Where Do I Start?

Have been talking with a few guys up here, and have decided that I am going to try to apply a liquid fertilizer with my barley seeds this spring. I see no reason why I couldn't run hoses RIGHT into the seed openers, and just blow the stuff out right with the seed huh??

I am thinking somewhere around a 30-50 gallon tank on the front of the seeder. The stuff I am using recommends applying their product at a 2% solution. 1 gallon, to 49 gallons of water. I need to apply that entire tank to ONE acre.

I have no idea how big of a pump I need. What to use for a tank? Hose set up? Nozzles? I am overwhelmed, and am just getting started....

What do you guys think?

Yo ! Bryce, think about GRAVITY. Bet you can work out a simple solution (pun intended).

some fertilizers are hard on seed germ. thats why we used to put it to the side of the seed. talk to your fert guy is what you need to do.

Nice......

This stuff seems to be pretty simple?? They DO recommend "drenching" seeds with it during, or immediately after planting.

I am going to talk to the inventor of the stuff Monday morning. I'll see what he has to say about it...

I have applied liquid fert for several years but only around 5-6 gallon an acre.
I have two different kinds of pumps
one is a diaphram pump and the other I really like is the squeeze pump.
it never plugs, is maintance free, and is real eazy to chance volume per acre by switching different sized sprockets.
if I had the time and money I would switch over to 2 squeeze pumps
just something to price and ask around for.
good luck

Bryce,
What kind of fertilizer is this? It sounds like snake oil. We apply some liquid nitrogen (28% uan) and to wheat we would put on 20-30 gallons per acre. Plus dry fertilizer for P,k, and micros.
Josh

It is called Sea Crop. Sounds like pretty cool stuff.. Worth a try in my opinion.
Sea Crop

That product appears to be a scam. I clicked on the "information" and "FAQ" tabs and no nutrient analysis. Snake oil.

I think the parent company make a product use in internal combustion engines.

Bryce, look for data on the results from independent researchers before you spend your money. I saw lots of these type things come and go when I worked at Clemson over the years. None of them ever did what they said they would.
Ask to see studies done by folks not in the business.
Richard in NW SC

I agree with the others...snake oil. If you do use a liquid fertilizer don't run it down the same tubes as the seed. It will gum up and the seed won't drop. Have to run it in a separate hose and drop right behind the seed opener.

Tell the guy if it is so great he needs to guarantee your results and can provide the product for free and use your place as a test plot. Maybe make him buy the seed up front too because a good chance he won't be able to be found after your seeds burn up.

Must be a different barley! Neighbors have barley planted this September. For 1 acres I would spray it on as a pre-plant and maybe scratch it in.

",,contains 89 elements..." including lead, arsenic, mercury..
Be afraid.Be very afraid.
Ben

(quoted from post at 19:30:38 01/22/16) ",,contains 89 elements..." including lead, arsenic, mercury..
Be afraid.Be very afraid.
Ben

Click to expand...

But it's organic!!

(quoted from post at 19:11:48 01/22/16) I agree with the others...snake oil. If you do use a liquid fertilizer don't run it down the same tubes as the seed. It will gum up and the seed won't drop. Have to run it in a separate hose and drop right behind the seed opener.

Click to expand...

Yeah at $200 an acre applied 2-3 times....then subtract what the deer eat, I see no profit there.

There is a 'fish fertilizer' here.I suspect your stuff is similar. The 'greenies' love it. Seems to work/improve yields somewhat. You apply it with your crop sprayer.Basicly that is the only way to apply it.Scratch it in with a harrow,ect before planting.However,most of it is sprayed over hay as a foliar. Makes everything (especially the equipment!)smell like dead fish.My advise is to forget about the liquid program for small grain. Spread some dry.Much better and easier.Probably cheaper,too.

I called and talked to the guy about it, penciled it out. If I do what he "recommends" I should spend about $600 on fertilizer, and if the stuff changes the yields as much as he claims it will, I will get about $190 more of barley.... TOTAL win I am a thinkin??

Forget that idea! Back to pellets! :

Yep, you got it figured out!! Not at all worth the amount of cost put into it. Did the math, and it was a loosing game, and that didn't even count the time / fuel to apply the stuff!

50 gal to acre yikes that seems like a little heavy to me

First that's a lot of weight for a small grain drill especially on the hitch. 50 x 8lbs a gal (approx.)= 400lbs+pump, lines and brackets. That might almost get the tractor light up front.

Second how do you plan on regulating it. just hoses it will be gone before you get the tractor moving.

For an applicator take a junk hose and stretch it along the whole length of the drill, cap one end and plumb to pump on other. Then poke holes for applying this gives more of a spread then drowning(possibly leads to rot) the seed.

