Planting grass seeds

Gibsonapp · Mar 6, 2007

How about a seed drill?? around here only cost about $6 per acre to rent....need a set of remotes at the rear

CJ4 · Mar 6, 2007

Geeeezzzzz, I agree with Mike.....250lbs of bermuda seed is a WHOLE lot. Anybody know how many pounds per acre is recommended for bermuda? In my experiences with it the bermuda seed is so fine we used to mixed it with flour or something to extend the area covered and then broadcast it by hand. I've done a normal size "city" yard with 5-10 lbs. And you are correct, one thing about bermuda it will spread well with water and sunshine. Isn't it way too early to sew bermuda?? Depending where you are, I thought it needed very warm temp before you sew it.....like 80's at least???

wickedinhere · Mar 6, 2007

Its just a little bit early here but next week the highs next week are goin to be 77 degrees. I will probably plant in april unless it warms more before then.

Mike120 · Mar 6, 2007

I normally use around 7# per acre when I'm redoing a horse paddock and I'll usually put about a 100# of sand in the cyclone spreader to extend/mix it. I have about 15 acres of paddocks/grounds and use less than 50# per year for overseeding/renewing paddocks. 250# on 4 acres is a LOT of seed.

wickedinhere · Mar 28, 2007

Well i finally got all my seed planted i put down 135 lbs of bermuda seed and that was plenty. I boxbladed my entire 4 acres spread the seed and used a piece of old fence with some 4x4's as a drag and it came out great. We had a couple of rains and the grass is sprouting very well.

tallyho8 · Mar 28, 2007

wickedinhere said:
Well i finally got all my seed planted i put down 135 lbs of bermuda seed and that was plenty. I boxbladed my entire 4 acres spread the seed and used a piece of old fence with some 4x4's as a drag and it came out great. We had a couple of rains and the grass is sprouting very well.

What kind of seeds did you use, hulled or unhulled? I test seeded a small area a couple weeks ago and nothing yet. Watered a couple times too. I'm not too far from you so mine should be doing something.

wickedinhere · Mar 28, 2007

I used hulled seed i got it from lowes it was pennington seed.

Z-Michigan · Mar 28, 2007

wickedinhere said:
Well i finally got all my seed planted i put down 135 lbs of bermuda seed and that was plenty. I boxbladed my entire 4 acres spread the seed and used a piece of old fence with some 4x4's as a drag and it came out great. We had a couple of rains and the grass is sprouting very well.

Photos please!

For anyone else reading this in the future - I have noticed that recommended seeding rates for lawns are many times greater than for pastures - I'm looking at 10-40lbs/acre for pasture (depending on type and whether it's a mix or just one species) and seeing specs of 5lbs / 1000sf for lawns with typical lawn grasses (which works out to 215lbs / acre). If you think about it, pasture and hay crops will let the grass grow both taller and wider, so more plants is just more competition with no yield improvement. I read a Canadian publication about meadow brome that indicated 1 plant per square foot was, after two years, as productive as 20 plants per sf. Obviously you won't have much of a lawn with 1 plant / sf mowed to a height of 3 inches!

wickedinhere · Mar 29, 2007

I will take some pics this weekend.

wickedinhere · May 6, 2007

Sorry for the delay here is an update with a little over a month of growth. We had a few cold snaps between the time i planted and now and it slowed my bermuda grass down a little bit. This last week the highs have been in the upper 80's and the grass is doin very well. I am goin to fertilize this week that should get my grass going. Here is a pic.