Yard Butler Sod Plugger turf cutter and grass plug tool for zoysia, St. Augustine, fescue, or centipede grass transplanting & repair - ISP-33

This tool works as expected. I transplanted many plugs of centipede grass from one part of our back yard to a bare area in the front yard. The grass plugs came out clean and about 3" of roots/soil attached. While making plug holes int the front yard bare area, I found it necessary to clean off the accumulation of dirt under the "pusher". I put a 5 gallon bucket of water nearby and cleaned the tool end between creating each hole for the grass plugs. Pusher worked well, too.

Well built and sturdy. A little pricey, but worth the cost to save my back. Thoroughly wet the donor and recipient areas to ease tool insertion and to create a perfect cube of soil.

I use this to make a hole to put grass plugs in. Works great and is good quality

Excellent

All the other reviews are correct. It’s hard to get the core out and since the plate is much smaller than the opening, it destroys the core. Would be great with minor adjustments. Make sure to use on moist soil.

I bought this tool because the grass plugs i ordered came in trays of 3x3 inches. Seemed perfect, only it doesn’t actually work very well at all. Have you ever been to the beach as a kid and tried to use a bucket to build sandcastles? Same thing here. unless the soil moisture is absolutely perfect to the bottom, this tool will not work as advertised. It just does not pull a plug without half the plug staying in the ground.I purchased 320 plugs. The first 5 attempts resulted in a partial plug (where some of the plug stayed in the ground). Over the next 315 plugs, I tried wetting the soil to various degrees. I got maybe 5 clean plugs out of 315 attempts. My soil is very sandy, so your experience may be different.But my experience was a complete disaster. I had to ‘fix’ the remaining 310 holes that i tried making with this tool. I used both a hand trowel and my hands. Both produced better results than this tool.It is well built and sturdy. It just doesn’t work at all for the intended job.

My first plugger was a sheet metal piece of junk that I bought with my zoysia sod. I used it and finally got the plugs in the yard, but the experience was sooooo bad that i didn't do any more transplanting for 10 years. But now, my 3 acre yard has a nice area about 30 foot square with nice zoysia that I am using to harvest plugs so I can expand the lawn. My first experience with the Yard Butler SP-33 sod plugger was when my friend loaned me his plugger to transplant plugs. I used it and transplanted 50 plugs in my yard. I liked it so much that I bought one from Amazon. My new plugger arrived in about 3 days and I tried it right away. After about 20 plugs, my new SP-33 plugger broke (incomplete fusion at one of the welds). But Amazon replaced it (and the return system is awesome). The second SP-33 that I received worked great and I transplanted 1000 plugs this summer. I would offer a few suggestions: 1. When it arrives, sharpen the cutting end. Use a flat hand file and sharpen the end of the square tubing that cuts the sod (sharpen so that the sharp point is the inside wall of the square tubing). It only takes a couple minutes and makes a huge difference. I sharpen mine after every 100 plugs. 2. Spray the inside of the square tubing with dry lube (Teflon) before you store the tool after use. The next time you use the plugger, you will notice how much easier it is to push the plugs out of the plugger. 3. It is much easier to use the plugger if the soil is damp (I usually try to plug the day after it has rained). 4. If you are harvesting plugs from an established lawn, fill the holes with garden or lawn soil that has fertilizer added (I buy mine locally at a garden supply store in 1 cu ft bags). 5. If you want instant results, plugging with zoysia isn’t the answer. Remember the saying about zoysia: “ The first year it sleeps, the second year it creeps, the third year it leaps”.

The media could not be loaded. SEE UPDATE BELOW:This little tool is GREAT!! Just great. It could have some improvements and I will cover that at the end. There is no need for a long review, it just works. I have clay type soil in North Mississippi and the ground is still very moist from a recent rain. I had 72 St Augustine plugs to put in and this tool pulled out the square plugs of soil with ease. However, to push down on the rod with your hand is a pipe dream. That does not work. I simply took a rubber mallet and hit the round nob at the top each time to knock out the soil plug. It just was not worth the effort to try and push it out by hand.This thing works great for pulling up plugs to transplant as well. So if you have a source, for say St. Augustine, it will pull them up very nicely so you can then transplant them elsewhere. I purchased my first 72 plugs but I will be using this to go and pull 400-500 plugs from my inlaws yard to put in mine. If you pull 400-500 plugs, say 18" apart and fill in the holes with dirt, the grass will grow back over it within weeks. I could not imagine doing this by hand or with a shovel!!It they really wanted to make this thing 6 stars, they would have some type of lever to eject the plug out. There is definitely a way to use leverage with a lever to eject the plug. Also, they include some plastic thing on the top and I think that is to keep it from moving in shipping?? Cut that off as it serves no purpose and not sure why it is there. You will be very pleased with this item. Last statement, if the ground is bone dry, I just don't think it would work well (nor any tool similar to it). I would make plans to harvest plugs after a good rain or put them down after a good rain. Any tool of this type would not work well on bone dry soil (at least in north MS where I live). I 100% recommend this tool.UDPATE:Bottom line is I still recommend this but read on. I had originally said this was 6 stars if there was such a thing. What really gets 6 stars is the idea. After using this for a bit I have found the following problems:1. The 2"x2" metal plate that ejects the dirt/plug/ etc, is made of VERY thin metal... too thin! In a relatively short period of time the corners began to bend up. So you have a low center and high corners. This will help cause your so to break apart as it gets worse and worse. I can weld so I cut off the cheap piece they put on there and welded a thicker piece there. The same cheap metal piece is that the top and it won't last long hitting with a rubber mallet which is required for ejecting clay.2. There should be some type of hinged piece at the bottom to hold loose plugs in place until you get it out of the ground. When removing a square plug of soil (no grass) it is easy. Just step on it and pull it out to remove a 2" square brick of soil. However, when there are good roots, it can be hard to pull the plug out of the ground. A solution would be if ONE side of the 4 piece cutter had a hinge, then you could move the handle out like a post hole digger to "pinch" the plug and help it come out. If you are doings many many plugs, then something like this would be very helpful.3. The teeth are NOT sharp. So you need to spend the time to sharpen them with a file as it will make a big difference. If you ever use a dull hoe vs a sharp hoe, then you know it makes a difference. Unfortunately they will not spend the time to ship it sharpened so you will need to take the 15-20 minutes necessary to put a decent edge on every side of the every tooth using a hand file.4. As mentioned before, there should be some type of lever to eject the plug instead of having to beat the rod with a rubber mallet. But that is not a huge deal. And the fact is I could find out that a lever sounds good but is not practical. I would just have to try it to find out.I still recommend this. But hopefully this company or another company will make improvements to future productions so that it can be 5 stars!