I think you'd be better off forgetting that idea for such a small lot. Go to neighbor that has cattle and get a truck load of manure and spread it heavy, then work it in.

The 5 levels of fertilizer:

1. Get your basics right. Fix your ph, then add P and K to what is a moderate to above average level for what your soils can handle. Here you want to use the cheapest types (granular, or manure if you can get it) and you will use lots of it. A couple lbs or gallons of some liquid spray will make your crop look nice for 2 weeks, and do -nothing- for your yields, but it will be a spendy fertilizer.

2. Banding fertilizer on the rows (after step 1) allows you to use perhaps 1/3 less fertilizer and still get good yields. This super rich band of fertilizer 2 inches to the side of your seed allows more feet to be released to the crop this year, so you can get by with less. Clearly this is aimed at row crops more than wheat or small grains. This banding can help if you have really poor soils, but you really want to be doing step one also to get poor soils built up to a good average....

3. Starter or pop up fertilizers, often liquids, are in small quantities and help get the crop off to a quick start, feed minor deficiencies. These tend to be expensive for what you get, and some years will help, other years might not do a lot. Depends on the weather and timing of planting and such. This will not ever be enough fertilizer to grow a crop on, it does not make up for lack of fert in your soils. It just helps fill in very minor gaps.

4. Biologicals, these are pretty new and used to be snake oils, but a few of them help your soils and your crop get together and make use of what is in the ground. In theory your soil has thousands of lbs of fertilizer in it, just tied up in forms that your crop roots can't get to. These things help that process. Some do well with them, some don't get anything out of them. I think there is a ways to go before these work for everyone....

5. Over the top sprays, foliar feeding. These can be well worth the effort on high dollar crops. Garden stuff, herbs, flowers, stuff that needs to look perfect, is worth a mint per acre. Takes multiple applications, testing, feed a tiny bit of stuff to the plants when needed. Typically corn, wheat, beans are not worth enough for these to pay. They are very spendy, and offer a very very low actual amount of fertilizer. These spoon feed small doses of expensive fertilizer to crops already growing on good well fertilized dirt.


Do the first 3 steps. Study up on #4, so when they get better we can use them.

Be careful of anyone who tries to sell you #5 for a common commodity grain crop. And number 5 will never never ever make up for skipping the first 3 steps, you need stuff right before getting to the last 2 options.

Paul

Paul's advice is spot on, do the first things first. A comprehensive soil test is some of the best money spent. It will tell you the levels of micro nutrients. A crop consultant worth his pay will then know what micro nutrients are making it impossible for your crop to feed on certain essential nutrients. With out the proper balance of micro nutrients too much of your NP&K is not available to your crop.

Start by throwing that info into the circular file. Just staring out with crops, no need to reinvent the wheel. paul gives good advice about following/mastering the basics first.

Hi Bryce
I seen your picture so know how old you look and what age you tell us, the guy was figuring on him being smarter getting your money, than you keeping it. He just moved from trying to get you to buy him top line steak to hot dogs for supper or trying to find another mug to buy steak for him L.O.L.

When I worked at the seed plant we had to try the in this year "Goofy potions" as I called them or the magic white powders or "pixie dust". Some worked ok some didn't and most of them came and went in the end in favour of something else that was in the next year .

The one I remember the most was treating seed with Calcified liquid sea weed. it would plug the treater pretty often. our joke with the boss became it was the whale poo getting through the processing plant filters and plugging the nozzle in our machine L.O.L. it sure could eat time up in a busy yard applying this stuff,to just his seed for big field trials. The money was scary to for the ones that needed the company's "own" applicator at $1200!

Gabe and Paul Brown, Dave Brandt and others have very good results with using cover crops to increase soil life.

Bryce,
I personally don't think that will do any good. But it won't hurt to try. I think you should leave a strip untreated so that next year you will know if it's worth it.
Josh

I copied all of that and put it into my some day book, Farming 101. I have nearly 60 pages of information, most of which I have collected from this site, and heard from others, etc.

This is AWESOME! I hate to say it, but being 17, this is really what I need. I need someone to say HERE, do this, try it, go from there!

Thank you so much, I know where to start!

For an acre or 5?
You already have all the equipment you need to get dry fertilizer to your patch of ground. Sounds like you may have the equipment to spread it, too.

Do you have a tank to haul or store the liquid fertilizer in? A pump to get it into the planter tank?

Liquid fertilizer is nice, when you have to handle a lot of fertilizer. When you're already set up for dry and don't have to handle much of it, I don't see that it would pay to switch.