About Us

PDF Brochure

 

We are Lee and Maggie Arbuckle. Years ago Maggie and I returned to the heart of the short grass prairie in Montana to put the pieces of Arbuckle Ranch back together. Arbuckle Ranch had started in the 1800s and steadily grew with sweat equity, savings, and cost conscious innovation. Working with my parents we bought out the interests of their generation and other generations. Arbuckle Ranch nurtured and spun off Native Seedsters, Inc.

We leased out the ranch, reserving grass seed production and conservation use acres. We reseeded some marginal ground to a good native grass species that enthusiastically produced high value native seed. However a combine shattered seed and was plugged up by awns. From this predicament the idea for the Arbuckle Native Seedster was born.
We talked to grass seed producers before having a machine shop build a crude model with counter-rotating bats and brush. In those years Maggie and I were with the United States Agency for International Development in Honduras developing new products and services for agricultural and rural development, so experimentation fell to our teenage son Tony Arbuckle. He used his judgment, long distance discussions with me in Honduras, and suggestions from ranch lessee Leroy Dean. But most native grass leaned away, or was nudged away, or slipped off the bats, or dislodged seed fell to the ground instead of being drawn into the collection chamber. We kept scratching our heads.
Maggie and I returned from Honduras to semi-retire.  But the grass stand was still producing seed. Ranching and overseas development had made us problem solvers, so we kept experimenting. We tried adding combs to positively engage seed stems for brushing and bingo!...seed recovery jumped! A patent search found no similar technologies, so the cooperating brush comb technology was patented.

Bill Larsen, Ph.D. retired chairman of Agricultural and Mechanical Engineering at Montana State University designed a small prototype. Our son Andrew Arbuckle, Emmy nominated film and video producer, used high speed video (HSV) to analyze seed dislodgement and seed flight pattern.  Thereafter HSV played a key role in accelerating R & D. Range scientist Brian Sindelar, PhD tested the effects of different variables on seed recovery.

Good results led to an award from the USDA Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) program to develop the seed technology. Seven USDA/SBIR awards and the Montana SBIR support program provided crucial support. We assembled a multi-disciplinary team: Plant Scientist Mark Majerus, design engineer Wade Wolf, production specialist Dale Detrick of MT Manufacturing Extension Center, Chief Technology Officer, Tony Arbuckle, and other occasional consultants. The Montana Business Incubator in Billings provided office facilities.  An intense R & D program, including field testing on many difficult to harvest seed species in several states, prepared the Seedster for the market. From the start the team strived to produce a simple, low maintenance, durable machine to mount on a common farm tractor. A complex Seedster could have been ready in a couple of years; development of a simple low maintenance Seedster took longer.   Simplification isn’t easy.

Calculate the advantage of using the Seedster
to collect difficult to harvest native grass seeds.

 

We insisted on a simple design that recovered a higher percentage of potential seed from the  spectrum of difficult to harvest seed species. Different brush and comb rpm, brush bristle counts and comb shapes are effective with different species.

Led by Mark Majerus and Drew King, the Native Seedsters team examined seed harvestability of all species of native perennial grasses in the U.S. that are commercially traded. This research was funded by a grant from the State of Montana Board of Research and Commercialization Technology. Finding: Panicle species for which the Seedster was designed make up over 87% of all species. The Seedster advantage is greatest with awned or hairy species or species with appendages even if the seed is light or very small..

We pledge to listen closely to seed producers needs, to help expand production of the full spectrum of native grass species that nature gave us, and make more native seed available for reseeding for reclamation or for biomass for energy. What other challenging seeds can be harvested with revolutionary Seedster technology remains to be seen.