Bermuda sprigging (the easier way?)
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Day 18 update: Going on vacation for the next few days, so thought I'd give you guys an update before I left. Things are filling in very nicely. Plenty of weeds as expected, but nothing that a celsius/certainty combo can't clean up in a couple of weeks. MUCH less overall weed pressure with this method vs last years seeding project.
That's coming in great! Enjoy your vacation.
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I've seen pictures of walk behind variants. I wasn't sure if those had an actual name or if they were fabricated to meet the requirement.WillyT said:
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I would have loved to see a comparison in terms of sprigs with a cultipacker vs the tilled in method, in terms of rate of establishment, water required, and weed pressure. I've wondered if tilling would generate new weed pressure.
Did you apply ronstar during any of this?
Did you apply ronstar during any of this?
No Ronstar applied. I do think it would be a great option if you wanted to spend the extra money, but I decided to just let it come up and hit it with Celsius/Certainty.Movingshrub said:
Things have been extremely dry and hot here. I got tired of moving the sprinkler around week 3 and decided to start weaning it off of constant watering and going to more deep soakings / wait for rain. I've mowed it a few times now and we just received 2" of rain yesterday, so I hit it with Celsius/Certainty today.
Even with the extreme drought, I've been amazed at the fill in rate. It's done better than I ever thought it would and I'd have no problems going with this method again. The only thing I would change is I would definitely run a harrow over it after tilling, then run the cultipacker over it after that to mash everything back down. I was scared that the harrow was uncovering too many of the sprigs/clumps, but the yard is bumpier than I would like and I think it would have been worth it to have used it anyway. I'm not too worried about it since I can fix it by top dressing with some top soil in a year or 2.
Day 30 update pics. I took these last week and it has already filled in even more than this. I'll post some more photos in a couple of weeks once the Celsius and Certainty have had time to work their magic on the weeds. I've got about a 6ft strip next to my existing sod that's not filling in as quick as I'd like, but it's also crappy dirt and probably isn't getting as much water as the rest of it either. It'll fill in eventually.
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I have no words other than this is amazing. Incredible growth and coverage.
Id venture to guess this method saved you 4/5k, with the same result?
Id venture to guess this method saved you 4/5k, with the same result?
I'd say more than that. I'm in this right now for around $1500 or so (already had chemicals, so would be a little more if I counted that). I'd hate to know what it cost to have someone come lay 1 acre of tifway 419, but I imagine it'd be very expensive :lol: .robbybobby said:
I would say you have to add the cost of the tractor and the tiller attachment as well. I know tillers run a couple of thousand.
If you have this equipment on hand, it really looks cost effective. Considering all things, in this crazy world, with fertlizer costs, the price of a pallet of fresh sod is CHEAP imo. I can only imagine how cheap it was several years ago.
You did a great job with this.
If you know how much a pallet was good for sqft wise (before being cut up) you could compare your cost savings with how much sqft you spread it over.
If you have this equipment on hand, it really looks cost effective. Considering all things, in this crazy world, with fertlizer costs, the price of a pallet of fresh sod is CHEAP imo. I can only imagine how cheap it was several years ago.
You did a great job with this.
If you know how much a pallet was good for sqft wise (before being cut up) you could compare your cost savings with how much sqft you spread it over.
Absolutely. If you don't have the equipment on hand, there will certainly be lots of extra cost involved and I did mention this in my first post. I'm lucky enough to have all of it except the tiller which I was able to borrow from my family's farm.STI_MECE said:
Quick google shows a pallet on average covers 450 sq ft, so you'd need almost 97 pallets to cover a full acre. At $120 per pallet, that'd be $11,600 in the sod cost alone, not to mention labor cost to lay all of it. If you have the equipment on hand and don't mind all the work this takes, I think this method roughly cost about 1/10th of the price. Just to note as well, I actually spaced the sod squares much closer than the guy told me to because I wanted faster fill in. He said he actually spaces his pieces in the rows 6ft apart instead of 3ft, and says you only need 6 pallets per acre at that spacing. This would cut the cost even further at the cost of slower fill in.
I don't know how much coverage the rolls of sod provide or the cost with those, but I imagine that is what most companies would do for larger jobs like this (my original sod around my house was laid with the machines in the big rolls). Maybe they are similar in coverage/price?
@epac90 I can tell you now, trying to lay 97 pallets in a day or two would require a hell of an army of men lol Probably solid 10 guy-15 guys maybe to get done in a day.
I was limited to around 18 pallets of sod per truck when I did a few areas of my lawn.
You should be proud of pulling that off with how you did it. That is extremely efficient for a one man crew.
I was limited to around 18 pallets of sod per truck when I did a few areas of my lawn.
You should be proud of pulling that off with how you did it. That is extremely efficient for a one man crew.
I can't even fathom trying to do 97 pallets after how hard it was to do just this amount, :lol:. I can't take all the credit, I hired my 2 nephews (one is 13, the other is only 9 but he begged to help and did a fantastic job) just to help me throw down the squares. With us 3, it still took an entire day just to throw the sod on the ground. Needless to say, they earned their keep that day lol.STI_MECE said:
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This is absolutely insane. Congratulations on the results.
@clbphllps @FATC1TY Great suggestions. My father and I have been looking into building a roller for this exact purpose. He has a huge roller off of a piece of equipment and we are going to try and build a tongue and hitch on it to make it a pull behind, but this probably won't happen until this winter.
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