Anyone ever use their Release seed? They say it's good to start with to rebuild soil. Thinking about no till drilling it in and basically following their soil building guidelines to see if it helps some of our plots. Any of yall ever followed this method?

Yes we have and we really like the stuff. Deer seem to like it too. We have dabbled in the no till portion of it but going forward we will start to be more committed to it. We didn’t really have the tools to do it before now. We still don’t have a crimper but we will spray instead. By the way, if anyone can figure out to make an affordable crimper that you can pull behind a 4 wheeler or side by side, I think they could make some good money.

Thanks for responding. Yeah we are going to spray as well. I know that leaves the food plot with nothing for the deer to eat for a short time but I don't think we are going to spend the $5-$6k for a crumpet right after buying a drill. This deer meat is already expensive enough lol.

GrowingDeer guys are still spraying a vast majority of their plots with Gly. Save your money and keep spraying them. Crimper comes with a lot of limitations

I’m planting a lot of stuff with regenerative techniques and I’m not crimping. Drill straight in to the standing crop, spray and walk away. Repeat for the next seasons crop. I’ve seen crimping work pretty well though in some cases.

That’s good to know. Thank you.



I thought that you needed to lay down the previous crop over the seed. Either by crimping, mowing, etc. Does the sprayed crop eventually lay down? If you broadcast instead of drill, does that change whether you should lay it down or not?

Laying down the standing crop by crimping accomplishes three things. First, it protects the seed that was broadcast and helps hold moisture at the ground level. Second, it adds nutrients/organic matter back to the soil. Last, it terminates the standing crop by cutting the flow of nutrients to the growing parts of the plant. Chemical herbicides do the exact same thing. I’m not broadcasting seed. I’m drilling, so yes it makes a difference. I’m placing the seed below the surface in the moisture and it’s protected. There’s no reason to crimp in that scenario. And yes the existing crop dies, lays over and is added back to the organic matter on the surface while the drilled seeds are germinating and penetrating through it. You get WAY better germination rates this way with larger seeds. Peas, beans, sunflowers and lab-lab do not germinate well sitting on the surface. I’m not throwing about 60% of my paid for seed by tossing it on the surface and leaving it. That technique may work well on thick loamy soil that doesn’t have a hard pan. It’s a no go on heavy clay like what a lot of AL has.

Look into the Vitalize Seed Co. mix. Al puts together a great mix. Also, look for a used Alamo flail mower, it does a much better job of shredding the cover than a bush hog.

Do you spray after you drill?

Green point AG can also put a blend together for you, and its much cheaper.

If you want a blend, its not hard to make yourself. You just need buckwheat, milo, sunn hemp, sun flowers and some peas/beans. Sunn hemp will be your best soil builder. If you really want some good nitrogen infusion, plant arrow leaf clover in the winter. What I have seen out of it on a field is pretty amazing.

@Mbrock, thank you for your response. That was very helpful.

We planted fall release this fall and are doing it summer release this spring. Sprayed to terminate the fall crop 2 weeks ago, and we’re going to no till drill it in after the next rain event

I’ve been using vitalize carbon load and nitro boost on rotation and I’m liking the results.

I’ve done it both ways. Just make sure you spray gly before any of the drilled seeds break the surface. I wouldn’t spray more than two days after drilling. Spraying after seed is in the ground gives it time to get a jump over weeds. It’s inevitable. After you spray, some of the first stuff to come back is sicklepod, tropic croton, crabgrass, etc. You’re very limited to basically zero herbicide options post germination of these seed mixes that contain a plethora of seeds.

Matt they say crimping also helps with weed control. Most the weeds have real tiny seeds so they don't have enough energy stored in them to grow tall enough to get through the thatch and start making energy from the sun. I don't know if that's true or not, it's just what the growing deer videos say lol. Here's my thoughts...

Spray with gly, drill into the dead stuff, the drill will pretty much lay down all the dead stuff and create a thatch for moisture retention and weed control.

Think that will work?

I really don't want to mow or disk ever again. Two passes twice a year is my goal.

Thanks k bush. I'll check it out

Matt or k bush, where are yall buying the vitalize seed at? Just ordering off their website?

Here’s two fields of the vitalize nitro boost. I also added a few lbs of cow peas I had left over from another field. It already has cowpeas in it, but mine has more. 😂

Right now, Jerremy Ferguson is the only dealer in AL unless something has changed. If you want some we can arrange it I’m sure. No, we have it drop shipped by the pallet. 😉

We do the same thing. Either spray and drill into a terminated crop or drill into green crop and spray soon after. I personally prefer spraying before. Drilling through it lays most of it down and what doesn't will over a short period of time.

How long after planting?

It looks like the vitalize seed is almost the same blend as the release seed I was talking about. Both advertise to accomplish the same things. Prices and coverage were very similar as well. Availability and shipping costs would probably be the deciding factors on which one to get.

