What Are Slinger Trucks?

Slinger trucks, sometimes called stone slingers, are specialized vehicles equipped with a large box, a mechanical arm and a high-speed conveyor belt. This setup allows slinger trucks to transport and precisely “sling” aggregate materials like stone, compost, or sand with remarkable accuracy. 

Slinger trucks can even efficiently place materials in hard to reach areas. With a slinger truck, your construction project or landscaping endeavor could have efficient material placement in a fraction of the time.

How Do Slinger Trucks Work?

The heart of a slinger truck’s functionality is its high-speed conveyor belt system. The mechanical arm, controlled by one of our experienced and highly trained operators, adjusts angles and speed to place materials up to 70 feet away from the back of the truck with pinpoint accuracy.

Our precise placement means less material spillage and less waste. This enhanced efficiency greatly reduces the need for manual material handling. (Your team will appreciate less time spent moving aggregate materials with backhoes and shovels.)

Using a stone slinger for material placement greatly increases customer satisfaction, because you can stay on or ahead of schedule, can increase cost savings and add time back into your schedule. 

What Are Slinger Trucks Used For?

Slinger trucks can be used for a variety of applications in both construction and landscaping.

• Construction: A slinger truck is ideal for filling foundations, crawlspaces, and driveways with materials like pea-stone and crushed concrete. Slinger trucks can also be used for pool and seawall backfills or even creating foundation drainage for new property development. 
• Landscaping: Slinger trucks are perfect for distributing topsoil, compost, and mulch across large areas. We often use blower trucks as well for this type of material placement.
• Municipalities: A stone slinger can also provide a cost effective way to prepare a playground or park. We can use slinger trucks to fill a sand volleyball court, add playground sand, or even place mulch.

What Is a Slinger Truck’s Capacity?

Our slinger trucks can handle various materials up to two-and-a-half inches in size. On average, one slinger truck can hold between 15-18 yards of material, making them the perfect equipment for large-scale projects.

3 Ways Slinger Trucks Enhance Efficiency

1. Shorter Project Timelines: Your landscaping and construction projects can get done in a fraction of the time. We can deliver and place your materials faster than a team could by hand. That means we can make your construction process shorter and your clients happier.
2. Precise Material Placement: Nothing is more frustrating than finishing a big material placement job and then having to clean up the stray bits of material. With our team’s precision, the stone slinger can place your gravel, crushed concrete, or other aggregate material exactly where it is supposed to go. That means you’ll have minimal material waste, less mess and no cleanup time (because we do that part too).
3. Less Manual Labor: When our stone slingers are taking care of the time-consuming material placement, you are able to use your team for more profitable tasks. No more overtime wasted on sand and stone placement. With our slinger trucks, your project timeline will be more predictable and more cost effective.

Who Has Slinger Trucks in the Midwest?

In the Midwest, Superior Groundcover has one of the largest fleets of slinger and blower trucks. We offer services in Michigan, Indiana, and across the midwest. Our slinger trucks can be used to install a large range of materials, including:

• Pea-stone
• Crushed concrete
• Topsoil
• Compost
• Fill sand
• Beach sand

Here at Superior Groundcover, our extensive fleet of blower and slinger trucks coupled with our experienced team make us a preferred partner for more efficient construction and landscaping material placement.

If you are tired of wasting time, money, and manpower with manual material placement, get an estimate from Superior Groundcover today to make your next landscape or construction project more predictable and profitable.

The post How Slinger Trucks Enhance Efficiency for Construction and Landscaping Companies appeared first on Superior Groundcover.

When Is the Best Time to Plant Grass Seed?

The best time to plant grass seed is typically in the late summer and early fall. During this time, your seed is less likely to face a drought or be drowned by flooding. It also keeps the heat of the sun from drying out the grass.

It’s a good idea to plant your grass seed at least a month and a half before you expect the first frost of the year. This will make sure the seeds have fully germinated and will grow healthy in the spring. If waiting until the fall is too long, late spring is also a good time to plant new grass—as long as you wait until after the frosts have ended.

Compared to DIY methods, a professional grass planting service that uses methods such as hydroseeding or Terraseeding® can give your grass a much better chance of taking root. Depending on your location and your soil, a professional service may enable you to plant your grass outside of the typical season.

