Well hot off the stove in coyotefred’s prairie-planting kitchen comes a new and improved seed planter that is easy and cheap to make and fun to use.

Get yourself a length of 1" PVC pipe, and cut it so that it would be about 6-12" higher than a walking cane you would use.  Cut the end to an angle (although this isn’t absolutely necessary I find it does help the seeding process).  Finally, cut the top 3" or so off a plastic 2-liter bottle, line up the pouring spout and the straight (top) end of your 1" PVC section, and then wrap securely with some duct tape.  ‘Finished!

Planting with this couldn’t be easier.  Put the tip down on the ground and give it a little shove with the side of your foot.  ‘Not hard…you just want to create a little divet/small indentation in the ground.  Keeping that end in place, drop a few seeds into your "spigot" and listen to them slide down your PVC nicely into the divet you just created.  Pull that end away from your divet and then use your foot to lightly scrape the soil from the side of the divet over your seed.  Done!  Then find your next spot and repeat.  Once you get the hang of it I was surprised how quick this method really is.  In fact it is quicker than any "stooping" method of planting (e.g. with a spade), since you can easily hold a large handful of seed in your opposite hand to sprinkle into your siphon with each new divet (rather than reaching into a bag or container every time).

I found this gizmo works great with a simple hip-pack of seed.  ‘Perfect for ambling around your property at sunset planting a few seeds as you enjoy the evening.  In fact it even works well in dusk/dark, since you really don’t need to see much of anything down near your feet once you get the hang of it.  I believe folks with a vision impairment might find this method quite acceptable in terms of planting some seed here and there.  Obviously this tool would be useful for those who have difficulty/pain in bending over…no bending over required!  I suspect this could also be used by someone using a wheelchair and limited mobility if a slight modification or two were made (e.g. weighting the end somewhat so that a foot would not be necessary to make the divet).  Here are some pictures…fun for the kids too–especially when harder seeds (e.g. buffalograss and switchgrass) are used which they can "hear" as they move down the tube. 

Although this may seem like a slow way to plant, keep in mind that for most native grasses and forbs, a few seeds per square foot is more than sufficient in terms of spacing once plants gets established.  And unlike surface broadcasting and raking, there is no great disturbance with this method (disturbance = weeds), and seed placement and soil coverage/contact is vastly improved compared to surface broadcasting.

Enjoy and keep on plantin’…

Coyotefred

 
 

 

 

 

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In the game of prairie restoration one has to play defense as well as offense, which means weed control.  I know folks have different feelings about the use of chemical weed control, but for my project I felt that the greater good justified the use of some herbicide to beat back the weeds and give my native seedlings the best chance for survival.  Here’s the setup I’ve used effectively for the last few months to spray weeds:

 

What I have here is a Swisher 10 cubic foot metal dump cart attached to my Sears Garden Tractor.  Actually any similar tow-behind cart would work fine; this one was about $100 from the local farm/ranch store.  My sprayer tank fit nicely inside without too much sliding around, especially after I used a couple of bungee cords across the top to further secure it.

Of course an ATV with the spray tank mounted directly to it at the rear would be more maneuverable, but I didn’t have the $$$ for an ATV and this setup has its advantages.  It attaches and disattaches easily right under the garden tractor’s sleeve hitch

 

As such, the whole trailer can be quickly removed to free the tractor up for other tasks–something far more difficult for a tank mounted directly to the body of the tractor/ATV.  This is particularly true when (as often happens) you have lots of chemical left, making the tank just about immovable due to weight.  You hardly want to dump all that chemical, so having a wheeled trailer makes it easy to just wheel it out of place until the next spray job.  The only other attachment is the electrical, and a two-conductor snap connection makes that, well, a "snap" (attached to garden tractor battery via some alligator clips).

My sprayer is a 25-gallon spot sprayer made by the P-K Corporation (Model SP2518MASC), which I bought from a local farm/ranch supply outfit for around $90.  It has a 1.8GPM pump which has been just fine for my needs.  I’ve seen many similar models out there that would work just fine too.  The only lousy feature of this particular sprayer is the 15′ coiled hose.  This is handy for keeping the hose coiled and "out of the way," but is a real pain in the *ss to actually spray with since it wants to "keep" its coils too tightly.  After an hour of fighting that hose I bought 20′ of simply 1/2" poly hose and switched it out, which works much better.

