planting pollinator mix and rye cover crop with equipment in have.

I

inairam

501 Club
I am trying to covert about 2000 square feet of old pasture to pollinator mix with a rye cover crop.

it was bushhogged and cut with a c2 twice and now the area is under clear plastic to solarize the area instead of spaying round up. I may burn it when the plastic is removed.

my question is I have a broad cast seeder, a fh disc, and a drag harrow with 4 level of aggressives. what do I do? the seeds in theses mixes are very small.

I was thinking once the area is clear to seed and disc it in and maybe drag.

any suggestions?
 
Once you have the vegetation killed off, I would try to find someone in you area that does garden tilling for hire. Then use your drag to smooth the seedbed. Finally, borrow a pull behind lawn roller to roll the seed in. Then pray for rain.
 
I wouldn't use the disk after spreading the small seed. It could be somewhat successful but much of the seed will be wasted because most of it will be buried too deeply. A typical lawn roller could work if the area has been smoothed out but any bumps in the surface can leave much of the seed without proper contact with the soil and therefore wasted. I typically get the soil fit by dragging with an implement that looks like chain-link fencing with a trailing board. Then seed and cultipack.

When I plant small seed such as clover or brassicas, I follow up spreading seed with a cultipacker. It's basically a roller with ridges that helps to make the seed contact more complete. I had the same issue as you mention until I found an 8-foot cultipacker by placing a "wanted" ad. It cost me $250 and the cost was shared by a good neighbor for the same purpose. I had to fashion some new wood bearings out of maple wood but it was no big deal.

It's a bit of equipment that'll push the little Cub to its limits but my '48 Barebones Cub has met the challenge. I wouldn't recommend it for a Cub that is weak - especially, if the soil is heavy or wet. Also, some smaller cultipackers can be found that may be more suitable for diminutive Cubs.

There is going to be some waste but the idea is to minimize it. Also, birds will pluck visible seed before it has a chance to germinate, but not to any measurable extent.
 
I do have a FH box. I could drop the teeth to 2-3 inches and use it like a chisel plow and do a lot of passes in different directions to loosen the soil. I also have a fh plow but I did not want to disturb the soil that much.

I have nothing like a cultipacker other than the turf tires on some of the tractors. I do have a flair mower that has a roller on the back.
 
Good advice above. Remember the rule of thumb, seed planting depth is 2x the largest diameter of the seed. You are working with very small seed. You want the soil as smooth as reasonably possible before seeding. A peg-tooth harrow (maybe your drag harrow, whichever style it is) or the chain-link fence options are good final pass choices. The ideal seeding machine would be a grain drill with a grass seeding option. You could drill the rye seed and use the grass seeder to broadcast the other seed mix. Without a grain drill, your best option is probably the broadcast spreader for it all. You may want to go heavy on the rye seed to compensate for a possible low germination rate.

However you get the seed on the ground, rolling it after is pretty important. I suspect the roller on your flail mower is too small a diameter -- it will probably not roll well and push too much dirt along. You could test it before seeding to see if it works. You aren't dealing with that much area. A tractor with turf tires is a reasonable option. Make a pass, move over 9 inches for the next, etc. until you have rolled it all. I've done exactly that on small grading projects. It works okay.
 
So
use the teeth on the box to disturb the ground.
use the disk to break up clumps.
Smooth it out ( I also have a FH rake or the drag harrow),
seed
drive over it with turf tires.

I have used the tuff tires cultipacker idea before when I planted sizable area of grass seed.
 
After I disturbed the ground with a box and used the disc and raked it there was still a lot of root clumps left. I ended up buying a walk-behind troy bilt rotor tiller for $200 from a neighbor about 2 miles away. I tilled the area and used the drag harrow. I keep dragging in the same direction and that removed almost all of the root clumps.

The turf tire cultipacker idea worked mostly.

Two things I learned - one If I was going to do this a lot I would have put garden tire rear wheel on the front. the ag front tires dug in a little on the rototilled ground.
The second thing I learned is if I need to do this a lot I need to find a cultipacker

I did the area twice. the second pass was 90 degrees to the first. see below. I also rototilled twice 90 degrees to the first.

