# Feeding deer sugar beets?



## Greydog (Mar 24, 2007)

I read an article last week in Farm and Dairy about a nearby state imposing an emergency ban on feeding deer. In the article they mentioned that dealers would get stuck with many sacks of apples and sugar beets that they ususally sell to hunters. Has anybody on here used sugar beets at their feeding stations? I have heard of farmers feeding them to livestock so i guess deer would like them. Might find a seed source and try growing some next year.


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## swantucky (Dec 21, 2004)

They will eat them. When I used them in the past I would cut a couple up to get them started. I don't think they work as good as corn or apples.


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## TheBiteIsOn (May 12, 2007)

I know in West Virginia where i hunt, all we use is sugar beats, they tear them up, they are cheap and the squirrle dont carry them off.....


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## Reel Thing (Apr 5, 2004)

I know guys that's been using turnips 
High protein 
Stay green 
Deer seem to paw them out 
I'd say they would eat the beets
geowol


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## PapawSmith (Feb 13, 2007)

Deer diet preferences are funny. When I lived and hunted in Michigan I used to go to Northern Indiana and buy sugar beets and carrots for feed piles (not 'bait' piles that was illegal). We could get 80# bags for about $3.50, late 70's early 80's, and the deer tore them up. When I moved to Ohio I went to Indiana and loaded up with the same and piled them on my property. The deer never touched them until about February. By then they were a rotted pile of frozen slop, but they dug the slop up and ate it. I suppose it was saved as a last resort.


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## swantucky (Dec 21, 2004)

PapawSmith said:


> Deer diet preferences are funny. When I lived and hunted in Michigan I used to go to Northern Indiana and buy sugar beets and carrots for feed piles (not 'bait' piles that was illegal). We could get 80# bags for about $3.50, late 70's early 80's, and the deer tore them up. When I moved to Ohio I went to Indiana and loaded up with the same and piled them on my property. The deer never touched them until about February. By then they were a rotted pile of frozen slop, but they dug the slop up and ate it. I suppose it was saved as a last resort.


Funny you saw that I have thought the same thing. Although the deer in Ohio will readily eat sugar beets in my area they will not touch carrots. In Mich. the carrots are the first to go. I have tried carrots a few times and they are still there in the spring!! This has even been in extreme winter conditions, they will eat even kernal of corn (50lbs) overnight and the carrots are untouched. My theory has always been the carrots contain some sort of nutrient not found in the forage in the Mich. area I hunted and there is plenty of it in Ohio????


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