Earthway Garden Seeder

[rufus]

I have a fellow at work that says his dad might want to sell and earthway garden seeder. Are these things worth the $ are they prone to problems or just a waste of time?

[ksfarmer]

I bought a used one at a estate sale a few years ago. I use it quite a bit, works good for some vegetable seeds if you have all the different plates. I think I gave 25 or 30 bucks for it with 5 different plates. They work best if you have nice mellow soil to work in.

[MaineFarmMom]

I like mine. I learned I was over seeding and crowding plants when I started using one. For a price comparison, Nolt's sells the Earthway with six plates for $78.

[Shawna]

I *inherited* my grandpa's seeder like this. I love it. When I plant by hand it looks like I've been drinking LOL! I have had some crazy crooked rows....And like MFM, I found I was way overseeding when I started using the seeder.

i haven't had any trouble with ours....and it's old. My grandpa's been gone going on 18 years, and I know he didn't use his seeder the last couple years he was alive....so it had to have sat for at least 20 years...still worked great!


Shawna

[Farmerwilly2]

I very much like it for what I've used it for so far. I'll wait till everything sprouts before I render a verdict. I can say it sure has made planting easier so far, just need to evaluate the results.

[holleegee]

It seems they sell for about $50 used on e-bay...by the time you pay shipping you might as well buy a new one.

[Oldcountryboy]

I had one and it worked great. Then one day I used it and left it out in the extremely hot sun all day. The heat was too much and warped the seed plate shaft or something. After that it would never work right.

So if you get one, don't leave it direct sunlight all day long like I did.

[MoonShine]

Well, I bought one and I realized right away that it wasn't going to drop seeds as thick as I wanted them, but I thought it would be okay. Tried planting beans with it this year and it was just spitting out those seeds way too sparingly for me. I just couldn't stand it, so I went back over the rows and re-seeded them by hand. It's not a problem with the seeder, it does exactly what it's supposed to do...it's a problem with me, and the fact that I'm apparently too set in my ways when it comes to planting

I'll probably sell mine on ebay, because there's no use in my keeping it if I'm going to keep going back over the rows and re-seeding them anyway.

[Snakeoil]

I have had one for several years and love it.

[WisJim]

We have had one for almost 30 years and never use it anymore. Our soil is too heavy in some of the gardens, and I found that for small seeds it took more seed than I had to get enough in the hopper to allow the machine to work. For larger seeds it works okay, but we grow lots of varieties of peas, beans, etc. so never plant enough to make it worth using the planter. I may use it if I ever plant corn for the chickens, but we don't grow corn due to allergies.

[rufus]

Thanks guys, I think I will give it a go if I can get it cheap enough

[Missy M]

Try google for the official website for earthway seeders. They are generally cheaper there than anywhere else.

[Oldcountryboy]

Rufus, make an offer to Moonshine. You might get a good bargain price.

[FarmerDave]

I looked at this recently and when I considered the price, no tax and cost of shipping compared to the cost of going to get it and paying tax it was cheaper to order online. Here's the link to Earthway-outlet.com. Cheapest place I found it.

https://www.earthway-outlet.com

[Sammy]

I use mine for planting corn.
I don't like the skips, but, it is a lot faster than sowing by hand !

[MaineFarmMom]

I bought the seeder and five plates at a yard sale for $5 a couple of weeks ago. I love a good deal.

[Humburger]

Moonshine,

Would it work to do the row over again with it set so that the seeds drop between the ones that you just planted, making them closer? I have been thinking of getting one of these for years... Would love to hear more about it.

Sammy,

Please tell more about your experiences with the seeder.

[Windy in Kansas]

Originally Posted by Humburger

Please tell more about your experiences with the seeder.

Personally I am not a fan of them, great idea just not enough precision to be truly useful.

It takes a lot of extra seed to prime the hopper in order to have enough for the seed plates to pick up the seed properly. Lambert used a similar design but had the seed hopper narrower at the bottom so it took less seed for priming.

Another draw back is that you cannot change any settings to the spacing you may wish to use. Instead the unit is locked into what the mfg thinks will work best which may not be best for your garden/moisture/locale, etc.

I never did like trying to push the unit while straddling the row and keeping from stepping on it.

It always seemed to my hearing that a lot of the seeds were being crushed if too many were picked up in the seed plate slot and didn't empty out correctly.

While I doubt that there are better units on the market at similar price there are most definitely better units on the market, albeit at a much higher price.

A true precision unit will last a lifetime, need less seed for hopper priming, accurately space the seed meaning no or little thinning, allow the spacing you desire, etc. Such purchase will also empty your wallet and the unit may not hold its value simply because others may not be willing to pay the price of ownership.

An imprecision unit won't cost a lot and they tend to hold value, but will you always have a little regret for buying the unit? Will you have to overbuy enough priming seed and seed to thin to have paid for a better unit over your lifetime? Perhaps your savings would pay for the extra seed over the years.

Except for large seed I would rather plant by hand than to use an Earthway as I demand accuracy.

[MoonShine]

Originally Posted by Humburger

Moonshine,

Would it work to do the row over again with it set so that the seeds drop between the ones that you just planted, making them closer? I have been thinking of getting one of these for years... Would love to hear more about it.

Sammy,

Please tell more about your experiences with the seeder.

Hi Humburger,

What you mentioned is exactly what I thought I could do. I thought I could go back over and get it to drop them where it hadn't dropped them before. It just didn't work. The pattern that it dropped them in just wasn't uniform. It seemed to be...skipping, for lack of a better word. Windy said, "It always seemed to my hearing that a lot of the seeds were being crushed if too many were picked up in the seed plate slot and didn't empty out correctly". That may be what was going on with my seeder. Because it seemed like it would get clogged momentarily and then spit some more out and it would be totally uneven. It's hard to describe in words, but I hope this helps.

Honestly, though, I don't think it's a bad piece of a equipment. I wonder if I'm just too uptight about the seeds. I wonder if the fact that the soil here is lumpy and rocky in spots causes it to clog up or drop seeds in an odd pattern. So many other people have had good experiences with the earthway, that I question whether my experience is a good one to go by.

[triplejmom]

I bought an earthway "precision" seeder this year and at first was not at all impressed! But after talking to a few people who owned one, we are enjoying ours . We were told with smaller seed to go over twice we did and it works great,even doing it twice it still saves time. The bigger seeds beans, corn etc work out ok. My hubbuy says they should change the name from the precision seeder to the labour saver.