Do yourself a favor and buy yourself an extra spray wand BEFORE spraying season arrives.  Inevitably your old one will split, or you’ll step on it, or you’ll forget to drain water out of it over in the early spring when you still might get some freezing temps and it will be cracked, etc.  There’s nothing worse than having the right day to spray and being without a wand (esp. if you live in a rural area without a ready supply of replacements).  Personally I like the universal replacement wands by SOLO, available from $10-$20.

Speaking of SOLO, their Model 425 4-gallon backpack sprayer is a bombproof unit that has given me years of dependable service.  It is a little more expensive that the competition (around $100), but after you’ve gone through several crappy sprayers (esp. the non-backpack variety) you’ll soon appreciate a quality unit like this one.

The final modification I made to this setup is to build/add a rear "fan sprayer" to be able to spray/cover larger areas simply by driving over them, rather than using the wand as a spot-sprayer.  Of course they make special "boomless" sprayers for this purpose, but I wanted to use my existing tank and setup.  So I installed a t-connector just off the pump so that I could run two wands from the pump:

 

 

One was my standard "spot-spraying" wand.  The second was a similar want to which I attached a special broadcast nozzle from Northsar (about $15).  The only hitch is that the nozzle requires a 1/4" female inlet and your standard spray wand has a 3/8" male end.  So you need to buy an additional 1/4" female to 3/8" female adapter to attach the special nozzle to your spray want (I just bought one from Northern Tool at the same time I ordered the Northstar nozzle):

 

I then secured the spray wand with the special nozzle to the side of my spray tank so that the end with the nozzle extended past the rear of the cart door about 8".  This puts the nozzle about 30" above the ground, right within the range of what the manufacturer recommends for a good fan width.  With my 1.8GPM pump I ended up with about a 12′ wide spray pattern.  To control everything I just set the wand so that the "on" position was locked, and then turned the pump off and on with the remote off/on inline switch that I attached up near the console of the garden tractor.  When I wanted to use the other want (spot sprayer), I just unlocked the other wand and I was ready to go.

I’ve sprayed quite a bit with this setup with good success.  25 gallons is a good tank size and will keep you out spraying longer without additional "fill ups".  The FIMCO pump that came with this P-K sprayer has held up well.  I even used this setup last fall when a small weed fire got out of hand and caught a corral fence on fire.  I was nowhere close to a spigot, so I just filled this tank up with water and drove over and got things under control.  In fact having this setup filled with water would be a wise idea during any burning project.  It isn’t going to deliver a lot of water fast, but it will help you keep things under control if you don’t let things get out of hand.

I haven’t sprayed anything too adventurous with this setup, just standard 41% glyphosate (generic Roundup) at various concentrations for non-selective control and amine 2,4-D for broadleaf control.

‘Bringing the pain to the weeds….Coyotefred

 

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Well it’s been some time since I’ve posted, but the good news is that much of that time I’ve actually be PLANTING and field-testing some tools and techniques I’ll share here, some of which might benefit others.

My first project was coming up with a reasonably cost-effective seeder for seeding areas larger than my handy Earthway Garden Seeder could handle.  What I came up with is this:

 

I know it ain’t pretty and it probably won’t win many awards, but I’ll tell you it does the job pretty well.

We start with a garden tractor, in my case a Sears Craftsman 26HP, 54" Mower/Garden Tractor (Model 917.27692).  This if of course the most expensive part of the operation and some thought needs to be put into the best choice.  Intially I played around with the idea of an ATV rather than a garden tractor, but when I priced everything out (esp. needing to buy a separate pull-behind mower for mowing), my budget dictated this choice instead.  You might be able to make this work with an ordinarily "riding lawnmower," but everywhere I read cautioned against this, explaining that the wider tires, different gearing, and hitch set-up of a true "garden tractor" was necessary for something like tillage/cultivating.  Of course if you already have an ATV that would be an effective approach as well.

So far I’m pleased with this Garden Tractor, although I haven’t yet used it for any mowing (and probably won’t since my whole goal here is a relatively maintenance-free prairie "lawn").  The 54" mower deck is removed easily, which I did for all of this kind of work.  I bought the optional Sleeve Hitch (Model. No. 486.24536) which was necessary for using the attachments and which installed easily.

