Oh boy, I'm in deep now!

Yeah, went off the deep end. I want to convert more old improved pasture grass to natives this year and add more food plots plus I want to go the no-till route. I bought a Land Pride NTS2507. Pictures are stock, it will take me about 5 weeks to get the machine.





I've been studying this seeder and the Woods PPS84 real hard but Land Pride won out because it is a tow vs. 3PT and the mudd scrapers are standard.

Very nice!

That's awesome! I've been keeping my eye out on those. Let us know how you like it!

that is the ticket

Will offer some reports once it is in place. Busy reading the 70 page operators manual!

PUUUURDY!

If you were a REAL NICE GUY, you would let us borrow it.

X2

Hey, if you guys weren't so far away...

Man!!! O man. Been looking for on old brillion for a while. That's fancy!!

Very nice

That's purdy, I'd be scared to use it! That first scratch is gonna hurt.

Yeah it will!

Dang it, RD! You get serious about this stuff!

Yeah, it seems that way. A couple of years ago, I got involved with The Nature Conservancy on a bobwhite quail habitat restoration project converting improved pastures back to native prairie and savannah grasses. I've been involved with wildlife operations for a bit over 12 years now, foregoing income from livestock operations, but the biggest change I've seen in the quality and quantity of all the wildlife has been through the native grasses effort. In the past, my entire focus has been the whitetail deer, but this effort focuses on providing habitat for the small stuff; quail, dove, horned toads, monarch butterflies, etc. What I found is that by getting involved or concerned about the small stuff benefits everything up the food chain to include myself.

I've made it my goal to convert every blade of improved grasses to natives over the next half decade (I don't like making any change to the land all at once). Native grasses take specialized equipment to get the little "feather" of a seed into the ground, so this influenced my decision on the seeder. TNC will provide a native grass seed drill/planter, but I would just rather use my equipment plus have it available for my food plot work. The quail work and TNC have put me in touch with two other "Quailers" in the county, we have become good friends. My intent is to let them use the seeder when they need it. Funny thing about the three of us, we are not interested in hunting quail, just seeing their habitat restored and the changes that activity brings.

Very nice

Thanks!

What I highlighted was the key for me when I was feeding all those leases. It's not just one thing, it's the whole "ecosystem" if you will. You make changes and that starts making other changes...some for better, some for worse.

Love that feeder. Hope it works for ya.

Yeap, exactly!

Shot Ranch Dog, pretty soon we will be seeing you on the TPW show about Land Stewards. And that's pretty awesome right there.

Thanks...

The LandPride NTS2507 finally arrived yesterday evening.





Had it been a little bit earlier, I would have planted some summer plots, but I plant my fall seeds on September 18th which is only 88 days from now. I think that I will use my empty plots to play with this planter while I learn how to use it. I read every word of the user manual back in May and rather than rush it, really go through this piece of equipment inside and out.

My contact and friend at The Nature Conservancy will be out next week to offer advice on the native grasses which will be planted the last week of August. I want to plant that seed anywhere I can get the planter into and all my senderos that are not already food plots and all my road beds.

I'm jealous!

Thanks for sharing, I enjoy reading your posts on what your doing with your property.

That thing looks great, RD.

Thanks guys!

I presume no fire ants to kill the bobwhite nests?

Sweet Baby Jesus, That is what I'm talking about! You can break it in on my place if you need to test it out first.

I took the No-Till Seeder out for a spin as I wanted to have the new equipment ready a month to six weeks ahead of planting. There is nothing to the setup. Figure out how aggressive the spiked rollers need to be to prep the soil and pull it. This is a seeder vs. a drill, so there are no seed depth settings. Seeder work with seed that needs to be planted 1/8" to a 1/2" deeper although it still will get anything out.



This food plot has the toughest soil I work with. It is an old drill pad that I removed the commercial base from and had been working at breaking up the clay for many years. It produces a great plot now, but the soil is tough to get it right.



The front rollers are set to their maximum angle, and it simply pulverized the soil to the spikes depth, about 3". It was very easy for my 8540 to pull; third gear low at 2100 RPM for 2.75 MPH. There is also nothing to operating it; lower it at the start of a row and pick it up at the end. It plants with the hydraulics in the "float," so the wheels are on the ground.



In that, the seeder is "No Till" it doesn't turn the soil, just loosens it, and leaves whatever matter that is on top pressed in place. There are some limitations on how much material can be on the ground. If excessive, the plot needs to be prepped with the seeder before seeding, or a disc can be used. How much prep it will need is just a matter of experience with it. Both the Kubota and Land Pride guys have been great to work with.

Matter build up is immaterial this year. We have four days of rain that will impact us this afternoon so I'm going to start discing at 7 this morning to prep the soil to collect that rain. Will follow the disc with a tooth harrow and then run my Brillon pulverizer over it as a final pass.

