disc and cultivator question

[Ben.MN/WI]

I'm looking for some low cost tillage options for my Ford 841 tractor and I was looking for any suggestions people may have. I have about 10 acres of tillable acres behind my house and right now I rent out about 8 of those acres to a neighboring farmer. I'll be planting the remaining 2 acres myself and I'm looking for something to dig up the plots (eventually I would like to plant all 10 acres myself, but that won't happen in the next couple years at least. I have an ATV sprayer, so I can kill off any sod prior to digging up new areas. I'm thinking a 3 point disc or cultivator may work well since it will be easy to move between plots. Has anyone every tried using a simple cultivator or disc for this type of job? Any recommendations on what to look for or what to stay away from?

Fleet Farm has some decent looking cheap cultivators (approximately 4' wide, single row) that are in the $250 range, but I'm not sure if they would be strong enough for my application. They also have some nice 3 point discs in the $1800 range, but that's a little more than I want to spend right now. I have an old horse drawn disc that I pulled out of a fenceline that will work fine, but I'm really thinking that a 3 point attachment might be the way to go. Any suggestions? Thanks-

 

[wiscwhip]

Why continue to till? Plenty of guys from all over put in plots without doing any tillage whatsoever. See the threads by dgallow or dipper(or CNC and yoder on the "other" site). Those guys and many others are currently getting good food plot production with little or no tillage at all and not all of those guys have a grain drill either. Spray or mow, throw and your good to go. Tons of good resources out there that will help you get good plots without taking steel to the earth.

 

[Ben.MN/WI]

I would skip tilling if possible, but I don't think I could plant the varieties of plants too easily without working the soil first. I had excellent luck with soybeans last year using my horse drawn disc behind my F150 truck. Obviously that wasn't the best plan I've ever had, but it did the job. The deer would walk through every other type of plants to get to the soybeans, so I want to plant them again this year (but closer to my treestand). I believe that I would need a no-till drill to plant beans without tilling the ground first and I believe those are quite expensive.

Any idea what a fair price would be for a no-till type drill that would allow me to plant different options? I would be all for no-till if I could plant a wide variety of plants.

Perhaps rather than asking what type of disc/cultivator I need I should have asked how can I plant corn, soybeans, oats, rye, clover, radishes with my Ford 841 tractor (approx. 60 hp). Thanks -

 

[wiscwhip]

Soybeans can be planted with a 2 or 4 row planter like a JD Model 71(or others like it). They work very well and are a fraction of the cost of a true no-till drill. I see these for sale on CL now and again, don't bother looking on ebay, apparently they think the ones they list on there are made of solid platinum or something? As you can see in the bottom pic it doesn't take much to pull one either.

 

[ruskbucks]

I'm looking for some low cost tillage options for my Ford 841 tractor and I was looking for any suggestions people may have. I have about 10 acres of tillable acres behind my house and right now I rent out about 8 of those acres to a neighboring farmer. I'll be planting the remaining 2 acres myself and I'm looking for something to dig up the plots (eventually I would like to plant all 10 acres myself, but that won't happen in the next couple years at least. I have an ATV sprayer, so I can kill off any sod prior to digging up new areas. I'm thinking a 3 point disc or cultivator may work well since it will be easy to move between plots. Has anyone every tried using a simple cultivator or disc for this type of job? Any recommendations on what to look for or what to stay away from?

Fleet Farm has some decent looking cheap cultivators (approximately 4' wide, single row) that are in the $250 range, but I'm not sure if they would be strong enough for my application. They also have some nice 3 point discs in the $1800 range, but that's a little more than I want to spend right now. I have an old horse drawn disc that I pulled out of a fenceline that will work fine, but I'm really thinking that a 3 point attachment might be the way to go. Any suggestions? Thanks-

Have you thought about a 3pt moldboard plow?I bought my 3 bottom for $400 and it is real nice. It will flip that sod under and you will have nice dirt on top to plant in.A cultivator or disc will leave most of the grass on top.I tried to disc corn stalks one year, it didn't work. I now brush hog them and plow them under,they are nowhere to be seen.I would suggest a plow and a disc.I just plow the corn,wr,and buckwheat under, everything else I just dics in the spring.

 

[Deer Kar]

I would look around for a used plow. They hold there value. I bought a 2 bottom plow to leave at one farm for food plots paid $100 for it used it for 5/6 years sold it for $500. No till is great but plows have there place. Sounds like you already have a workable Disc for what you need if for.

