|
It's June and with newly born or hatched young, many wildlife species are at their most abundant, and experiencing a period of tremendous nutritional need. One of the best ways to attract and hold more and healthier wildlife on your land, including deer, turkeys and a host of other wildlife species, is by providing the proper amount and type of natural food to meet their year-round nutritional needs. Food plots are one way, but you can widen the window of attractiveness significantly by establishing mast orchards.
Planting a perennial summer fruit plot of plums from Chestnut Hill Outdoors is a great way to fill potential nutritional gaps that are occurring right now. Plums are among the earliest soft mast shrubs to fruit, providing ripe fruit as early as May and June in the deep south and early July further north.
Plums are available from Chestnut Hill Outdoors in both native and imported varieties. Their most popular variety, the native Chickasaw plum (Prunus angustifolia) is best suited to plant hardiness zones 6 and 7, but the folks at Chestnut Hill Outdoors will make sure you receive plants that are appropriate for your regional climate.
In addition to expanding available year-round nutrition for wildlife, another reason to establish mast orchards or perennial fruit plots is to minimize cost. Once established the orchards are relatively maintenance free and that's especially true of plums. They have no major pests, are disease resistant and require little or no maintenance or sprays, which is often not the case for many commercial varieties of soft mast trees and shrubs that are bred for fruit quality, not hardiness. They're self-fruitful so they don't need another tree to pollinate, though fruit production increases with more plants and more varieties. In addition to providing food, plum orchards also make great cover, shelterbelts and windows. Unlike many other mast producers, plums do quite well in loose, sandy soils.
Plum trees are available from Chestnut Hill Outdoors for bare root in winter. They bear fruit in their second or third year and will typically grow to be 15-20 feet tall, and be tremendous producers of soft mast. A 4-5 year old tree can produce 20-30 pounds of 1-inch diameter fruits that will ripen and drop at a time when other mast is in short supply.
Chestnut Hill Outdoors is more than just a nursery. In order to ensure you receive the maximum benefit from their products, they also provide sound advice and instruction on proper planting and care. And they ensure the plants you receive are suited to your regional climate. For more on Chestnut Hill Outdoors products and how to care for them, visit ChestnutHillOutdoors.com, or call (855) 386-7826.
Chestnut Hill is the best place for you to purchase your food plot and deer attractant plants because they offer a large selection, their plants are specifically bred to attract deer, and they offer customers different sized plants at different levels of growth.
For more information, please visit