Home Forums Miscellaneous Topics Rural Living Spring Spraying

Am starting to spray for unwanted brush, weeds and also spraying fencelines, etc. Also spraying invasives in and around the pond area. Rice sedge and that crap.

Of course I had to put a new pump on the sprayer.

By the time I got going, I only got one tank sprayed until the wind kicked up to over 20mph... I sure don't want that stuff coming out of the sprayer to drift much. It'll kill everything big enough to die.

I'll get a fresh start in the morning.


You guys spraying any yet?

I have already sprayed about 20 acres of pastures with 2-4-D for wild buttercup, and have been spraying fencerows and other areas as well. For the fencerows I use a mix of glysophate and 2-4-D, and if they're really bad, I'll use Crossbow. I have a 60 gallon sprayer for the little tractor and 15 gallon one for the UTV and ATV. Had to buy a 12 volt pump for my insecticide sprayer this year. For some reason, I go through one a year on it, and all I do are spray the fruit trees 4 or 5 times, and around the house and outbuildings with Taurus. Seems like I keep a sprayer hooked up on something all spring and summer long.

It's getting damn hot down here!

Of course I have to fill up my backpack sprayer and walk a couple of fencelines that I can't drive down with the Mule.

Using a 40 gallon sprayer on the Mule. Heavy SOB. You don't fill that up and drive across soggy pastures with it...

Have a 12' boom sprayer, but hate messing with that.

Did a little ,but it is snowing again.

I do a little spraying around the barnyard with an ATV sprayer but we hire a guy do hit the actual fields.

He doesn't mess around, big JD with 120' booms. Covers a chitload of acres in a day.

Just got done doing 1100 acres, $23k.


Makes a guy sick thinking about the cost but we simply do not have the time to get it done and when you have a bunch of weeds coming it is really nice to just make a phone call....


My dad does run a 50' SpraCoupe down on our smaller flood irrigated fields but that's only maybe 150-200 acres.

I been spraying the hell outta thistles with a 25 gallon boom sprayer on the 4wheeler. They're starting to get too tall to use the boom. I hate having to shoot individual plants with the wand. Looks like I get a few days off spraying, because of the rain this week...

sprayed my clover food plots 2 weeks ago with volunteer. damn fescue thinks it's fertilizer lol

I looked into getting one of those spray rigs. You get the pull type you are looking at over $50k. You can get a decent used self propelled one for about $100k...

Then you basically become a salesman for the chemical companies.

No Thanks. Glad there are those that do offer that service. But it won't be me.

Looked into gopher eradication as well.

I decided I would only be a salesman for Martin's Gopher Bait. Most of what you charge a client goes to cover the bait. No Thanks.

When I first started farming, back in the 70's, I bought a pull behind 300 gallon sprayer with a 20 foot boom, and it was considered high tech at the time. I used it for many years, and finally converted it to a tobacco sprayer, by making an extension so I could raise the boom about 8 feet in the air, so it would be several feet above the tobacco.

After I quit farming, it sat in a fencerow for many years. A few years ago, I took it to local sale and some Mennonite bought it for 150 bucks. He must have wanted it pretty badly. I'd considered going over it and fixing it back up for a pasture sprayer, but didn't think it was worth it.

Todays sprayers are head and shoulders above what we had when I started farming. My nephews run a JD with the 120 foot booms, and they can do things with it that I never imagined a sprayer could do. Fortunately, for what I do these days, I don't need anything that fancy.

Down here the ag co-op has a boom sprayer truck.

They look pretty much like this rig.



They spray pastures for brush. (Better not be very boggy when they do... )

sprayed my pasture two weeks ago. Mullen, musk and Canadian thistle are my main targets. Glad I only have to do 40 acres.

Still trying to get that one ranch done...

Was moving right along with that, when wind started kicking up over 20mph today.


Killing new upcoming brush in a field.

I squirt that stuff I'm killing brush with in a strong wind, and it'll kill everything for 30' downwind.

I'll be spraying one pasture this afternoon and tomorrow morning (if I don't get finished). Will be spraying fence rows and ditches after that's done.

Basic plan of attack I follow:
1. Shred one tractor width on inside and outside of fence row (if I can get to both sides).
2. Spray pasture.
3. Spray fence lines with weed/grass/brush/everything killer mix.
4. A few days to one week later worm goats/cattle and immediately rotate them to the previously sprayed pasture.....they hammer any sprayed weeds at that time.

I usually go back and spray the pasture I removed them from as well...but not always. After a pasture is grazed I always leave it 3+ months before I return stock to it to give it time to recover and time for parasites to die. Stock is always wormed before being turned out on fresh pasture.

This rotation (and the chicken chit) has done well by my pastures and stock.

Rotation is the key. I believe it is the best management tool a cattleman can use. I don't rotate enough, but, I'm in the process of fixing that by adding water to a pasture that had none, so I can graze it without giving cattle access to another pasture, so they could get to water. If I was inclined enough to do so, I would do the intensive rotation, whereby you use electric fencing, and are constantly moving the cattle around. It's just too much work for me.

I'm usually spraying Whitetop by now, but winter is hanging on. Snowed a couple inches this morning.

The Whitetop that ruins my life hasn't shown up in some of the places it was the last few years. We have had snow and a lot of rain this Spring and that probably slowed it up. I suspect it will be here soon.

Weevils are not in the alfalfa yet either, but it is going to warm up the next few days so I suspect they will start soon.