I would love to be able to do that.Unfortunately I don't believe a $10,000 no till drill is in my foreseeable future.

Agreed

More like $20k.

If I was going to spend $20k on a drill it wouldn’t be his brand it would be a Great Plains.

You fellas that are interested in a No-till drill for food plots check out the new Tar River drill that has just been recently introduced on the market. It's for food plotters that do not want to invest 15K to 20K on great plains or land pride. There is one listed on ebay with free shipping within 1000 miles. I will most likely own one before fall planting.

Buffalo system ain't throw and mow. Woods basically chits on the throw n mow method in one episode. I like his youtube channel and the buffalo deal is neat. He is selling a product and that's all. Nothing wrong with profit. I still want a no till drill or planter. It would save time for me but time is at a premium for me this time of year.

Thing looks like a complete toy, ready to fail.

What give you that impression?

I use a KASCO unit now that is an okay unit. If it had double seed openers like the Tar River it would perform much better. The Tar River is built similar to the kasco, but with some nicer features. It might be junk as I have not seen a unit in person. Based off my research I'm gonna give one a try if I like what I see in person. I do not have 15K to 20K to invest in a Great Plains or Land Pride for food plots. The Tar River unit will work just fine in my soil type.

It just simply doesn't work easily like they are showing in the video. That's misleading to say the least. My much bigger heaver and better Great Plains drill would have a difficult time planting into all that matted down grass. I've done it and you have to up the seed rate a bunch (30% in my experience) and you waste a lot of seed, etc. And you just don't get a professional looking job or stand of whatever you are planting. If you are only planting a couple acres this is out of your price range. If you are planting enough ground to justify the cost of the drill you just spent 30% more on seed yearly. That can be a significant amount of money and ongoing increased operating costs. If you have a variety of weeds that roll crimper doesn't work. You have to have to appropriate cover crop and roll it at the appropriate time. It can be a real challenge. You have to have the biomass to get the weed suppression and the roller really needs to be in front of the tractor because where you are driving your tires are going first and the roll crimper doesn't work well on your tire tracks. You wind up with a mess. If you are pulling a crimper the same width as the tractor you will have problems.

Just doesn't work like that or that efficiently. It does work I'm not saying that. In experience Cutting and spraying it works a lot better. You can get an equally crappy stand of whatever you want to plant just throwing and mowing IMO.

How did you go about planting in to the terminated vegetation? Did you lay it down and then drill into it etc??? From my understanding of it you are supposed to drill into a stand of vegetation that is really green or really brown but not during the period when its drying down. Its supposed to get real tough during that period and not work well

Just a side note for discussion but do y'all know why its called the buffalo system to begin with??

It's called the "buffalo system" because the underlying principles at play mimic how the huge herds of buffalos used to manage the vegetation across the Great Plains and the impacts that it had on the soil and other animal populations. The herds of buffalo would basically "mob graze" a large area of land. They would consume about 1/3 of the vegetation....they would trample down about 1/3.....and they would leave about 1/3......In the process they would fertilize the area with manure before moving on to another area......Once they moved out the area would rebound with lush diversity teaming from a nutrient rich soil full of life that provided the food and cover for animals like deer and antelope.

Now there was nothing neat and orderly about the way the buffalo managed the vegetation but the end result was highly effective. The biggest problem with food plotters today is that most folks are worried about the wrong end results. They’re caught up on producing pretty pictures of green fields to put on seed bags or magazine covers. Is that picture the end result that you are really the most concerned with though??? Are you worried about it being “pretty” or effective??

Man several of those deserved to be shoulder mounted. Very nice spread.

Thanks....

I planted it directly after rolling it. Doesn't work worth a crap you really need the roller out in front of the tractor and pull the planter behind. How the cover crop stand looks has a lot to do with the success rate IMO and this is another amount of work and problems not addressed with this seemingly easy solution.

I'm a little jaded when watching any of his videos on it because he's twisting around the truth to sell products. It's hard to know what to believe and what not to believe as being factual unless you've studied and understand the concepts for yourself

I agree. I think he’s a smart guy but that whole angle has soured me on his videos.

It'll be extremely interesting to see where things go in the future. When this all started back years ago on the QDMA forum....it never even crossed my mind at the effect it would or could have on the $$$ flow. I was just experimenting.....The cat is too far out of the bag now though to put it back in regardless of what I or anyone else does from here on out.......It just becomes more and more obvious as to their intentions when someone tries to do so...…

Its all a hell of a conundrum really…..I mean cause it’s the $$$ that’s paying for someone like Dr Grant to deliver a “message” in the first place even if it is slightly tainted…..Its the $$$ that makes the world go round so to speak. If he were to come on there and tell the complete truth in that most of the stuff they’re selling isn’t needed….then he would cut his own legs out of from underneath him and the very platform that’s allowing him to say such…..So what do you do??? It doesn’t do a whole lot of good to tell the complete truth if no one ever hears it.

This reminds me of a joke I heard a long time ago, looked up how it actually goes. You really have to do the Indian's portion in quotes using your best Native American accent, which is maybe not compliant with the code of conduct:

A cowboy and an Indian are riding horseback.
The Indian stops his horse, jumps off and puts his ear to the ground.
He looks up at the cowboy and says, "Buffalo come".
The cowboy looks around and then back at the Indian. "How the hell do you know that?"
The Indian replied, "Ear sticky".