How to Prep a Lawn for Seeding

1. Test the Soil

Even the best grass seed that has plenty of water and fertilizer will struggle to grow in the wrong soil. We always recommend conducting a soil test to ensure the optimal conditions for your seed.

There are DIY soil tests available that will allow you to determine the pH of your soil, but a professional test is the best option. A landscaping or ground cover expert can give you expert recommendations and determine if you need an application of topsoil to help your seed grow.

Topsoil is specifically designed to contain organic materials and to help grass absorb water and nutrients. It can be delivered and installed on its own or with a mixture of compost. A professional installation service can spread the topsoil at the right depth and consistency for new grass to grow.

Services such as Terraseeding will mix grass seed into the topsoil to apply them both at the same time. This provides a layer that protects the grass seed from wind, water, and animals. It is especially useful in heavily sloped areas or on top of erosion and water control solutions such as SOX and sediment control berms.

2. Create a Watering Plan

An effective watering plan is essential to making sure your grass gets the support it needs to be successful. We recommend watering the lawn three times a day, for enough time to maintain a damp, but not soaking wet environment, for 4–6 weeks after the grass has been planted.

The best times to water your lawn are in the early morning, late morning, and early to mid-afternoon. If you’ve received some rain, you may be able to skip a watering or two that day. But if you’re facing a drought, we recommend watering your lawn up to five times a day. Never let new grass seed go for more than a day without watering.

You should also take care not to overwater your lawn, which could drown the grass seed and decrease your chances of success. Standing water can draw in pests and expose your grass to disease. For that reason, we advise against watering your lawn late in the evening or at night. Grass absorbs less water at night, and the water is much less likely to evaporate, which means it will be left standing until morning.

3. Stock Up on Fertilizer

There are plenty of different types of fertilizer on the market, and the best one for your project will depend on your location, soil, and type of seed. Fertilizers that are high in phosphorous are a popular choice. But if you work with a professional grass seed application company, they can give you expert recommendations on the type of fertilizer to use for your lawn.

After the initial application, we recommend waiting around three to four weeks to start fertilizing your grass. Once you do, you can place fertilizer about once every three weeks for the first two to three months. After that, you might move to once every month or longer, depending on how the grass is growing.

4. Prepare the Soil for Grass Seed

If you’re planting the grass seed yourself, we recommend removing any existing weeds or older grass to make way for the new. A shovel or spade is good for smaller areas, but you may want to get a sod cutter if you’ve got a lot of ground to cover. You can typically rent a sod cutter from a local heavy equipment dealer.

You’ll also want to make sure the ground is smooth and accommodating for the seed. Take out any big rocks you find, level out the ground, and rake or till the soil to break it down and soften it up.

5. Plant!

For small lawns and patch repairs, you can probably plant the seed by hand. But there are also spreaders available for sale or rent, which can make the process much faster—and they can ensure a more even spread of the seed. Be sure to follow the instructions on the seed you purchased on how much to apply.

Once you’re done, you’ll want to protect the grass seed by gently raking soil over the top of it. You may also want to apply a layer of straw over the ground to protect the seed from wind and rain. However, straw doesn’t always create the nicest or most professional look for your lawn, and it can be time-consuming to clean up afterward.

Using a professional hydroseeding service is a great way to quickly and effectively plant grass on your property. A hydroseeding truck can spray a liquified mixture of grass seed, fertilizer, soil amendments, and water that will grow quickly—and it won’t be an eyesore in the meantime.

Professional Grass Seeding with Superior Groundcover

The team at Superior Groundcover can quickly lay down hydroseeding or Terraseeding to save you time and minimize disruption to your property. We have one of the largest fleets in the Midwest, and we frequently work on commercial and government projects to create beautiful, healthy grass.

Superior works closely with our clients to use the best solution for their soil and their property. Our blower and sprayer trucks have long hoses, which allows our team to easily apply the soil, compost, or hydroseed without driving onto sensitive areas of your lawn.

The post How to Prepare Soil for Grass Seed appeared first on Superior Groundcover.

What Is Terraseeding?

Terraseeding is an ideal supplement for Superior Groundcover’s blower trucks, which quickly place topsoil, compost, or mulch onto an area by blowing it through a long hose directly where the material needs to go. Terraseeding is a method of seeding the ground by placing a finely tuned mixture of seed, fertilizer, and other components into that material as it is being placed.