The area that is not done is not seeded. I planted some native plants from a Penn State program

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Join us for . . .
web.cvent.com web.cvent.com

I will see what comes up next summer






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Follow Jim Becker's advice. VERY important, the seed is in the top 1/4 inch of ground. It dries out quickly. Watering it will give you the best result. Most poor germination that is blamed on birds, is actually from seedlings drying out.

Ed
 
The commercial guys that planted our farm for us used no-till planters with round-up sprayers on the units and set the planters to 1/4" deep in the year before cornstalks.
Some of my pollinator mix called for 4 OUNCES of seed per ACRE!
this is a perfect stand and in rows just like corn or beans would be.

6K1PEyd.jpg
 
I have a water wagon. you can see in the picture. It is an 275-gallon IBC toto with a 12v water pump for a camper 55 psi. I used a lawn sprinkler and used the whole 275 gallons. Will do it again in a few days if we do not get rain.
 
They sprayed round up as they seeded? Not wait time?

Very pretty by the way. Another thing I do not have a no till seeder


SONNY said:
The commercial guys that planted our farm for us used no-till planters with round-up sprayers on the units and set the planters to 1/4" deep in the year before cornstalks.
Some of my pollinator mix called for 4 OUNCES of seed per ACRE!
this is a perfect stand and in rows just like corn or beans would be.

6K1PEyd.jpg
Click to expand...
 
You can usually rent no-till seeders very reasonably from your local soil conservation district. BUT, you need a much larger tractor than a Cub to use that. I think your seedbed looks great. For what you’re doing, it doesn’t need to be lawn perfect. In a couple of winters, freeze-thaw will remove any irregularities. If you can find an old antique metal bed spring, they make a perfect drag prior to seeding.
 
Ya, they sprayed roundup as they planted. As for the rented seeders,---well they wont to a decent job cause they are not made for this small seed. I looked at them and decided to hire the pro's to do mine. 137 acres in one field so I cant mess around!
For a small patch you could use a small hand seeder and get by with it. Still need roundup over the top first to kill any new weeds that are there.
 
inairam said:
They sprayed round up as they seeded? Not wait time?
Click to expand...
I am under the impression that Roundup has no effect on seeds and that the half-life in the ground is only a few days. Spraying it at seeding time will only knock down weeds that have already germinated. That will mean that the weeds no longer have a head start on the desired plants.

No warrantees on these comments. I haven't done the research from reliable sources.
 
SONNY said:
Ya, they sprayed roundup as they planted. As for the rented seeders,---well they wont to a decent job cause they are not made for this small seed. I looked at them and decided to hire the pro's to do mine. 137 acres in one field so I cant mess around!
For a small patch you could use a small hand seeder and get by with it. Still need roundup over the top first to kill any new weeds that are there.
Click to expand...
The seed size has been my concern. https://www.ernstseed.com/ who I used and was advised to me by every towships who did projects in my area, do advise a cover crop of rye or oats. The cover crop helps to add volume in the seeder. I was also thinking about mixing in sand as a way to add more volume to the mix. But I am not dealing with 137 acres.
 
Several things to bear in mind when selecting a cover or nurse crop to add to your wildflower mix. Rye germinates quickly and will over-winter, but is allelopathic. That means it releases chemical compounds from the roots that stifle the germination of other competing seeds. Oats germinate quickly, but does not over-winter. Wheat germinates more slowly, but over-winters well. It has the added benefit of reseeding itself the following spring and produces seed utilized by songbirds. I use crimson clover as a cover crop in our garden. It’s also a small seed and is slow to germinate. But, once established will come back year after year if not tuned under. Pollinators love it.
 
Rye was recommended and supplied by the seed company. They recommend oats for late spring planting.

I am supposed to cut it to 8" late next spring when it reaches ~ 18". The following late winter very early spring I am supposed to cut it to 2" as a way to suppress the rye and warm the ground

From the site:

Seeding rates are based on our experience with native meadows and our desire to establish strong, individual plants. Planting cover crops that are too aggressive or thick diminishes the long-term viability of the perennial meadow plants. We have concluded that the annual, small grains, such as oats and rye, are the best cover crops or companion crops to plant with native seedings when there is a need. Due to its physiological adaptations in warmer regions, brown top millet is recommended for portions of the planting season. Grain cover crops can reduce competition from aggressive weeds because they grow quickly and also reduce the potential for erosion by providing quick cover. We do not recommend annual ryegrass as it is too aggressive and long-lived.
 
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