Attached directly to the tractor via the sleeve hitch is a 42" "Row Crop Cultivator" made by Agri-Fab (around $150).  This is raised and lowered by the arm-lever control of the sleeve hitch.

 

 

The cultivator has 7 tangs which can be spaced as you like with the U-bolts.  I ended up installing them as you see above, which worked well for the heavy rate of seeding I had in mind for my project.  Obviously you could reduce the number of tangs/adjust the spacing to suit your needs.

Next I added Agri-Fab’s Ground Drive Drop Spreader with a 40" spread width and 175lb carrying capacity (around $200).  This is where I had to be a little clever.  Ordinarily this drop spreader would attach directly to the garden tractor or ATV.  But after some experimentation I found this really wasn’t ideal.  For one thing you had to make at least two passes: one with your cultivator and another with your drop spreader to seed.  But on that second pass your big-old tires would end up closing up some of your furrows, which was less than ideal.  In the end I simply wired the tongue of the drop spreader to the back of the cultivator.  ‘Nothing fancy about it but you really don’t need anything more than that.  Now with one pass I could easily drop the seed into the furrows created immediately ahead of it with the cultivator.

One problem with this arrangement, however, was opening and closing the seed drop lever from your seat on the tractor with your seeder being so far behind you.  For this I simply attached a long wooden rod to the seed control lever.

 

Now I could easily "shut off" the seed when I need to when making turns, etc.  This worked surprisingly well and only required some practice to remember to do it  

The remaining addition was to find some means of closing up the seeded furrows.  Initially I planned to just use my seeder without any additions and then make a 2nd pass over the seeding with a drag harrow, etc.  But there’s something appealing about being able to make just a single pass, so I rigged up a couple of drag chains pulled behind the seeder:

 

The front chain is a heavy logging chain; the rear one a lighter chain with more links to make greater soil contact.  The wooden spacers were necessary to keep the chains from "bowing" and not extending the full 40" of seed spread area.  These were attached by a couple of 1" wide pieces of metal I just shaped with a hammer to ride over the axle between the wheel and the body of the seeder:

 

The wooden spacers and chains were attached simply by drilling some holes in them and wiring them in place with some fencing wire.  Certainly someone more mechanically inclined or inspired might come up with something sexier, but this worked well, never fell off or became tangled, etc.

So that’s the basic design.  I’ve used this setup to plant probably about 1.5-2 acres of ground where the large drill on my seeding project (15′ Great Plains drill) couldn’t come close to reaching.  I also used this to run along "critical areas" (e.g. along fencelines) to give them a "double seeding" to outcompete the weeds.

All things considered this setup is pretty maneuverable.  Backing up is nearly impossible (at least for me!) so one has to plan ahead in tighter spots for turn-around room.  The seeder is quite adjustable and does a great job laying down a variety of seeds, as can be seen here (with a mix of wheatgrass and prairie sandreed):

 

 

The chain drags do a nice job of covering the furrows up:

 

If you want greater compacting, just pull up the cultivator and drive over your planting a few times with those big fat wheels.  

I didn’t do any additional compacting, however, and I had excellent germination results as you can see below with my assistant standing nearly on top of a clearly-visible planting run (wheatgrass seedlings about 3" high):

 

I used this to do my seeding about a month ago, and I’ve inspected most of those areas and found a high rate of germination and pretty consistent seeding.  This system works really fast and the "one pass" operation means no worrying where you went the first time in heading back for covering/packing/etc.  This worked easily around outbuildings and many "tight" places; tighter ones I finished off the the Earthway seeder.  Note, however, that most of this ground was previously tilled using an old John Deere tractor.  Soil prep is key with this setup.  With the tines set so closely, too much debris/soil litter would quickly "clog" them up, making seeding difficult.  My soil is also pretty sandy/loamy, so I can’t say this setup would necessarily work wonders on heavier clay soils.  However, I’ve been very pleased with the results.  This is a cost-effective, hassle-free way of laying down a significant amount of native seed with one-pass efficiency.  I wouldn’t want to plant 10-20 acres with this, but if one were patient you could certainly do it (with effective results).

