4,093 (pounds) by mid-April, 2005."

Commercially sold mixtures typically include some sort of early producing forage mixture, usually of the brassica family, such as rape or turnip.

"Many different commercial mixtures are available," Smith said. "But none provide the combination of early fall forage production and full-season production that this new mix does."

Also, Smith said, an open time was left when no forages were producing.

"That's the main reason we included oats in the mixture. They act as a winter bridge between the cowpeas and the arrowleaf clover," Smith said.

Cowpeas, on the other hand, are a proven forage for white-tailed deer. But they are usually planted in the spring to provide extra protein during the summer season, Higginbotham said.

With these factors in mind, in 2002 Higginbotham and Smith began testing various ratios of seed when planting in early September. Earlier trials had shown that Iron and Clay cowpeas and Apache arrowleaf clover were a winning combination.

"In 2001 trials, the cowpeas had produced almost 2 tons of dry weight forage per acre!" Higginbotham said. "By late May 2002, the arrowleaf clover stands also produced almost 2 tons of forage per acre. The only problem was that gap in forage availability from the first frost in late November when the cowpeas disappeared to when the clover came on strong."

Smith chose a variety of oats called "Heavy Grazer" to fill the December-to-March gap. Oats are cold tolerant and perform well if planted in late August to early September, "as long as there is adequate soil moisture at planting," Smith said.

The scientists set out to determine the optimal combination of seeding rates and if the varieties would compete with each other for soil nutrients and moisture when planted together.

"Call it 'variety compatibility'," Higginbotham said. "There are lots of seed combinations on the market today, but most do not undergo this battery of trials to determine how much of each is just right."

Higginbotham and Smith tried six seeding rate combinations for the cowpea and oat mixtures. The arrowleaf clover component was held constant at 10 pounds per acre throughout the trial.

Apache arrowleaf clover was developed by Smith and released by Texas A&M University in 2002. It is resistant to bean yellow mosaic virus, and beef cattle production tests have shown cattle can gain an average of nearly 3 pounds per day under moderate stocking rates.

by Robert Burns