I'm going to plant two premixed seeds that I've used previously with great results; Whitetail Institutes Extreme and Pure Attraction.

Extreme is a perennial that I plant on my senderos. It typically has lasted me three years. The key to its survival in my area is stopping the grass growth in the early spring.



Pure Attraction is an annual that will be used on the food plots.



Another good thing about the mixes that I'm using is calibration is not required. It has already been figured out by Land Pride. Set and pull.

RD, been following your posts about this stuff as I am about to get head deep in it as well... would you mind spelling out the process you use to prep the plots and approximately how much time or what you look for in between each step?

For example, spray gly on plot and wait 2 weeks, then disc ground and wait 2 weeks until dry, then use pulverizer, then go over with seeder, then wait for rain...

Also, is assume you mentioned your tractor above is a kubota 86 hp model, do you think this is appropriate hp for what you are doing or does it seem Under or over powered? I am unsure what tractor to start with.

when looking at all the steps involved, approx how much time do you take to prep and then plant each plot per acre?

Finally, have you tried any single pass till and seed products before and if so, how would those compare to your current method (I know this is your first season with the seeder so experience may be limited)

Thanks, and if you wish to take offline via pm that's fine.

I just came in for a cup of coffee and will be at this field work for a better part of the day but will sit down and pull up my records to give you an idea of time/acre I have run.

As far as the tractor goes, I think it is perfect for my operation. It has plenty of power and doesn't struggle with anything including the 3 bottom plow and hard soils. It's compact and fits up close to brush and under the oaks I work around.

I will get back with you this evening or in the morning depending how the day unfolds.

Ready to see after photos!

Timed the discing just right, have a steady slow rain for about 18 hours now. The plots have not had any runoff, they have sucked it all up.


If we are talking about an existing plot, I do the prep work based on planting on September 18th for my area. Historically, within seven days after that date, we will experience a tropical rain. Now the other stuff.

To control weeds after an annual food plot is used up, I spray Roundup (41% glyphosate) or disc as needed throughout the year. I choose one of the other based on the soil moisture and exposure to the sun. Discing dries the plot out; spraying doesn't. Spraying works better on a damp plot as the moisture can impede the effectiveness of the disc. My idea is to end up grass and weed free at least two weeks out of planting. Two weeks is the minimum for me, and I prefer a month out as something always comes up, and I don't like missing my planting date unless a look ahead indicates that there still is some harsh temperatures ahead. In that case, I would plant the extreme and delay the Pure Attraction. The trouble is with the rain we typically see that last week of September; you are not going to get to work the plot for awhile as when the rain comes, it comes. Everyone gets stuck for the dove season opener 3rd Friday. Once had a hunter stuck his Jeep Commander that afternoon and we could get it out until May 3rd!

The last couple years I've been fertilizing as I plant with the drill I had, it had both seed and fertilizer boxes, but now I will fertilize with a drop spreader before planting.

With new plots, I start in the winter for the following spring or fall planting.


As I noted, my tractor works great for me given what soils I work with. You didn't mention what type of acreage you will be working with and what other uses you will have for the tractor. Do you own the property or lease?

I've owned three tractors; a Massey Fergusion M35, a 75 HP Zetor, and the 85 horse Kubota. They all fit my needs at the time. If I bought another, it would be Kubota, and that is based on the service I receive from my dealer more than the model. I like the Zetor, but the dealer network is weak in South Texas. I just bought a 26 HP Kubota, but I use it as a lawn mower. It is a bit back to the acreage you plan on working, but my advice for any tractor under consideration be that you get one with four wheel drive.


This is another depends. Just about everything I do is done at 2.5 to 2.75 mph. That is somewhat a product of horsepower and the recommendation for the implement being worked.

Time on a field depends on the shape and size of the plot with the time in the turns being a production killer. As an example, I have a couple of senderos that are 3,000' long. The food plot is 14' wide, so that is a little under an acre (.96). It takes slightly less than 30 minutes to plant it with only one minute in a turn. I have another food plot the same size that is a rectangle that is 175' wide; it takes almost an hour to plant. 54 minutes exactly, with about 27 minutes of that turning back for another pass. I have a simple spreadsheet that I made and use to give me my field times. Turns, at about a minute each, are a killer. I love planting senderos and the deer like them a lot better than square or rectangle plots.


I'm not sure what a single pass product is? I have owned two different drills and a row planter plus have used the local Coops Adams fertilizer buggy (fertilizer mixed with the seed) and my broadcast spreader. They all fill different needs. The only owned equipment I regret parting with is the Cole 4 row planter I had. It was an outstanding four-row crops planter for seed like lablab, I even planted watermelons with it! It did take a flat prepared seed bed to work with but I sure wish I still had it. It placed the seed as the specified depth and spacing down a row plus drilled the fertilizer in a row to the side of the seed row. I even had the row markers for it to keep everything nice and straight. Not worth a hoot with the small, shallow depth, typical food plot seeds though.

