Deer Research SAE

When it comes to SAE's there are many opportunities out there and they are all very cool. However, with me being an environmental science nerd I geeked out a little when I was able to visit a student who was doing a research SAE on food plots for deer.

To get there we had to request a time that would work best for both the student, his parents, and Raylene and I. with both of this student's parents working at the school it wasn't entirely difficult because we all had similar schedules. We went up on April 3rd. to see the fields.

He took two areas of land and planted two different types of feed to see which feed attracted the most deer. He was also looking to see which field, in particular, the larger bucks preferred. the way he accomplished this was by setting up trail cameras after he planted the seed in their respective fields. The first plot was growing clover and beans and the second field was growing a mixed seed that was created by the white-tail institute.

This was a fairly new SAE idea so there were some kinks to work out, however, the student seemed to have a pretty solid foundation as to what he wanted to do. When it came time to suggest things we discussed where the best placement would be for the trail cameras and how he would go about identifying each individual deer that came into the fields so that he could keep a record of how often deer are going into either field. This student also used AET to keep his records on his feed plots