First Tractor Purchase for 100 Acre Property

[ddivinia]

Thanks to all of you for some terrific thoughts! To answer some of your questions:

The mowing is for 1-2 x a year before spraying for weeds in our pasture 60 acres horse pasture. This pasture does not have enough water to become a hay field.
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Not that bad. You will want the largest mower you can get. I went with a MX-6 so I could haul it easily. You may want to look at your options there. The MX-8 is a lot more money (more blades, gear boxes, etc).



The haying is in a 40 acre creek basin area, which can be very wet and has gotten many a tractor stuck while trying to cut the hay.
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What kind of bales are they making?

If the price is right and the hay people are reliable - you may be better off letting them do it. Maybe you rake it and save some money or something or for the fun of it.,



The snow can be horrendous on our 1700 ft driveway with huge drifts. I have watched hired tractors with loaders, tractors with plows, and a tractor with a snow blower come through. The snow blower was definitely the fastest and did the least damage to our gravel drive (he kept it about 2" off the ground).
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I don't have any experience with this aspect. It sounds like a snow blower makes sense. A cab tractor for sure.



Therefore the priority is the driveway, then typical horse property duties, then the mowing and maybe the haying in the future.
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What kind of horse duties?

Do you need to do any finish mowing - yard?


Are we still way off base if we go to a 4720 instead of the 4320? I priced a 5225 and while it looks to be the answer, it it easily another $10k.

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You should look at the horsepower requirements of the snow blower and other implements. That will really drive your 4320 vs. 4720 decision. They are essentiall the same tractor.

If you don't plan on haying - take the $10K savings from teh 5225 and buy implements.

There are lot of options on these tractors. Once you decide on the tractor, you will want to sort thru them.

D.

 

[Kyle_in_Tex]

I would guess that the 4710's turning radius would be a big plus in horse operations. Haying is very expensive and its usually cheaper to let someone else with the capitol buy the equipment. It would pull an 8' double bladed mower too.

I think deere builds a 59" snow blower front mount that the 4710 would easily handle. Sure beats neck craning a rear mount model.

 

[Grrrr]

I respectfully disagree - this would require you to average 5.4mph in mowing, with no overlap of rows and no time lost in turning, nor any time lost in passing over mowed areas while turning or maneuvering. I find I can't go much over 4mph on my fields, not for lack of power (I have 2x what I need for my 6' mower) but because the field is too bumpy to go faster without beating up me and the equipment. Also, I tend to overlap 6-12", not because I want to but because my current skill level doesn't let me get all the grass without some overlap. And I do lose time going over mowed areas while turning corners. Some of this will get better with skill and experience, but it won't all magically improve. On bumpy fields, and assuming adequate PTO hp, I only expect 2- 2.5 acres/hour with a 6' mower. YMMV

Well...

I guess I just drive fast

Mowing the 'set aside' fields (ones that aren't being intesively farmed and used) I averaged about 9 MPH.

I was using a Massey Feguson 135, I found this speed was about right. I could have gone faster, but third high on the 135 is really fast and just made the ride too bumpy.

Admittantly the growth wasn't massive, about a foot of grass / weeds, but still made the tractor work. I mow in circles so the cutter is cutting most of the time.

I have some videos of it, if I ever get around to uploading them.

We normally use a 10 foot cutter which seems to cover the ground a lot faster. It has a bad bearing at the moment.

 

[ddivinia]

Mowing the 'set aside' fields (ones that aren't being intesively farmed and used) I averaged about 9 MPH.
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That is cruising. On my new pastures that I have been working to get smooth I can cruise at 10MPH with hay bales on front and rear. With a 15' mower, I don't think it will mow very good at that speed.

I mow in circles and run around 7mph or so.

D.

 

[Grrrr]

Mowing the 'set aside' fields (ones that aren't being intesively farmed and used) I averaged about 9 MPH.
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That is cruising. On my new pastures that I have been working to get smooth I can cruise at 10MPH with hay bales on front and rear. With a 15' mower, I don't think it will mow very good at that speed.

I mow in circles and run around 7mph or so.

D.

The fields are all flat as a pancake because they are on a floodplain which floods evey year. Forgot to mention that.

 

[Z-Michigan]

I guess I'm a slowpoke. The big field I'm mowing was disked and repeatedly dragged this spring, but is still a bit rough (plenty of rocks we haven't yet picked up, too). It also has some very shallow gulleys that, if I go too fast across them, can slam the mower up; not good. I do have some technique left to learn.

I carry round bales at only about 3-4mph on fields, and maybe 6-7mph on our gravel driveway. YMMV!

 

[ddivinia]

You aren't going that slow. Speed can be ugly sometimes - easy to tear stuff up or worse.

I have the suspension system on my JOhn Deere 542 FEL. It really smooths out the bumps when I am moving hay.

D.

 

[mjncad]

Any opinions on a proper sized tractor for 35-acres of relatively flat former dry land wheat field? Note, I use my loader with ballast box the most and a HST is a must for me. The next most used implement is my Bush Hog followed by my rear blade.

 

[Soundguy]

when i had 5-6' mowers i did the circles.. but now with the 10'15' mowers I makes oposing stripes.. seems to have less overlap.. etc... ( my field is rectangular.. etc.. )

Mowing the 'set aside' fields (ones that aren't being intesively farmed and used) I averaged about 9 MPH.
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That is cruising. On my new pastures that I have been working to get smooth I can cruise at 10MPH with hay bales on front and rear. With a 15' mower, I don't think it will mow very good at that speed.

I mow in circles and run around 7mph or so.

D.

 

[Grrrr]

when i had 5-6' mowers i did the circles.. but now with the 10'15' mowers I makes oposing stripes.. seems to have less overlap.. etc... ( my field is rectangular.. etc.. )

This is the same way that we do most other tractor tasks like power harrowing, rolling, seeding, silage cutting etc.

The longer the field the more effective it is. Also, the wider the implement the easier the headland turning is. Having a trailed implement also helps with keeping the turns tight.

The combine driver that did our wheat this year was aiming for just a few centimetres overlap on a 30 foot header. Talk about precision farming