This has been a tough year for a lot of food plotters across the country. If your food plots have not been negatively affected this year, give it some time, eventually everyone can suffer almost total food plot failure.

I live in central Michigan and a complete lack of rain has noticeably reduced growth on the majority of my soils. In fact, I tilled up some extra ground last night on August 19th to increase my fall volume that I will be offering. I am one of the lucky ones that has good soils and I have the equipment and knowledge to react to unforeseen circumstances. I have an uncle whose property is still underwater in Pennsylvania from the extreme flooding that has taken place recently. His options to have a successful fall hunt are dwindling by the day if he can't create the needed food source to attract and anchor deer on his property.

I am not going to lie, I completely bought into the concept of only planting fall planted foods. What's not to love, extremely attractive forage that is peaking when surrounding food sources are dwindling. That is until the drought, flooding, or pests occur. I have not met too many people that can reach their whitetail goals without having significant food value in the fall.

I prefer the perennials of clover or alfalfa to be a portion of my fall food plot success. When trying to establish perennials, start early in the spring or plant in the fall with a nurse crop of oats. The oats will provide a great fall food source but will freeze out and die over the winter. Clover is attractive until around November1st, great attraction for bow season and food offering during critical fall months. I still rely heavily on fall planted oats, peas, brassicas, and rye.

Planted food plots are not my only food sources that I rely on to reach my whitetail goals. I have a dozen natural apple trees that I have released on the property. I have also started planting additional apple and pear trees in spots that work with my overall property plan. I've been planting trees and shrubs for many years to increase the volume of food offerings now and in the future. I have planted tall grass prairie with an abundance of forbs that the whitetails dine on. I have worked on expanding my hedgerows 60 ft. and allowing planted switchgrass and regeneration take over. Here in Michigan, if you don't cut a switchgrass field after a few years natural regeneration starts to occur.

In conclusion, offering fall focused food is more than planting on August 1st with a diverse mixture of oats, peas, brassicas, and rye. It's a total food plot program for your property to attract and protect the neighborhood whitetails. I still focus on fall production, but this may include spring planted food sources to ensure total failure in any year does not occur. Properties that focus on a single planting date are increasing their likelihood of failure at some point in the future. Diversity is often the key in any ecosystem and that rule also applies to whitetail habitat.