Our Cash Crop Pays Us $6,534.00 An Acre

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Our cash crop—grass—really and truly does pay us over $6,000 an acre. And this isn't that expensive illegal "grass" that you smoke, either. It's plain old ordinary sod. The kind a great number of golf courses, nurseries, landscape contractors, and private parties are always eager to buy.

Figure it out for yourself: There are 43,560 square feet in an acre and the current wholesale price for sod here in Yakima, Washington is 15¢ a square foot. That pencils out to $6,534 an acre. And even allowing for some waste around the edges and during cutting, we usually do better than that ... since we always sell at least some of our harvest retail for 20 to 26 cents a square foot.

DO IT RIGHT

Growing and selling sod is like any other business: The people who take enough pains to do it right have the least trouble marketing their product for a premium price.

We plow and run a disc over our acre in the fall and work In a liberal seasoning of manure. Then we let the weeds die and the dirt settle during the winter.

The following spring we rake out all the clods, sticks, and rocks and hand-level the patch of earth just as evenly as we possibly can (this makes cutting the sod much easier later on).

PLANT THE BEST

You can seed your plot of land any time from early spring through late fall ... but seeds planted during hot weather generally do poorly, and you're taking a chance on "freezing out" your grass if you plant It after the first of October.

"Bargain" grass seed always seems to contain so many weeds when it comes up that it never turns out to be a bargain after all. Buy the best grade of seed you can find. Here in our part of Washington, that means you'll be spending $1.49 to $1.52 a pound for the approximately 218 pounds of seed that you'll need to plant your acre. (Which is a total of $330 for both your acre's seed and fertilizer it, like us, you get cow manure "free for the hauling" from a nearby dairy.)

We prefer a good blend of Kentucky bluegrass here in Yakima, but different grasses grow differently in different climates. Ask the county agent or the folks at your local plant nursery or food and seed store if you need help picking out the best blend of seed for sod in your area.

Most seed stores will rent (at low cost) or loan (at no cost) a grass seeder to anyone who deals with them. Take advantage of this service. Grass that is hand-seeded tends to look far more spotty (and, therefore, is worth less) during its first couple years of growth than grass planted with a seeder.

Another tip: Many stores which offer loaner seeders to their customers buy a now machine every spring and then, after one season's use, sell it for hardly anything at all in the fall. We bought ours for $10 this way and it was well worth the investment since it was the nearest thing to new when we got it and we use it a lot.

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