Seed bed prep question

I have a 60'x150' that I plow,disc, and drag. I use a IHC251 planter to plant sweet corn, several different kinds of beans and peas. My soil is clay and was tough going the 1st couple years. I'm in Houston so don't get a winter freeze. I plant in the spring and a cover crop in the fall. I hauled lots of manure and dumped anything organic in the garden. It's the 3rd year and is now working pretty good with the big seed and relatively heavy planter. No way the earthway and small seed are going to work in this garden.

My second plot is 25'x100' with 16-25' rows. This is where I grow all my small seed and plants. Same soil, same amendments. In order to plant small seed like carrots,beets,spinach etc. I till the row, use a hoe to cut a V for the seed, fill the V with potting soil and then run the earthway. That works perfect as the potting soil is fine enough to hold moisture, and the earthway works perfect.

My soil is slick as snot when too wet and hard as rock when too dry. Catching the perfect moisture content to be able to work the soil is critical.

I came from KY, where we had great soil fairly easy to work with.

That Houston gumbo was a mess to work with for a KY boy,

but as you, I started dumping everything organic I could find into my garden plot, by the third year, that garden would grow anything and was easy to work.

People who have never seen gumbo soil would not believe how hard it can get if worked wet.

I learned to garden in Iowa's rich black soil. I had to start my learning process over when I came to TX and discovered gumbo clay.

Next step is to use a spring-tooth harrow to break up the soil.

Next step is to use a blade to break up the large clods.

Next step is to use a tire drag to smooth out the clods.

Next step is to use a rotary hoe to smooth out the seed bed.

Next step is to use a cultipacker prior to seeding.

Next step is to use the broadcast spreader to spread the seed.

Final step is to use the cultipacker once again to get good seed-to-soil contact.

Hope this helps.

We enjoy using these old JD tractors and equipment here on the farm.

all those old green tractors, do they need a tune-up, they sound like they are all running on just "two cylinders"

Ha, Ha!

great pictures

We use all of our old JD tractors for various jobs here on the farm.

Having only two cylinders makes it a lot easier to remember the firing order.

Here's another video of seed bed preparation we did last Spring.

You didn't say if you plowed in the fall but if you have clay soil this works much better. The freezing and thawing over winter breaks down even the toughest clods. I plow and usually disk once in the fall then work the soil as little and as shallow as possible in the spring so as to not turn up sticky soil. Working clay soil too wet in the spring makes rock-hard clods that will haunt you all season.

You can plow it this fall while somewhat wet, and the frost and thaw cycles during the winter will help to break it up. Come spring, you can also plow it, but the ground must be somewhat dried out before putting steel to it. Plowed in the fall or spring, don't get too antsy about working it up. After it dries, and looks dry on top, wait a day or two before trying to break it up. It will then work up nicely and be a pleasure to work in. One thing I use here in N. Maryland id to look at the puddles in my lane. If they are still full of water or even still muddy, it's too wet to work ground. Take your time and don't get in such a rush....

Soil around here can do that, and I have experienced similar with the earthway planter.

Ideally, you don't want to plow when there is too much moisture, some use the rule of hand and squeeze a handful to see if it forms in your hand or crumbles off, and we know soil conditions vary widely.

In regards to the plow, make sure its been modified so it works properly, and can be adjusted correctly to the tractor. Make sure the shares are not worn out and there is no related problems due to same. It is advisable to make sure the plow performs correctly, to get a good seed bed established. So, if its not turning the soil over, flipping the sod over completely or any other similar problems you may want to deal with that. I've disc'd my own poorly plowed ground as well as when I was able to get my single bottom to really work well, there is a significant difference in the results. No excess root clods or vegetation, trash on top, and it was much easier to work down with the disc. Don't get me wrong, you can do a lot with a disc, so much nicer when its plowed under properly from what I experienced.

You'll get those clods with moisture laden soil like that, you may want to fall plow, then disc or till in the spring.

Not sure what disc you have, but when I need to break up the soil I set the gangs in an X, check to see its not leaving a ridge in the middle, and the overall job its doing, I've even used the loader bucket to screed and level as I disc, on rough ground to help level it, worked well for me, no different than running a dozer and grading.

The results are in the photos,no expert and work with old junk LOL (well old "good" junk) you could literally run that earthway planter through this patch, it was dry when I plowed, heavy soil, lot of clay in this section. The dis'c was missing one disc blade, set it accordingly to cut, then almost made the gangs parallel to level, came out well.

I tried my new to me #25 Massey-Ferguson disc harrow, on my corn patch this year, after plowing twice, it had dried up got hard, so I had to break it up again, and I did plant corn with the earthway planter, without using my tiller, soil worked up fine and that disc really does a nice job, clay, gravel loam topsoil mix with lots of round stones.

Also be aware of compaction and or hard pan, not sure how that applies, but the less passes made, may help. These tillage practices can make hard pan, which can be broken up when real dry using a subsoiler. Not sure I've experienced it here, but there can be a concern about it and ones tillage practices.

Here in Central Ohio, you can turn Clay soil most any time (except for too wet) and work it down.. In Black Wax, (on our ground) it was time to plow when water was about standing in the field..BUT..you had better NOT Plow it Dry in the Summer or you would not get it worked down well at all And pulling so hard we would be breaking Cover-Boards off. That is best plowed in the Fall and let lay 'till Spring and than it will be like Ashes.. Work your ground when it is moist, but not wet and the clods will break up. Forget getting a Rear Rototiller for your Early Ford, it is way too short on power and too fast in 1st gear for it to work out.

Ron.