I have a similar Kubota tractor - ac ETC IS AWESOME

Ranchdog, appreciate all the info. That was very helpful.

Little about my place: 400 acres in Oklahoma, has had some plots done in past and will continue those plots but wish to make more as time goes on as I wish to develop the place into about 5-10% plots. Mixture of wet ground and dry so the info on spray vs till was good. I don't have any senderos but would love to plant some "clover senderos" down the road as well. Time will tell.
Tractor would be used for mainly plots and brush hogging, with some Occasional other farm activities. Initially was thinking of a 35-45 hp tractor and then reassessed and thought double that would be good, but recently have been looking hard at the kubota m6-111, but that may be overkill. Just know I want a cab so I can work in any weather hot or cold. I will probably rent a tractor this fall to put the plots in as I don't have a storage building for any equipment yet and don't want to leave things out in the pasture to get mice and rodent infested. I know the local kubota dealership rents 70-80hp tractors so I may just give those a try.

One Implement I was thinking of were a woods precision seeder. Advertised as a multi seed multi depth single pass seeder, minimal till as it has some discs as well as spike roller and a cultipacker on the end. 6 feet wide.

I've always tried to keep a minimum of 10% food plots, in the past I had 640 acres and have whittled it down as I've gotten older to my present and final 120 acres. Right now I have 12.5 acres of food plots, the plots average about an acre each, and I'm going to increase it to 24 acres so that I will have 10% for both spring/summer and fall/winter. Of the remaining acreage, I will have a 50/50 mix of native brush species and native grass.

I do think that you can have an overkill on a tractor only because as they get larger, they get wider, higher, and heavier. They get tougher to fit into small places that whitetails like, and they are tough to work tight around any trees. The picture below shows my 8540 pulling a fertilizer buggy out of a plot that the whitetails love because of the thick cover. If my 8540 needed to be replaced. I would buy something of the same size. For me, a cab is a must and the same with storage to keep it and a seeder protected.



I studied the Woods PPS84 with the native seed box, not the Hunter Edition, just as hard as I did the Land Pride NTS2507. They are very close to being the same. They are both seeders so they can plant with all the seed boxes at the same time, but there is no control over the depth, they are not a drill, other than the prep of the soil and the angle of front tillage.

The "pro" of the Woods over the LP was a calibration tray, and "con" was scrapers were optional and expensive. Both three point models are very close in price, but the cost of front tractor weights for the Woods was going to push it further apart. Here is this the summary from a spreadsheet I was running with all the numbers from both seeders.



The Woods fell out of the running because they did not have a tow model and an after market tow bar was going to make them uncompetitive. I was not going to move to a new planter without it being a tow model. My tiller based drill did an excellent job, but at 2000 lbs, it was a killer to put on. In fact, I had it shift a couple of times while getting it hooked up and I could see that I could get easily get hurt. The money spent on NTS did rise above $14K because of options that I decided to add and that would not have been available on the Woods. These were an acre meter, additional seed box agitators, and highway lighting.

A fellow in my Wildlife Management Association overheard me talking with another fellow about the NTS, and he said that he had a PPS84 than he would sell at a very good price. I asked what's wrong with it; he said "nothing, other than it is very heavy and a 3pt." That went along well with my experience and decision making.

I hope I don't appear to be a know it all as I don't. I have been actively planting food plots on my own ranch land, both spring, and fall, for 26 years now and I'm convinced that I will never know it all and will always be wondering if I could have done something better and smarter.

Ranchdog, love the info!

Give me a quick take on why you prefer tow vs 3pt for the seeder...

With something this big, the weight and mass are tough for one guy to handle. If you don't have a lift arm remote outside your tractor, few tractors in this size range we are talking about using do, a single operator is going to run himself to death crawling in and out of the cab. There is no horsing the seeder into position. You might be inclined to open the back window of the cab and stand on the lift arms so that you can reach into to the cab for the lift arm lever, but that is a very bad idea as it places you between two very heavy pieces of equipment. Honestly, with something that weighs in at a ton, I don't want a second person standing between the tractor and the implement while I attach that implement. Once on the tractor 3-pt, it is a job just leveling it as you cannot simply screw the top line adjustment in or out. With this must weight and for the slightest adjustment, all the lift must be relieved. Leveling will take a couple of lifts.

Once in the field, it is tough for the lift arms to float the seeder on the plot as it is on the end of a fulcrum whose balance point is the rear tires. If the front tires go over a slight rise, the seeder is pushed into the soil, and as the back tires go over the same, it is lifted. It is almost impossible for the lift arm hydraulics to response the conditions causing the change are being encountered ahead of the implement. Lift arm float response is typically quite slow.

