Hi Guys,
This fall was my first real planting (5 lbs) and I was wondering how fast y'all are able get your seed in the ground. I'm using the Persons rake and scatter method and the fastest I could do was about 4 hrs per pound (actually 2 hrs with 2 people per pound). That was in an ideal spot, with most of the site prep done, little rocks and soil that didn't require a good scratching of the surface. If I remember correctly, the Persons book budget sheet projects 2 hrs per pound using the same method. Is anyone here able to do that? If so, how many years or how many pounds did it take for you to get that quick? Any tips for getting there? I think with practice I could get down to 3 hrs per pound, but 2 hrs a pound seems impossible. For small plantings it doesn't matter, but if attempting to do large scale plantings saving an hour per pound makes a huge difference.

Thanks!

Vafiddler,
I plant 1 lb per 1600 square foot. If I have a woods with a clean run, I will make two side by side 5 foot beds 160 foot long with a 1 to 2 foot space between the two beds. The key is how fast can you pick up the sticks and how fast do you rake. I will take all the sticks 1 to 3 inches thick and pick them up and toss them well aside. Anything larger I work around it if it's just a log laying across my beds.

The key is this. Rake dry leaves if possible. It increases your speed x 2. I rake from left to right, so I will rake all of the 5 foot bed to the right all the way down the 160 foot bed. I am left with a 5 foot wide raked bed and with all the leaves in a nice long mound on the right side of the bed. Then I start at the other end and work back up raking left to right leaving a 1 to 2 foot gap between the 5 foot beds. When you are done you are left with two side by side 5 foot bets with a 1 to 2 foot gap in the middle with a length of 160 foot. This gives you 1600 square foot.

It is also possible to do everything as I have mentioned above and I do this technique often as well as follows: Sometimes I will only rake 2 1/2 foot of leaves to the right and 2 1/2 foot of leaves to the left making a 5 foot wide bed with leaves on both sides of the 5 foot wide bed. You can really make good time doing this. Just remember when you are done you have to share the leaves from the middle leaf row to recover both beds.

The key is to uncover and create 5 foot beds with the least amount of moving a large quantity of leaves with your rake as possible. This conserves your energy and helps you get done quicker.

There have been times I only have an 80 foot clear run so instead of 2 side by side 5 foot beds I will just double it and have 4 side by side 5 foot beds with a 1 to 2 foot gap in between all 80 foot long. Its still 1600 square foot.

If the leaves are dry I can do the initial raking, then scratch the surface of the soil with a garden rake, sow the seeds 4 to 5 seeds per square foot, rake the leaves back on and walk the beds down all in 2 hours no problem.

If you are raking wet leaves it will take much longer than 2 hours. And if you rake some dirt to the side of the beds after the leaves are all raked to the side and sow the seeds and then rake the soil back over the seeds and then rake the leaves back on too it's going to almost double the time.

So 2 hours best case and if you are raking wet leaves and covering the seeds with soil too it will take at least 3 to 4 hours per 1600 square foot to do it right.

Anyway, all three ways kick me in the butt and I am sweating a lot even if it is chilly out. It's a good workout.

I planted 5 lbs this way in one day and I started at 8:00 am and finished at 6:00 PM. I couldn't move for a day or two after so I try not to do that much in one day.

Hope that helps,
Latt

Fiddler,
Here are a few pics of a few beds I made last year on the _link_ below. Don't know if it will work but here it goes.

http://www.wildgrown.com/index.php/Ginseng-Forum/Growing-Ginseng/8736-ReSpring-planting.html#8736

If you have ALL your bed prep done prior to planting, and all that is needed is to rake back the leaves... it goes pretty quickly. IHMO.

All the reading and fornulas are good basis from which to work, however what the Scott book doesn't speak to very clearly is "intention to get it done".

I look at it as separate and distinct parts.
1] bed prep
2] planting

Bed prep can include a whole group of labor that has as it's end result the planting and growing of our favorite plant. However this can be some of the most labor intensive and time consuming work.

Planting is {IHMO] 'way easier that the actual bed prep. Many of the guys here include the bed prep with the planting when they speak of how much time it take to plant a pound, however, in my view they are two related components.

I had a enormous amount of bed prep to do... so this distinction helped me to get thru it all. Taken together, the task seemed daunting.

Good point Whit. Picking up sticks and clearing the area for raking leaves off and back on takes the majority of the time. Sowing the seeds takes little time in my book once you get used to it.
Latt

VaFiddler- If you go to page two of this paticular forum, and find my post "Planting this weekend, 5 lb.s" it might help you in you thinking.

Thanks guys. Its good to know that 2 hrs per pound is doable. I honestly can't remember if the leaves were wet or dry when I was planting, but I do know I wasn't losing much time in the site prep. I had pretty well done that before starting the clock. I think a lot of my wasted time is in the seed dropping itself, trying too hard to get exactly 4-5 per sq foot. Latt, I see you are also raking off larger beds. I end up doing a lot of 5x40 beds. Makes sense that doing it all at once is more efficient.

Whitjr, are you down to 2 hrs per lb once all the site work is done?

VaFidler- I really didn't keep timing , like, per bed or pound. In my post from last fall, I had 5 lbs, and got it done in about as many hours.

I found that having the bed prep done was a real asset. All I had to do was rake everything. Well, rake everything a lot!

I'll have to start from scratch on the next patch of ground. The rhodo is very thick on the seven acres we are doing. Not looking forward to that much....

Vafiddler,

I work by myself, am 50 years young, and I don't really get in a big hurry, but don't take my time either. I just work steady at it and here is a breakdown of about how it works out for me time wise with my double rake and scatter method.

To plant a 5'x50' (250 sf) bed.

I would call these average times for an average site.

5 minutes - site prep, clearing saplings, rocks, logs, putting down flags or markers.

15 minutes - rake off leaves, rake over extra soil and leaf mulch

5 minutes - drop gypsum and seed

15 minutes - rake leaves back on, level, and walk it down

Around 40 minutes total time.

In a 250 sf bed, if planting 4-5 seeds per sq ft (as Scott recommends), that is 1000-1250 seeds per bed, and you would need to plant around 6.5 to 7 beds like that to get a pound of seed planted.

At 40 minutes per bed, times 7 gives you 280 minutes or around 4.7 hours to plant a pound of seed.

You can obviously get it planted a lot faster, by working harder, faster and perhaps smarter, but you may skimp on quality some too by doing that.

I tip my hat to anyone that can plant a pound of seed in 2 hours and say - way to go.

For me - it just ain't happening that fast.

I think for most rookies and perhaps some older folks that are not going to work that hard and fast, they would be better off expecting more like 5-6 hours to get a pound planted, with quality planting results.

Good Luck to you all !

TNhunter

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