Since you brought the buffalo back up……..just to add a little more to that idea

The buffalo were merely a means of resetting succession. They did it in a way though which promoted more fertile and diverse conditions instead of causing them to deteriorate. The buffalo weren't getting all fancy with it…..they weren’t using any kind of special beans or peas with special equipment…..they were using hooves, buffalo chit, and native vegetation. Your method doesn’t have to be all fancy either even though you can certainly make it as fancy as you want to…Whether it be with native summer vegetation or a special seed mix that you plant.....your method needs to recycle the vegetation in a manner that builds soil fertility and diversity instead of destroying it like our past methods have.......... In the process we mix in our winter cereal grains and clovers and incorporate them into the cycle as well.

Hell I've been drilling beans into standing cereal grains for 16 years but no youtube back then so I missed out on my eagle seed and trophy rock endorsements dang it. Seriously I like Grant and think hes about as good as it gets when it comes to getting good information out about how he does things and his results on his rock farm AKA the proving grounds. I don't blame him for pushing products hes got to make a living and at least hes pushing and good one with Brad's beans. Brad (owner of eagle seed) is also a great guy and has personally helped me out years ago when I was a dealer for him and ill never forget it. All that being said I believe that its impossible to get unbiased opinions on these shows when the products they are pushing pay the bills and yeah he's kinda left the small budget land owner and hunting club guy in the dust. As for the roller crimper I don't have a clue cause I've never used one but ive have great success drilling into standing grain. I have a 10ft john deere 1590 it is completely different then other no till drills in a lot of ways but on this subject the depth control wheels on each row lay the grain down when planting. It almost looks like it has been roll crimped and really does a unbelievable job but its over kill for most normal common sense peaple. I'm a dang fool for even buying it to plant crap for deer. Anyhow all I do is spray the standing grain with gly in and plant sometimes the next day or next week but pretty much always before its completely dead. I will say laying that grain, grass or whatever down right is a game changer cause it really helps the soil a lot more then cutting it and weeds comp is down tremendously.

I've drilled into sprayed vegetation but it wasn't laying down. All the vegetation had been sprayed approx 5 days and it was vertical but it was "dead man walking", so to speak. The drill worked beautifully. But I don't expect a drill to penetrate a layer of dead vegetation that's been sprayed for a month or two.

Grant Wood's system and methods work. But he LIVES there so he can do what he needs to do exactly when he needs to to it. No waiting for a weekend.

Grant's not a salesman however, there is nothing wrong with making money on what you love to do.

Not to highjack the thread but looking to try this. Last year we mowed short and no till drilled. It didn’t do very well as I expected but it was out of my control. This year I would like to spray and then drill in to leave that thatch layer for moisture the other added benefits. Some plots have very tall weeds and grass, probably even chest high dog finnels and such. Would you mow this high say leaving 12 inches of grass then wait a week for regrowth, then hit the field with roundup, wait 1-2 weeks for it to die and finally drill in the seeds and spread fertilizer? I also worry about just spreading the fertilizer on top since we are not working the soil

If you have a drill I'd probably drill into it with the vegetation standing. Either that or you're gonna need to kill it way ahead of time so that its broken down and brittle......Natural planting times for us is likely gonna put you at t time when the veg would be tough to drill through in a mat across the soil surface. Its in that in between stage between being good n green and good n brown....the biomass is tough at that point. Some other folks on here who have more experience using drills can comment further on what they've had success with. Broadcasting the fert over the top is no issue.....when it rains it'll seep down into the thatch and soil.

i was thinking more about this response....I was hoping others who have used drills more than I have would give opinions but it doesn't look like they're going to. One issue that you may have trying to drill into your field....veg standing or laying down..... is if you have a lot of really large dog fennel.....It can be like a small tree. I'm not sure how well a drill would handle running over something like that. If its really small in diameter then you may not have any issues.....If its really large then you may want to consider terminating it really early so that it has time to get brittle.

I drill over 200 acres a year for livestock. But i know whatever I could tell you would be wrong according CNC.... He will answer some more of his own questions later on in this thread I’m sure.

My drill would cut through dog fennel with ease. It’s just a damn weed

I guess my main question or concern is should I mow it down a little before spraying? Or just spray, give it a few weeks to die and then plant? Since these plots are so thick and overgrown I didn’t want to have too much dead debris for the new seeds to have to grow through.

My field is 7-8 ft tall with vegetation and I don't have any issues. I've been just running over it with the tractor though and not pressing it neatly to the ground.......I'd think that if you drilled it with the veg standing that a drill would cut slits that would allow your seedlings room to emerge if you just waited and planted then sprayed on the same day. Take this with a grain of salt.....

Has anyone else run into this dilemma and had good success? I’m just worried I would have too much thatch laying dead over the seeds

Good luck.......Everyone has just about been run off......That and the folks who are doing it won't speak up due to not wanting to deal with the horse crap.....

4Him146 - I found some good videos few weeks back in qdma and no till I believe - described what to do and what it should look like-one even showed qdma similar - No till food plots should bring stuff up too

You do not want to bush hog stuff that’s too tall and create a matted up layer that the drill can’t cut through. The taller it is the better it’ll plant

Makes sense. I’ve researched a lot but you hear both sides. I’d much rather Not have to bush hog. Thanks for all the input folks and I’ll check the qdma info

Keep us updated on how it turns out....