Need experienced advice

[JHumphreys]

Hello all. I haven't owned a tractor before. I own 16 hilly acres now with about 6 farmable, but am going to sell and buy a larger more farmable piece of land in the next 5 years about 100 acres with around 30 acres farmable. My plan is just to be as self sufficient as possible. Provide as much food for my family as I can. Garden, few cattle, pigs, chickens, and orchard. That's my intentions any how. I have been looking at tractors for about 3 years now and am about to bite the bullet on a Massey ferguson 1540 4x4 shuttle shift w/ a fel, backhoe, box blade, tiller, and bush hog all new. I know new is expensive but I don't want to have to worry about repairs and figure on having this stuff for a long time. Should I look into different brands of implements? Everything I'm looking at now is MF. And the main reason I'm going with them is that they are closest dealer. No others are within 40 miles. Sure could use any advice I can get. Thanks

 

[Muhammad]

Welcome to TBN.

 

[Briana03]

Hello & WELCOME to TBN!

I moved your thread to the Buying/Pricing/Comparisons Forum.

By the way, congrats on your goals of self sufficiency. Please keep us posted through your journey...

 

[jenkinsph]

Hello all. I haven't owned a tractor before. I own 16 hilly acres now with about 6 farmable, but am going to sell and buy a larger more farmable piece of land in the next 5 years about 100 acres with around 30 acres farmable. My plan is just to be as self sufficient as possible. Provide as much food for my family as I can. Garden, few cattle, pigs, chickens, and orchard. That's my intentions any how. I have been looking at tractors for about 3 years now and am about to bite the bullet on a Massey ferguson 1540 4x4 shuttle shift w/ a fel, backhoe, box blade, tiller, and bush hog all new. I know new is expensive but I don't want to have to worry about repairs and figure on having this stuff for a long time. Should I look into different brands of implements? Everything I'm looking at now is MF. And the main reason I'm going with them is that they are closest dealer. No others are within 40 miles. Sure could use any advice I can get. Thanks

Curious what you intend to do with more farmable land? You can grow more beef and have better grazing for sure. If your considering more grazing on the additional land and not farming it the MF 1540 should do for you.

A half acre garden worked carefully can feed a small army.

 

[MarkV]

Welcome to the forum! For what you have now I think you are looking at a tractor of the proper size and you could get by with lesser hp for 6 acres in my opinion. Now if you plan to farm 30 acres of role crops in the future 40 hp is a little light. My advice would be to buy what you need for the present and buy what you need for what you might have in the future when you have it and decide what you want to raise on your farm. After all 30 acres of orchard, 30 acres of hay, 30 acres of corn or 30 acres of market garden all require different types of equipment.

I agree with jenkinsph that an acre or two properly done can feed more than you might think and be more work than you might think.

MarkV

 

[SSdoxie]

Nothing wrong with buying new. Someone has to buy the new stuff so the rest of us can get used later on.:laughing:
Yes, if you got all the specs. of the attachments and started shopping around for equal or greater spec. equipment you may save some $. There are some deifinte advantages for going all 1 line.
1. As you said, only 1 dealer to go to for all your needs.
2. If this is all financed as a single package, it has to come from 1 dealer.
3. Everything will be color matched. No need to repaint to look pretty out in the field or post pics here on the forum.

Good luck and post pics when you get it all home.

 

[DennisFolsom]

I liked the Massey Ferguson 1500 series when I was researching and shopping. They have a very nice platform and control layout.

In my opinion, you are going for about the right size range. While it may be true that you could make do with a smaller tractor, a little extra heft and horsepower is not a bad thing. Especially for using a backhoe, I would not want to go any smaller.

I went up a size (compared to what I had been looking at) when I bought my used JD 4600 and JD 48 backhoe, and I'm glad that I did.

I just pulled out my MF 1500 series brochure. I think the 1547 tractor, with the 1580 backhoe, is closer to the setup I have. If taming rough land is part of your vision, you might want to consider going up a size range. (Adds to the cost, though. Only you can decide what's the proper balance between cost and capability.)

Good luck in your tractor purchase!

 

[JHumphreys]

Curious what you intend to do with more farmable land? You can grow more beef and have better grazing for sure. If your considering more grazing on the additional land and not farming it the MF 1540 should do for you.

A half acre garden worked carefully can feed a small army.

My intention is for more grazing and general development (pond, orchard, game food plots). I had only figured on a half to a full acre garden. Probably even smaller starting out. I was quoted $29,000 for the 1540 tlb, 5' brush hog, and 6' box blade. Sounds like a good deal to me. I sure appreciate your and every one elses advice so far. Thank you

 

[jenkinsph]

I am no garden expert but with plenty of space to use I have considered spacing the rows to accomodate a 48" tiller between the rows. Just thought that might lessen the work of cultivating. Even with this wide spacing you can grow a lot of food in a 1/2 acre.

I have a similar powered tractor an older Deere 820 31 pto hp and can do alot of work with it still. Getting the right attachments and implements is as important as the tractor, so make sure you budget enough for this expense.

 

[txdon]

Make sure you have a source of water to irrigate all your plants and grasses and trees.