This allows for an efficient and low-cost way of automatically seeding an area to the client’s exact specifications. Since the seed is automatically mixed into the material as it is being placed, it is far more difficult for the seed to be eaten by animals or blown or washed away. The seed to soil contact is unparalleled with seed incorporated into the growing media.  Terraseeding is often used for erosion control, berms, athletic turf, and golf courses, as well as lawns and landscaping.

The grass will start to grow within days of being planted, and customers often see dramatic results within two weeks of the material placement.

Terraseeding vs. Hydroseeding: What’s the Difference?

Hydroseeding is a similar process to Terraseeding that also mixes grass seed with other components that can facilitate its growth. However, it does not automatically plant the seed by mixing it in with blown-in topsoil, mulch, or compost in the same way as Terraseeding. Hydroseeding can be a great choice if your existing soil is of high quality, and you’re not worried about rainfall washing away your seed.

The advantage of Terraseeding is that it builds up a layer of material around the grass seed in which the seed is already planted and ready to germinate. Since this soil is high quality, carries nutrients, and protects the seed, it is a great alternative to hydroseeding in areas where growing grass may be more difficult due to environmental conditions. This includes poor soil nutrients or heavily sloped areas where rainfall can more easily wash away hydroseed. It can also require slightly less water and other forms of maintenance than hydroseeding.

Terraseeding Applications

Terraseeding is used in a variety of applications because of its speed, efficiency, and affordability. If you would like to know which method of seeding will work best for your property, the Superior Groundcover staff would be happy to speak with you.

Lawns

The staff at Superior Groundcover are experts at quickly placing material with minimal disruption to the surrounding area, and that’s exactly what they do when Terraseeding. Blower trucks can access hard-to-reach areas without needlessly driving over your lawn or other areas of the property. You don’t have to worry about equipment smashing down your lawn or potentially damaging any underground pipes or drainage.

A large lawn that would take a team of landscapers an entire workday to cover and seed can be completed within a few hours using our blower trucks. You can also skip the wheelbarrows, shovels, and rakes because our team will take care of that and the cleanup afterward.

Erosion Control

Terraseeding is great for creating an erosion control blanket that absorbs rain and slows runoff, which helps vegetation grow and prevents standing water from building up. This is particularly useful for construction sites that need to meet the Environmental Protection Agency’s permitting standards for the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System, which seeks to prevent potential pollutants from entering the surrounding area and its groundwater due to rainfall.

Sediment Control Berms

Terraseeding is an efficient solution for placing over the top of water control solutions such as sediment control berms, which can divert and filter rainwater runoff. Since berms are often made from mulch, compost, or soil, they are the perfect choice to use Terraseeding to quickly cover the freshly placed material with new grass. Within a few weeks, it will be difficult to tell that a berm was placed there.

Athletic Turf

Do you have a big game coming up and an athletic field that doesn’t have enough grass? Superior Groundcover can quickly solve that problem with Terraseeding. You will likely see significant grass growth within two weeks of planting, and since the seed is already mixed into the soil, you can start walking on the area sooner than you can through other methods without worrying about damaging the seed.

How Much Does Terraseeding Cost?

The cost of Terraseeding will depend on several factors, including the amount of ground to be seeded and the material chosen to mix with the seed. Our staff would be happy to talk more about the process and give you a quote on your project.

Our Terraseeding Method

Our Terraseeding method is very similar to our other services. You tell us where you need the new seed to be placed and how much you need. We send out our experienced staff who can complete the job within a few hours. Once they’re done, they will clean up the area and perform any necessary finishing touches. You just need to sit back and wait a couple of weeks for your fresh new grass to grow.

Professional Terraseeding from Superior

Ready to grow some healthy new grass on your property? Let us know! We’d be happy to give you a quote.

The post What Is Terraseeding? Benefits and Applications appeared first on Superior Groundcover.

Whether it is weather-related or the result of human interference, unless it is properly reinforced, the erosion of the ground is constantly occurring—and it’s a problem. Erosion weakens the structural integrity of the soil, creating potential problems for the surrounding property. Erosion is not only unsightly, it is damaging to the environment and can become dangerous to the public if infrastructure is at risk of collapse.