 

[biglakeba$$]

I chisel plow everything then run the disc over it.

Its truly amazing how much of the smaller stuff is around. But I have found in many instances even though it hasn't been used for eons, the farmer/landowner doenst want to part with it due to family history.

Most of what we have bought is what we have found and approached the owner to see if they would sell it.

 

[Deer Kar]

I chisel plow everything then run the disc over it.

Its truly amazing how much of the smaller stuff is around. But I have found in many instances even though it hasn't been used for eons, the farmer/landowner doenst want to part with it due to family history.

Most of what we have bought is what we have found and approached the owner to see if they would sell it.

I picked up a 12 foot disc that way drove by it for years before I noticed it. Stop one day talked to the guy got it dirt cheap had to use my chainsaw to cut the trees so I could get it out.

 

[biglakeba$$]

Best time of year to scout for implements is right now.

Amazing how much stuff you see up in woodlots, fencerows, etc.

I have been eyeballing a number of things this spring. :)

 

[wiscwhip]

You might even be able to find a nice 4 row JD planter in the weeds somewhere and leave that heavy steel to the scrap man. Unless you have unturned ground or soil issues like compaction, a moldboard plow is not your friend. Even with compaction, a single shank subsoiler is usually the better steel implement for correcting that issue. A subsoiler will destroy much less of your soil profile and OM than a moldboard plow. A smaller chisel plow would be far better than a moldboard on your soils, but they can be fairly hard to pull depending on the number of shanks and how deep you set them. I know a few farmers who use these 4 row planters to do their "deer fields" and save the big iron for the crop fields. One guy has great luck with doing 2 rows of soys in the center planters and the 2 outside rows are corn.

 

[kabic]

Some where didn't someone mention in a four row planter 3 rows of soy, 1 row of corn, so that when they turn around at at the field edges and plant back the other direction they end up with six rows of soy and then 2 rows of corn

 

[Ben.MN/WI]

You might even be able to find a nice 4 row JD planter in the weeds somewhere and leave that heavy steel to the scrap man. Unless you have unturned ground or soil issues like compaction, a moldboard plow is not your friend. Even with compaction, a single shank subsoiler is usually the better steel implement for correcting that issue. A subsoiler will destroy much less of your soil profile and OM than a moldboard plow. A smaller chisel plow would be far better than a moldboard on your soils, but they can be fairly hard to pull depending on the number of shanks and how deep you set them. I know a few farmers who use these 4 row planters to do their "deer fields" and save the big iron for the crop fields. One guy has great luck with doing 2 rows of soys in the center planters and the 2 outside rows are corn.

I actually have a 4 row John Deere planter that I picked up last year for about $400. But I bought that planter before I purchased my tractor, which doesn't have hydraulic lines in the back of the tractor to raise and lower the implements like my 4 row planter. The farmer who is renting about 9 acres of my tillable ground will be planting corn this year, so I'm covered there. I'll probably get him to leave me a few strips for the deer, but the beans will hopefully be the backbone of my archery season since the deer went crazy for them last year when I planted them late and they were the only green soybeans in the area.

The cultivator/disc will be used this year on an acre field next to the highway that I'll have to dig up myself since the field driveway is too small to get the farmer's large equipment through. I sprayed the sod and will be going with a soil building buckwheat crop at the end of the month and likely follow that up with rye or some other soil builder in late summer/early fall.

I appreciate the responses, please keep them coming. My soil has a low organic matter % in about half of my fields (around 1.7%), so I'm a little worried that a moldboard plow would burn up the remaining organic matter at a higher rate than a disc or digger.

 

[wiscwhip]

A moldboard will push whatever OM you have a foot deep and basically out of the useful zone where the soil microbes do their best work. A chisel plow would be a better option in this respect. IIRC they recommend 10 hp per tine on a chisel, so 5 or 6 tine would be a good fit for your tractor, a 7 tine would be pushing it.

 

[Ben.MN/WI]

Well I ended up picking up a pretty heavy cultivator/digger. It's a John Deere C10 and it has 3 rows of shanks (13 shanks total). It's built like a tank and it looks a lot stronger than the lower end cultivators I've seen for sale new. I bought it for $375 and I also picked up 3 sections of drag for another $100. Now once my tractor gets back from the shop I'll be able to see if it can pick it up with the 3 point hitch and I'll find out how many shanks I'll need to remove.