frost seeding

[jkjkoda]

Just did this last weekend first time doing this was the best info I found out there!
If you live in an area where the surface layer of soil freezes during winter, you can save fuel and equipment costs by frost-seeding a portion of your plots. Frost seeding involves spreading seed on frozen ground and allowing the freeze-thaw-freeze-thaw cycle that occurs as spring approaches to provide good seed-to-soil contact. When moisture in the top layer of soil freezes, ice expands upward, carrying soil with it. This process, called “heaving,” helps work small seeds like clover and alfalfa into the soil, the same way light disking or cultipacking creates good seed-to-soil contact. When early spring temperatures are optimal, the seeds will germinate.

This works best when there is minimal to no competing vegetation in the food plot, and you achieve this by spraying the field with the appropriate herbicide the fall before you frost seed, or by frost seeding a field that was planted in an annual the year before, such as wheat or oats.

You can frost-seed cool-season perennials such as alfalfa, red and white clover, trefoil and chicory, and cool-season annuals like oats, wheat or rye. Do not frost seed warm-season annuals such as corn or soybeans, and while brassicas can be frost-seeded, I prefer to plant them later in the summer. You can frost-seed a new plot or frost-seed cool-season species into an existing plot that is thinning.

Has anyone had any luck with frost seeding??

[dakids]

Never tried it.  I didn't spray and kill any of my plots last fall so I will just wait and do the mow and throw technique.  Mow, spray with roundup, throw seeds before a rain.  Worked great for me last year.

[Goosepond Monster]

I put down some clover and plan on putting down some chicory as well.  It was my first time trying it, so we'll see how it works.

[nic53]

I've always been told not to throw your seed down until after most the snow melts. Not sure cuz of run off or what's the reasoning though. But I have done it and it works.

[dakids]

Some varieties of seed are not as cold hardy.