Earthway Precision Garden Seeder Opinion

[yak651]

I've been looking for a two row corn planter to pull behind my tractor, but haven't had much luck finding anything under $700. I was wondering if anyone has used the Earthway Precision Garden Seeder and if so how did it work for planting sweet corn. Also hoping to use it to plant pumpkin seeds, looks like they have a plate for cucumbers they say may work with pumpkins. Does the ground have to be "perfect" for this to work? Just woried that it will be too light to work on any ground that isn't perfectly tilled. Your opinions are appreciated.

 

[ray66v]

I plant about 400-500ft of corn with mine, and it works good. Sure beats being bent over for 2hrs.

I till 3x and plant. Not sure what you mean by perfect, but, corn grows in almost anything so I would not worry too much.

 

[Bird]

I thought mine was quite handy. I've forgotten just how many plates came with it originally, but I ordered the others for a total of 11, if I remember right. I used it for sweet corn, green beans, blackeyed peas, okra, radishes, turnips, etc., but didn't use it for cucumbers, watermelons, squash, and pumpkins because I planted those in "hills" 4 or 5 feet apart.

 

[Chuck52]

I use mine mainly for beans, peas and okra, and it does great if the planting bed is reasonably smooth and loose. I did try it for corn one year and was not happy with the results. My cornfield was new, and wasn't all that smooth, but aside from that I didn't seem to get very even seeding. Seemed to me that the pointy corn seeds caused more problems for the Earthway than the smooth bean, pea and okra seeds. I got lots of popping, with seed getting blasted out of the bin, and lots of skips and multiple drops. It may have mostly been due to the less that perfect seed bed, but it sounds like you may have a similar situation. Since I was planting only about 250 feet of row at a time, I ended up using the old pvc pipe drop method to plant my corn. Tied a pointy stick to the end of a 4' piece of pvc, poked a hole with the stick and dropped a seed down the tube and into the hole. At least I didn't have to bend over!

Chuck

 

[charlz]

I picked one up at an auction last fall for $35 and just used it for the first time the other day. Seemed to work pretty well, not too sure on the 'precision' part though. I planted beans and it seemed like it didn't always grab a bean every slot in the planter plate. I was in a bit of a hurry so I will pay more attention when I plant corn to see how it does.

I'm not sure about planting pumpkin seeds...unless you are talking about the mini pumpkins which are about the same size as cucumber seeds. Jack o lantern seeds are pretty big.

Sure beats planting by hand though... might even be dangerous... you can plant so fast it makes you starting thinking about bigger gardens

 

[randy41]

I've used one for sweet corn and precise is not part of the description in that it will drop more than one seed at a time. There are many different sized corn plates for the big boy planters but there's but one for the earthway. But having said that it beats trying to place each seed by hand.
It works great for spinach and beans.

 

[shvl73]

I use one and like it. Wet soil can cause some grief. Dry loose soil seems to work real easy. I use mine for corn, carrots, beans, and beets. We start the tomatoes, cukes and squash in the hoop house or buy plants. I'm starting some early yellow corn in the hoop house this year. I'll try transplanting in a couple weeks. Last year, the crows loved my early corn and when I replanted and it finally started to mature, the turkeys loved it as well. I'm not sure what it tasted like, as I didn't get any.

 

[Luremaker]

I have use the Earthway Precision Garden Seeder. I plant sweet corn, beans, peas, carrots, turnips, pumpkins and squash. It works good for the most part.

• With sweet corn, I have to thin them as it often drops two seeds together.
• Beans and peas I achieve almost perfect spacing with those plates.
• Planting squash it works pretty good. I sometimes have to move plants a little.

• Carrots, I have to make two passes in the same row to get near perfect rows of carrots.
• Pumpkins seeds do not seem to work well with any of the plates. I plant pumpkins in rows spaced 5' apart and and drop one seed every 3 feet. Because of the seed spacing I do not to use the seed hopper on the precision planter when planing pumpkins. I bent a piece of aluminum tubing and attach it the the planter so that the tube ends at the precision planter's seed chute. I drop a pumpkin seed into the aluminum tube by hand every three feet. It works for me.

I prepare the gound with my tiller and find the flatter your ground is the more consistent your seed depth will be. Small valleys or hills may leave your seeds on the surface or too deep in the ground. I find it easier to plant a few days after I tilled my garden. It seems for me the planter works better after the ground has had a chance to compact a little after being tilled. Have fun planting.

 

[xlr82v2]

My experience mirrors all the others here. I've had mine for 6-7 years now, and while it isn't perfect for corn, it's MUCH MUCH better (easier) than doing it by hand. By the time you're shucking ears, you don't even notice how "unprecise" it is with corn I don't thin the corn... it does drop double at times, but I haven't found it to be an issue in the long run, big picture.

The more finely tilled the soil, the easier it is to push, as you would imagine. The marker doesn't give as wide of spacing to the rows as I would like so that I can get the troy built between the rows, so I just parallel it by about 6-8", it works. Whatever side you have the marker on, the planter will tend to pull to that side, so you just have to "steer" in the opposite direction to keep your rows straight.

Like one of the other posters mentioned, it really is quite "dangerous"!! Our garden grew from 25X50' when we first bought the house to nearly 100x100' , which is really too big for just our TroyBuilt Horse tiller!! Next year it will likely grow wider by another 30' or so. Maybe we're nuts! So far this year, I've got about 900 feet of corn planted (9 rows) and we're planning on another 8 to 9 rows of late season corn that I'll get planted in another week or so. It really does make putting in a large garden quite easy! Also, so does my 6' KingKutter tiller ... Couldn't do it without either one.

Have any of you guys planted lettuce with your EPGS? I've had the seed plate kit since I got the planter, but I've only used it for corn up until this year. Don't ask why, I don't have an answer. But, this year I used it also to plant a row of peas, and it handled those very well. I was looking through all of my seed plates and saw that I had one for lettuce... but unfortunately, I had already planted our lettuce the old fashioned way ... along with Okra (doh!)... and spinach (doh!) So, how does it work, has anyone used it for lettuce?

Later this summer, we're planning on doing a "fall garden", and I'm planning on using the EPGS to put in a few rows of turnips and radishes.

 

[jinman]

I bought one of these from Amazon last year and it works pretty well. I didn't plant corn with it, but I used it for planting peas and beans. It's not as versatile as the Earthway, but works pretty well. I rate it as between the Earthway and using just a length of PVC pipe. They sell a snap-on handle for this if you want to pay $10 more, but I just put a piece of PVC over the adapter and it works fine. The nice thing is this one doesn't take up much space.

Wolf-Garten Planter

I don't understand anyone using a planter to plant melons, squash, cucumbers, or pumpkins. I plant those in hills or in a row and 6 feet apart. I don't know of any planter that will plant on 6' centers. I put 3 seeds in a hill and thin later when they come up.

I thought the Earthway would work a lot better if you added some weight. I'm not sure how you would easily add ballast (maybe between the handles), but it is so light it bounces around and the seed do tend to pop out of the hopper as Chuck52 said. I will cover the hopper with a clear plastic bag and bungee it in place the next time I use it.