Coyotefred

PS I just re-read this and wanted to emphasize again the importance of pre-planting soil prep.  Most of the ground I planted using this setup had been tilled several times last year to loosen up the weed-bound soil and for weed control (tillage not only kills existing weeds but disturbs soil, encouraging new weed germination which are then killed with subsequent tillage).  Even with multiple tillages last year I can already see a fair number of weeds already coming up along with my planting.  Nevertheless, I think taking an entire season for nothing but prepatory tillages made sense, and certainly made seeding easier and into a more weed-seed-free seedbed.  This setup can get "clogged up" pretty quickly in areas where debris/litter in the soil are somewhat thick, so some kind of soil prep is necessary.  In my case I had a neighbor disc everything up with his huge disc early in the season, and then I did subsequent diskings with my old John Deere 60.  This is a disruptive process, but I think in the big picture it made sense to do it this way.  A huge seed drill like the Great Plains 15 footer I used to drill most of my 20 acres has no problem drilling into existing weedy soil, but that huge drill (and the tractor that pulled it) couldn’t get to a lot of areas around outbuildings, trees, silos, some fencelines, etc.  So either those areas don’t get seeded (and these are often the weediest), or you need something like this.  So I guess the bottom-line is that I would highly recommend finding some way to do some serious soil-prep before you even think of planting.  If your seeding area is relatively weed-free already this can be less-intense, otherwise it probably isn’t a bad idea to devote an entire season of discing (or chemical knockdown like glyphosate/Roundup) so the following season you can be planting into a more weed-free seedbed…

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I continue to be impressed with the Earthway Garden Seeder I posted on months back.  I’ve run it hard for several months now and I can say it is durable as well as extremely convenient and effective.  As I discussed previously, this seeder is marketed to plant common garden seeds, which I would imagine it does well.  The variously-sized interchangeable seed discs, however, work effectively for planting many native grass and forb seeds as well.  I’ve found it works particularly well for harder, denser seeds like wheatgrass, switchgrass, lovegrass and sunflower.  Mixes tend to do fine unless there are too many "fluffy" (typically warm-season) grasses.  Little and Big Bluestem will likely cause some clogging, but mixing them with some denser, heavier seed like wheatgrass will generally keep them flowing.  The blade that creates the furrow is adjustable which is handy, and I’ve powered the thing through a rocky, gravely driveway edge with few problems.  I would imagine a more clay-bound soil might pose problems if wet; my soil is sandy loam.  I switched out the chain it came with with a slighter heavier one, which I also lengthened a little to keep it from "catching" on the nose of the furrow blade as it would sometimes do.

This would be a great unit to lend out to friends to quickly plant a few rows of native seed at the edge of a bed, etc.  Pretty much idiot-proof and effectively packs the seed row in nicely, which is critical for effective seed-soil contact and germination.  Here are some illustrative photos:

 
 

Here is a top-view of the seeder showing it full of a mix of slender and sodar streambank wheatgrass and prairie sandreed (my choice for a competitive mix of cool and warm season species with some rhizomatous growth).

 

Here is the seeder in action, digging a nice little furrow and dropping the seed in.  Actually the amount of seed being dispensed is more than would ordinarily be called for for all the but the densest seeding projects, but depending on the germination rate of your seeds this might end up just about right.  Note the thicker-than-normal chain I installed that pulls the soil into the furrow, which the rear wheel then rolls over and compacts.

 

The completed furrow.   You can really motor with this seeder, although the "handle" on top is not all that well designed and gets a little tiring.  If you’re on the tall side you’ll be a doing a little stooping with this, but nothing too awful.  And compared to the alternatives of several steps of digging furrows with one tool, dropping seed into them by hand on your knees, closing your furrow and compacting in another step, etc., this baby is perfect.  I keep it just inside the door loaded with a little seed and ready for action when you have just 15 or 20 minutes at the end of the day.  You can easily plan hundreds of feet of seed in this amount of time without pulling out seed, tools, etc.

 

Ah the fruits of our labors.  Here’s part of a row of sodar streambank wheatgrass I seeded about 6 weeks ago using this seeder.  As you can see, the density is really much greater than you would need for this type of planting (1 plant per square foot is typically recommended).  Oh well you can’t have too much native grass!  I interseeded these rows between some existing rows I had planted two years ago "by hand".  Wow…it took me about 20 minutes to interseed the same number of rows it took me several hours to do "by hand"–and the germination rate in the Earthway-seeded rows is far greater than other methods.

Happy seeding!

Coyotefred 

 

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Incidentally, I think this would be a really cool band name as well as posting title ("Tumbleweed Burning")

Those of you anxiously awaiting my next posting, hoping for the next Walden or Sand County Almanac or are in for some disappointment.  The best I can come up with is a nifty way to safely and conveniently dispose of tumbleweeds.