Grant Woods knows how many sheets of toilet paper he uses per week!!!! He leaves NOTHING to chance and if he does something, it's because he's taken detailed notes and analyzes everything!!! I trust Dr. Woods and love his videos!

Here’s the nitro boost taken a few days ago.

Wow, that's doing great Matt! Did you fertilize at all when planting?

That has received zero fertilizer, and it’s on a ridge with about 2” of sandy loan over a deep red clay soil.
It’s also the last surviving field I’ve got. The others were destroyed in about two weeks once the deer decided to do it.
I’ve put a fence around one other forage soybean field and hope to let the deer in around late July.

That’s about the extent of it……then you’re left trying to grow some kind of biomass in its place……It’s why I finally came to the conclusion to just go ahead and grow the "other stuff" from the start……It would take some really high end management with some big fields to justify trying to grow summer plots over what can be accomplished going a simpler route. Folks don’t want to hear that but it just is what it is no matter how many times we try to pound that square peg into the round hole. It makes for some pretty pictures though.

Yeah I’ve been telling ppl for several years now to stop expecting your food plots to look like commercial agriculture fields because we have two different objectives. Deer are hammering our ragweed, elderberry, pokeweed, Peppervine, vervain, etc. Manage it alongside your crops and use it rather than fight it.

If you’re trying to manage using “regenerative ag” on small fields then you really need for there to be stuff in there that the deer don’t eat……That way you have something to produce your biomass at the end of the cycle. If you just make your soil fertile in your food plots it will grow attractive plants during the summer that the deer will pick out and eat….The stuff they don’t eat is what keeps you from having a bare field at the end of the summer.

You also gotta ask yourself this question.... if we’re being for real, for real…….How much impact to overall “herd health” did you create with those two weeks of the deer demolishing the plots??......My guess is virtually none…..About the only way I could see it having a significant impact is if you had enough acreage so that the deer could browse high protein forage all summer OR if you had enough acreage to put a fence around and then turn them loose during the late summer when other food sources become more limited. Either scenario you gotta be able to produce a BUNCH of it for it to make a difference.

Amen! Plant summer crops for turkeys and doves. Let the deer get out and scrap for a living for a few months. They get plenty of welfare during deer season.

It’s so bad you’ve got to do that just about everywhere anyway. Summer crops don’t stand a chance in a lot of areas if it’s something deer are attracted to.

Would yall please send some deer to my lease??? Heck, I will come pick some up if I can borrow a livestock trailer too!!!

Another method I use, terminate the standing crop with gly and once it's dead I roll in down into a mat with my cultipacker. I then drill into the mat with my summer crop. In most cases I never spray and just let my grass mature and die out then I roll it down. I am usually too busy turkey hunting in the spring to worry about terminating a green grass crop.

CNC I like a summer mix that is heavy with sorghum/milo. You get three benefits; it produces enough thatch come fall, when mature feeds a lot of wildlife and offers good support for vining beans. It will leave you enough biomass come fall so you are not left with a bare field. I mow it down with a batwing and it leaves a very nice thatch layer to drill into when planting fall plots. There is a guy out of Dothan that mixes a very productive blend that I have had excellent results with. He calls it summer browz. Below are a few pictures of his mix and how it looked after making a few passes around the plot with the batwing. They only down side to these blends are weed control post emergence. This plot is old ag land that had a heavy sickle pod seed bank stored in the soil.

Squeaky I see you know Dave. I have that same mix on half of my summer plot field. Other is Eagle Beans and corn. Doing a side by side comparison and right now Summer Browz is winning. Really need rain though.

Yes sir I do know Dave. Good luck with your summer plots and the rain. Hopefully we get some this coming week.

I've been planting Stonewall beans on 30" rows. $30 bag.

No-till Deere 7200 planter cost about $4-5k.

Pretty simple. Seems like it takes a LOT less time than screwing around with Weeds and the results are really good.... I've got a soybean field.

Hogs will be your only issue.

Seems like what y'all are doing is a waste of time and you are just playing around with some dumbasses that are tying to sell you seed. Appears to be working for them. And not working for y'all since you are having a hard time figuring it out. Think about why you are having trouble... I'll give you hint... when it comes to work doing stupid things usually costs you time and money.

This isn't that hard or expensive if you just do it the right way. I can do it with less than $15k in equipment. Easily. Y'all are spending stupid money running around spraying chemicals all over your weed patch. I cultivated my beans and haven't sprayed a drop of anything yet. Don't think I will have to. Fuel is way less $$ than Gly.

Questions? What are you accomplishing doing this? Better soil health? That's an interesting concept I've got waist high beans you've got some crap and Dr. Deer has your money. Facts.

Geez man. Do you just go around to each forum trying to fish for a response? Grow up a little.