SEEDS IN CLAY PELLETS

Press, Volume LXXXV, Issue 25796, 6 May 1949, Page 3

SEEDS IN CLAY PELLETS

U.S. AERIAL SOWING EXPERIMENT

An ingenious method of resowing the barren lands of the south-western United States with grass is now being developed. The idea started in the mind of Dr. L. S. Adams, of Phoenix, Arizona, who noticed that seeds eaten by rabbits and left in their droppings sprouted more quickly than other seeds. This suggested to him the idea that if grass seeds could be scattered widely enough with a protective covering of earth or clay they wduld have a better chance of taking root than seeds sown by normal methods, which were so frequently devoured by birds.

As an experiment 90.000 acres of barren land were sown from the air with little .pellets of dry clay, each enclosing a few seeds of grass or clover. The pellets were distributed through a revolving drum underneath the plane, and they were heavy enough to fall in a regular pattern and not to be scattered by air currents. Fertiliser was also put in with the seeds.

To keep the plane supplied with its ammunition of grass seeds, a travelling pellet factory moved across the open prairie, mixing the clay and seeds in huge drums as it went. So far, the results are very promising.