Adding fruit trees to the deer food plot area

The area we are building out to attract deer is coming along, the fields have been seeded with clover, rye grass and radish. But now I am adding a few fruit trees. These will be out in front of my permanent hunting blind that we built, also known as the shooting house. So during deer hunting season we have a nice place to set up a wait. And in a few years hopefully these fruit trees will be big enough to produce fruit and entice deer to come by.

I got myself 2 pear trees, a peach tree and a plum tree.

Having these fruit trees will be nice to have as well for the food they provide to us, I will not let the deer eat them all..lol Gonna be sleeping in that shooting house a lot if that starts happening.

Prepping for fruit trees.

Using my tractor mounted mower, I cut back the weeds growing between all the seed planted in the fields.

Takes me about 30 minutes to but it all back.

Behind me is where I plan on having the pine trees in a few years once they are ready to be planted outside in the ground.

Making quick work with the mowing its time to move onto drilling holes next with my power equipment.

With the grass cut back we can really see that clover. Its quite established and I am sure it loved the tilled ground we provided it.

Planting the fruit trees.

A few weeks later and all the grass cut has fallen below the clover and it can really be seen even better now.

Planting the trees went well, I used my auger drill on my skidsteer. And then filled the holes with half garden soil and half native dirt.

The two pear trees should pollinate each other. I really like Seckel pears, quite tasty.

I do not expect much growth right now, but next year they should come alive. Will need to keep a close eye on them for insect pests. And if deer start rubbing against them I will need to put a wire cage around them.

Bartlett is the other kind of pear in the combo I got. They are tasty good, but not as much as a seckle. Maybe baking bartletts make them even more tasty.

That clover is amazing, even where I drove over it with the skid steer it is coming back.

The peach tree is self pollinating, I got myself a late blooming variety so early frosts do not kill the flowers. I had that problem where I lived previously so hopefully this one will do better.

Little trees now, but one day they should be big and strong.

I have never grown pear trees, hopefully they do good here.

The plum tree should get quite large. We wanted purple plums, and I could only find a standard type. The others are all semi-dwarfs.

So now we wait, and one day they should produce fruit. In the mean time I am sure the clover all over will do great.

We may over seed the clover to get some bare spots a little more filled.

But in general the deer food plot is looking great. It seems to be more of a "turkey food plot" at the moment as that is where the wild turkeys hang out. But good to have either way.

The deer will eat the clover too, and it is a perennial so it should come back and get stronger with every year. Hopefully it will also help the fruit trees by fixing nitrogen and bringing it back into the soil. The trees should love that as during their leafing stage (vegetative) they want lots of nitrogen.

One other thing to mention is that I inoculated the roots of these fruit trees with mycorrhizal fungi. So hopefully they will do even better. We shall see, could be really interesting seeing how quickly they grow because of it.