Why would I buy 50% filler bags of grass seed?!

8 years ago

I'm planning to overseed my lawn in the spring. I've been looking at the products in the big box stores. The 2 main brands (Scotts and Pennington) seem to each have a 15-20lb bag in the $50-60 range. Looked at the ingredients and each of them sells a bag that is 50% filler. Pennington has one however that is 100% seed. Why wouldn't someone want all seed at these prices? I will probably need 4-5 bags of whichever I choose but cannot understand why someone would be the bags with half filler. Thank you.

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Comments (5)

User
8 years ago
They coat the seed for "water retention", add some fertilizer and charge triple. If you don't know any better you buy it, and a lot of people don't know any better. I wouldn't buy big box store seed of any kind, but if I had had to choose between Scotts and Pennington I would choose Lesco.
dchall_san_antonio
8 years ago
With seed you get what you pay for...assuming you're looking for seed and not coated seed. Some of the more noxious grasses, bermuda and creeping bentgrass for example, have seed the size and weight of dust. Compared with fescue and KBG seed that you can see and roll around in your fingers, dust is pretty small. Seed is sold by weight, so when you buy 10 pounds of fescue that is .998% pure fescue, you get 9.98 pounds of fescue and 0.02 pounds (1/3 of an ounce) of either weed or other crop. There could be thousands of bermuda or bentgrass seeds in that mix.
Mike K. thanked dchall_san_antonio
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owlnsr
8 years ago
last modified: 8 years ago
I've noticed that the areas where I applied Scotts Turf Builder coated seed (a) are the best looking parts of my lawn, and (b) I haven't had to return to those areas to put more seed.

The areas I've applied untreated seed, such as Titan RX or Black Beauty, required me to do a second seeding that I didn't have to do with Scotts. It's important to note that I had to do the same thing when using Pennington's coated seed.

From my basic, real life experiences: Scotts Turf Builder seed produced the best portions of my lawn and was also the best value because I didn't need to reseed those areas. Penningtons coated seed is probably a ripoff, though.
Mike K. thanked owlnsr
HU-858122627
last year
If you seed properly, rough up the areas, topcoat with a little soil, and put a fine spray of water each day, it will be fine and you will not have to reseed. Just like the antifreeze companies are giving you a 50/50 mix of antifreeze and water and telling you they are doing you a favor, these seed companies are perpetrating the same scam.
charles kidder
last year
I also have had better success with coated seed. Less watering required and better germination rate. When people seed, they typically put down 5x the amount of seed needed. Which is going to waste way more seed than having a bag of 50% seed. It's not a scam. Given all the time and effort involved in seeding a lawn, paying extra for more viable seed is well worth it IMO.

Why would I buy 50% filler bags of grass seed?!

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