"Tumbleweeds" are almost iconic in western myth and movie.  Yet most of them are comprised of two invasive species: "Kochia" (Kochia scoparia) and Russian Thistle (Salsola kali).  These annual broadleaf weeds propagate by seed, which is effectively dispersed when the dried parent plant breaks lose at the base of the stem and proceeds to "tumble" across the land, dropping seed in the process (around 15,000 seeds per plant for kochia).  In "tumbleweed country" like mine, the first strong winds of fall tend to bring these brazen balls streaming in from neighbors to the west/northwest.  They catch in fences, along the base of trees, and generally make a nuisance of themselves as well as representing a fire risk.  Disposing of them is easier said than done with their large size and prickly character.  Burning can be effective but open burning can be a fire hazard, will usually result in less-than-complete burning, and requires transporting the miserable things to the burn site.

Here is an alternative that I field-tested today with good results.  Find yourself a 50-gallon drum or similar metal barrel.  Saw off the top with a sawzall or circular saw and an appropriate "made for metal" blade (be careful!).  Cut open a hole in the side near the bottom (closed end) of the barrel.  You now have yourself basically a mini-version of those charcoal-lighting gizmos you stuff with newspaper and dump the charcoal on top of. 

Now before you get all fired up here’s the best part: make it portable.  Find yourself a metal wheelbarrow and put your "burn barrel" on top of it.  For safety you should probably secure it in place by punching some holes in the side of the barrel and using some heavy-gauge wire to cinch it down to your wheelbarrow.  I didn’t do this, however, and it stayed put just fine so long as you were careful when moving and had heavy gloves to steady it if necessary.

Now you’re ready to burn.  Push the thing near a supply of tumbleweeds.  Crumple up a few pieces of newspaper and stuff them into the bottom, using the hole you’ve cut into the side (this hole is also necessary for proper air flow while burning).  Take 3 or 4 tumbleweeds and stuff them into the barrel.  Use a thatch rake, shovel, old metal bar, whatever to jam them in there pretty good.  Now light your newspaper and let the fun begin.

The weeds burn hot and fast, so you should be ready with a few more close-at-hand so you can begin to build some heat/coals in the bottom.  Wear a long-sleeved shirt and protective gloves and you can simply jam the tumbleweeds in, one at at time (or a few small ones) by hand, since it will generally take 10-15 seconds for them to catch fire.  After you’ve burned 15-20 you will have a decent enough pile of embers at the bottom to push the thing around your place, stuffing in the tumbleweeds as you come across them.  ‘No more having to watch an open fire while you bring the weeds to the fire…now you bring the fire to the weeds.

I used this rig for about 2 hours this afternoon, pushing it around the corrals and burning 75-100 tumbleweeds that had accumulated around fences, gates, bottoms of trees, etc.  ‘Couldn’t have been easier, and very safe so long as you take some care to jam the weeds fully into the top opening so burning pieces don’t drop into grass, litter, etc.  When this did happen most of these fell into the wheelbarrow bed anyway.  But obviously keep a close eye out.  Carrying a small fire extinguisher along in your wheelbarrow is really all the insurance you need if you are exercising some common sense (not burning in extremely windy conditions or close to highly flammable areas, etc.)

I found that ever very large tumbleweeds (far larger in diameter than the barrel opening) can be burned effectively.  Get your fire going by burning a small weed or two, then push the big weed onto the top, holding it in place with your rake, rod, whatever.  Keep pressure on it and push it down on in as it burns, allowing you to compress it more.

When you’re finished, your embers can be safely extinguished by dumping a little water into your barrel and mixing.  Dump ‘er out and you’re ready for the next time.

No rocket science here, but tumbleweeds are a real pain in the *ss if you live in many rural areas.  I found this a reasonably safe (esp. compared to alternatives) and effective way to deal with them.  Make your "burning barrel round" a couple of times a year and you should be able to keep your tumbleweed situation under control.  ‘Leave the tumbleweeds to High Noon and the OK Corral.

Coyotefred 

PS The piece of stovepipe you see up near the top of my barrel was not part of my "design."  This is the only barrel I had laying around…looks like someone had used it as a barrel stove, which was just right since it already had the bottom hole cut in place… 

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