Towing an implement places it between the tractor's rear tires and the implement's rear tires. It is using the hydraulic's remote float, so the implement can correct position as it experiences the change rather than experiencing through the tractor. Hydraulic power through that source is also more stable and responsive.

It has been an expensive, but my experience is that heavy 3-pt implements are not worth purchasing. My school is not that of the "hard knocks", it is the "hard and expensive knock!"

Still too hot to plant a food plot but my friend had more native grasses to plant so I towed it the 25 miles to his place and he put it to work.



Planting natives is like planting feathers, but the Land Pride did the various senderos and small fields, 10 acres total, on the seeding schedule. The ground has repeatedly been prepped for a year, it takes that to keep the improved grasses from reappearing over time, and 2¼ acres/hour was a comfortable ride.

With rain in the forecast, cooler day & night temperatures plus the armyworms gone, I finally was able to use the NTS2507 to seed my food plots on Wednesday! Several weeks ago I did calibrate the seeding rates for the three products I was going to use, all from Whitetail Institute: Extreme (perennial), No-Plow, and Pure Attraction. Calibrating the seeder per the instructions is work, as it takes 266 rotations of the packer drum while collecting samples from three tubes. The Berckes Scale makes it simple, 47 turns of the drum with samples from two tubes. I've been using the scale for about three years; I bought mine from the manufacturer on eBay. I also use their fertilizer scale.



The work started with the fertilizer application on Tuesday; I was also going to seed my Spring native grass restoration project with oats as a cover crop to hold the soil in place over the winter which increased the acreage, so I used an Adams buggy from the Farmer's Co-op. The Ground Buster I purchased earlier this year was able to be put to work on my senderos.



I've learned that in subsequent years that you will pay for using the 40' broadcast swath of the Adams for these types of applications through chemical treatments or trimming labor to keep the paths open. That brush does love it some fertilizer!



The Ground Buster's purpose is to take advantages of bulk purchases with its capacity and hubs/wheels that are road worthy. The minimum bulk fertilizer purchase is 750 lbs, but I'm usually looking right at a ton, which is the capacity of the box for the Ground Buster. If you will notice, I am loading it from bags thanks to the notice a forum member posted! At Wal-Mart, I purchased 40 lbs for $3.50. Bulk fertilizer to fill the buggy was $412/T or $8.24/40 lbs. We owe that fellow a beverage!

I had already been able to use the native grass (rear) box, and the food plots put the grass seed (middle) and food plot (front) boxes into play. The oats, both for the food plots and the TAMO 411 for the native grass restoration went to the middle box.



The food plot boxes are split because of the adjustment lever for the spiked rollers that are used for soil agitation. You could use two different seed mixes, one in each box, as long as the lbs/cuft of the product and application rate was the same as there is only one seed meter rate control for both boxes.



The last mechanical manipulate of the soil on these plots was September 10, a disc and tooth harrow pass for weed control but after that pass, I did use a pulverizer to seal the soil's surface which would minimize moisture loss. A majority of the days since that work have been in the mid-nineties with no rain. On October 6th, I sprayed the grass and weeds that were surfacing with a 3% solution of 41% Glyphosate (Eraser). As the seeder made its pass, the crust on the plots was tough but soil moist below.



The food plot work went quick. I had the spiked agitators set at the midpoint of their adjustment and was able to seed at five mph. The seeder sure leaves a pretty surface, and I'm looking forward to seeing the plots.



The work on the native grass project went late into the night, but that is the subject for another post.

You have some cool tools to play with

Man that is a great looking plot, look forward to seeing a lush green plants

The frontal system brought no rain despite it being forecast four days in a row.

Awesome job!

Thanks!

In that, it didn't rain I'm thinking about putting the various seeds that I have out over some of the senderos so that I don't have to store them. The spiked agitators in the minimum till position will not disturb the seed been. I have 9 lbs of Extreme and 14 lbs of oats.

Jealous of your time and toys! Plots look great also.

Thanks, red! They sure would look a lot better with rain on them. The next chance is Tuesday; I'm getting a bit skeptical. I do have a bit over 2 acres of irrigated food plots, but my well is down right now, the well guy was out most of the day pulling and replacing the motor under warranty. That didn't do it so it means it is the pump side so they have to pull it again and replace that. It is a five hp motor/pump and the warranty requires that each half that is down the hole be addressed individually. Bummer...

Just to let you guys know that I been down the hard road (or row) with my food plots. In the past, I have planted every acre, except a 1.5-acre plot that is fairly new, with my Earthway Ev-N-Spread. It is well used, clean, and ready to go and I would walk out the seed if that needed to be done!

Man that is one pretty machine!