All he wants is a little grass.

[Guest jackdm3]

My FIL has a two-acre portion of his land that is bowled and leaning downhill. It was fine with all the trees that were natural to the area, but he decided to remove the trees, smooth it out and plant grass seed. Now there's constant and aggressive erosion creating spiderveins as they all come together towards the bottom. These cracks are up to 10" deep and 8" wide, there's at least 50 or 60 of them, and it only gets worse as all the water finds those little gullies and rushs downhill. It's now to the point that he can't bushog for fear of getting stuck in the ruts, which I'd imagine would take him only 7 minutes to do.

Every website I've come across says you don't simply level a bowled terrain and plant grass, and that grass will only accelerate the downward slide of rainwater. Now the grass is nearly 4 feet tall and he can't cut it. He's thinking about somehow filling hundreds of linear feet of ruts with dirt and planting Johnson grass, but I'm certain he won't pack them tight enough and quick enough to get the seed to take root before the next torrential rainfall.

Ideas?

Edited May 29, 2010 by jackdm3

[Rightwinger]

Asphalt

[Guest Jamie]

I can only think of two options, and they aren't ones your FIL is gonna want to hear:

1) Terrace it to stop the erosion.

2) Leave it alone and let Mother Nature fix what he f'ed up.

He should have done his deforestation a bit at a time, starting at either the top or bottom, and giving the grass time to take root. But since he didn't, I don't know of any way to fix it that won't take a lot of time, money, and material. :-\

J.

[Guest jackdm3]

Well he's looking to lure some deer there, winger.

[Guest Jamie]

Well he's looking to lure some deer there, winger.

Then he should've left the trees.

J.

[Guest jackdm3]

And, yes, at 74 he's showing all sorts of cognitive failure, but it's all done now.

[Guest Jamie]

And, yes, at 74 he's showing all sorts of cognitive failure, but it's all done now.

By the time he gets it fixed he's probably not going to be in any shape to hunt any way...

J.

[Guest fourspdRAT]

Mud hole?

Seriously though, maybe terrace or erosion wall?

[Rightwinger]

You ever drive the interstate? Deer LOVE asphalt! I see em sleeping there all the time.

(agree with Jamie, should have left the trees and put a pile of corn and a salt lick out)

[TripleDigitRide]

You ever drive the interstate? Deer LOVE asphalt! I see em sleeping there all the time.

[Guest Jamie]

Jack, the only solution I can come up with that might work is a sort of mini-terracing...

Take a tractor and a plow, if the grade isn't too steep, and cut furrows across the slope, about tractor-width apart, and then re-seed with grass as needed.

Past that or terracing, it's pretty much a case of waiting for scrub and undergrowth to fix the mess. And that takes years.

BTW... I've lived on a hill for nearly 20 years now. People keep saying I need to cut some of the trees down. I keep telling them that I want to keep living on this hill, not get washed off of it.

( With all the rain we've gotten these last 2 years, downhill water skiing is a very real possibility, some days. )

J.

Edited May 29, 2010 by Jamie

[Wingshooter]

Asphalt

Could paint it green. Asphalt and paint... that's how they "fix" the "grass" at some airports.

[R1100R]

May be you could try silt fence at the bottom where the erosion is. It's not too expensive.

[Farman]

is the answer, I hope. I have the same problem. The previous owner did clear the front acre and had big erosion gullys. I brought in 14 loads of top soil, had it graded and seeded. It helped alot. Now I'm planting trees, that like water, in the gullys, starting at the top. I'm planting weeping willows, bald cypress, river birch and around those areas I'm going to put in leyland cyress, native pines, tulip poplars and other fast growing trees.

With as much area as your FIL has, maybe he could get the forest service or some "green group" help him with trees and such.

[Currently]

Kudzu ...

Then goats ....

Don't forget the Pyenees dogs to protect the goats ...

Now you got to buy dog food and feed them every day ...

OR

He can plant a bunch of black walnut trees and his inheritors will be able to harvest them in 60+ years for incredible sums of money.

[Guest BEARMAN]

Try planting a fast germinating seed like wheat or oats, and mix in Ladino clover and orchard grass and timothy grass...all are excellent forage for deer and turkey.

Wheat and seed oats, is what alot of construction/ landscapers use for quick germination for erosion prevention.

I too, live in hilly terrain, and this is the seed recipe I used to stem erosion....It worked, too. FWIW.

BTW jack...you'll need to plant it around the end of August, first of September...when the rain and cooler weather at night starts to come.

Try to get it covered with a quarter inch of soil, for best germination, and try and plant it before a weather front comes, so it will get that jump from the rain.

Wheat, oats and clover can't take the hot, dry summers of Tennessee very well either.

Edited May 29, 2010 by BEARMAN
spelling

[strickj]

Kudzu ...

Then goats ....

Don't forget the Pyenees dogs to protect the goats ...

Now you got to buy dog food and feed them every day ...

OR

He can plant a bunch of black walnut trees and his inheritors will be able to harvest them in 60+ years for incredible sums of money.

Kudzu is illegal to plant.

[Guest billwilly73]

Maybe build a dam and turn it into a pond.

[Guest TargetShooter84]

Maybe build a dam and turn it into a pond.

And breed some fishes and you can charge those fellow TGO'ers to fish at that pond and charge high admission for non-TGO fellers.

[Il Duce]

And breed some fishes and you can charge those fellow TGO'ers to fish at that pond and charge high admission for non-TGO fellers.

WINNER!

[Guest jackdm3]

Starts like this:

Then these all over that keep you from taking a tractor anywhere near anything:

Then:

Then, much worse than it was two weeks ago. This is 3-4 feet wide, 15" deep.

Now we're getting serious with:

And.

Edited May 30, 2010 by jackdm3

[Fadex]

He's going to have to fill or regrade the ruts out first or it will continue to erode. All of that water is concentrating in those areas. After that maybe (big maybe this late in the year) try hydroseeding and add an polymer to get the seed to "stick" and hold. Then follow up with something like crown vetch.

[Guest Jamie]

Sorry, Jack, but if the ruts can't be crossed with a tractor then there is no easy fix.

J.

[Steelharp]

You know... I could use a little piece o' grass, myself...

[Guest Glock23ForMe]

He can plant a bunch of black walnut trees and his inheritors will be able to harvest them in 60+ years for incredible sums of money.

If the lumber industry ever leaves China....

It's true... My father had a 3 Generation Hardwood Mill.... I was gonna be number 4, my grandfather sold Magnavox 85% of lumber they ever used in the cabinet TV's, now, it's closed, because no one buys lumber in the states anymore... Everything goes to China.