The compost and seed services we offer for commercial properties are an incredibly effective form of erosion control, as the best way to prevent erosion is through establishing plentiful vegetation. After you contact us for services, our trucks will deliver growing media (nutrient-rich compost, or a combination of compost and high quality seed), which will then be blown onto your property with our application hoses. Blanketing the soil with this supplemental blend of compost leads to erosion-preventing plant matter, leaving your lawn looking great while maintaining optimal ground stability.

Nine out of ten times, our services are used as a soil amendment solution. Poor forms of soil like sand and clay do not contain enough organic matter for vegetation to flourish, and thin vegetation allows for erosion to run rampant.

Types of Compost & Seed Services

Superior Groundcover offers two types of vegetation-based erosion control services:

• Thin top-dress application: This process involves spreading ground-nourishing compost that has been pre-mixed with seeds. This method is great for those wanting to establish vegetation, as with the increase of vegetative growth, erosion is minimized.
• Existing soil incorporation: If the soil on your site is poor and lacking in nutrients, this process can help by incorporating a compost or compost blend directly into the existing soil, sans seeds. After the ground has been tilled, mixing the earth with the blown-on, nutrient-dense layer, the organic content increases while the chance of erosion is lowered. This method has great returns, too; increasing organic matter by 1–3% can decrease erosion 20–33%.

Benefits of Using Erosion Control Grass Seed & Compost

There are many benefits of using compost & seed services. The result is an increase in vegetation, which both increases water holding capacity of the soil, and also allows water to filter easily and evenly into the ground, preventing eroding runoff. More plants means buffering pH levels, which lowers the chance of large pH fluctuations. There is also an added bonus; a quick turnaround time means your commercial property will be full of lush plant life working to stabilize the soil in no time.

Erosion Control Blanket vs. Seed Compost: What’s the Difference?

You may have heard of or previously tried out a seed blanket. Our compost and seed services are more successful at erosion control than seeded and rolled erosion control blankets, as our services are more effective at filling in the many voids that a blanket cannot reach. While our blown compost leaves an even layer of coverage, blankets are susceptible to tenting over uneven spots of ground, leaving an area of soil uncovered and increasing the potential for erosion-inducing water collection.

If your property features slopes or hard to reach areas, compost and seed services are the best method of erosion prevention. While erosion control blankets are limited by the slope of a terrain, our truck’s hoses can spray a uniform cover of growth material into narrow spaces, aiding in ground stability.

What Else Can Compost & Seed Be Used for?

Compost and seed services can be used to help with:

• Landscape beds: Landscapers with a large scope to cover can use our high-quality compost and seed services to receive a well-spread, biologically stable bed for future plants to flourish.
• Roadside seeding: This procedure is necessary to maintain stable, long-lasting roads. If water starts to collect due to poorly filtering soil, run off leads to accelerated erosion. A quick spread of compost & seed will evolve to ground-saving vegetation with proper filtration.
• Slope stabilization: Slopes can be tricky to cover without the proper equipment. Our services can be utilized in steep areas, like a highway overpass, to aid in the permanent preservation of structural integrity.
• Quick vegetation: Since seeds are directly integrated with nutrient-rich compost materials, strong-rooted vegetation flourishes quickly, providing the ground with a natural, long-lasting erosion solution.
• Commercial lawn seeding: For large zones requiring vegetation, an application of our top-dress compost and seed mixture (also called Terraseeding) is a great way to ensure an evenly distributed, healthy lawn.

Commercial Uses for Seed Compost

Erosion Control Grass Seed on Construction Sites

From the machinery to the crew, construction projects can agitate and upend ground, leaving the soil disturbed, leading to erosion. To repair the ground post-construction, ensuring it is not only aesthetically pleasing but structurally stable, sites can use compost and seed services to induce expedited germination and offer quick, permanent vegetation, preventing erosion.

Slope Stabilization on Commercial Property

Steep areas of land near bridges or similar, difficult-to-access situations that deal with narrow ridges can still benefit from our growth establishment processes. The reach and flexibility of our hoses brings stabilizing compost and seed services to challenging and uneven terrain that other forms of erosion control cannot effectively cover.

Protect Your Property with Seed Compost

Ready for your commercial property to be stabilized from a wide-reaching, precise application of compost and seed? Send us a message today to inquire about which of our two growth establishing services best fit your needs for erosion control.

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