Corn planter

   / Corn planter #1  

woody2022

New member
Joined
Jul 25, 2022
Messages
5
Tractor
Kubota
Looking for ideas for a corn planter. Currently using a John Deere 246, but it is about used up. Plant approx 10 acres for duck feed. Would like to apply fertilizer with seed.
 
   / Corn planter #2  
Well if you want to apply fertilizer with the seed that rules out all the unit planters. The John Deere 51 and 71 unit planters plus the various other competitors unit planters. How big of a tractor do you have? There are the various regular row planters, like the john Deere 494, 495, etc, and competitors products, but you will need a least a 35 horses to pull them. Plus what is your budget, any of the newer technology planters can be expensive. In the South you may be able to find Cole MX series or Covington planters, but they in themself may not be inexpensive. Plus they are not designed to be used with minimum tillage.
Bill
 
   / Corn planter #3  
get the fertilizer boxes for your 246 planter. John Deere still makes a lot of parts for the 246.
 
   / Corn planter #4  
I also use a JD 246 with fertilizer hoppers, that I paid $ 200 for about 25 years ago. The shoes were about worn out on it when I got it. My father in law gave me his old JD 290 a few years later and the shoes on that were like new. I swapped them out with the worn out ones on my 246, and sold the 290, lacking fertilizer hoppers, on CL for $ 250.

My 246 has some serious hours on it but it is relatively simple to maintain and repair when necessary. I like the fertilizer feature. I only plant corn on old clover plots. Doing that, gives me yields of close to 175 bu/acre with only 50 lb/acre of triple 15 starter fertilizer at planting.

E208F3A7-0539-4DC9-9928-BDAC466B55B9.jpeg
 
   / Corn planter #5  
I would look at JD 71 on a tool bar. They are still made by Yetter. Double disc opener gives you a lot more forgiveness then the typical shoe style opener which needs really well worked soil.

Another option is take a look at the Tar River SAYA no-till drill or there DRL planters. I recently picked up a DRL model and have used it for no-till because I have pretty loose soil and it worked pretty good. The biggest advantage is it has two separate seed boxes so you could do a corn/Wildlife grain sorghum mix in just one pass.
 
 
Top