[Market-farming] Pinpoint seeder
Allan Balliett
aballiett at frontiernet.net
Thu Feb 5 15:25:00 EST 2009
>Also, I have the greens harvester and have reverted to a knife. It
>just pushed my salad mix down rather than cut it (yes, it was sharp,
>though it is rusty now) and I had trouble emptying the salad into a
>container without spilling it. Call me uncoordinated.
Marcy - I have the greens harvester, also. It has to be continuously
sharpened. The sharpening is easy, but requires a 'special' file. I
would encourage you to plan for and plant for the shortest harvester
as the longer one really seems to require 2 people and then what have
you gained?
As far as the seeder, in my exeprience, Beth is accurate in her
comments, but I don't feel she is accurate in her conclusions.
As the inventor of this high priced tool will tell you, it is a tool,
not a machine. That is, it takes skill to get the best out of, it
doesn't do the work for you. When you get it right though, oolala!!
I would encourage you to find an old 'turf roller' to prepare beds
for using this seeder. (Not a bad thing to use in seeding, anyway!)
If you roll the beds, which you can actually do with the empty seeder
upside down, the seeder, which feeds seed through friction, seeds
much more accurately. In my experience, the drive o-ring pops off
because the bed is too loose and soil gets under the o-ring in the
pulleys and then the o-ring pops off. "Packing" the seedbed will
prevent this. (BTW - You ALWAYS have to keep you eye on any and every
aspect of any of the pinpoint seeders while they are seeding!)
If you are going to do cut-and-come-again seedling mixes, you pretty
much need a pinpoint seeder. The amt of seed they will save you will
pay for the seeder in a relatively short time.
-Allan in WV
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