How to smooth out 10 acres of yard?

[sawtooth]

Gentlemen,

A year back I purchased a large tract of land consisting of forest land and about 60-70 acres of old tobacco fields. Some of the fields have now grown up but we still have some 9-10 acres around the house that have been mowed for the past 20 years. The problem is that these larged mowed areas still have some signs of the plowed ground where you get the ridges etc making it a little rough to mow. My objective is to removed these ridges and smooth out the land so I can mow faster. I've considered hiring a man with a dozier to grade everything or to use one of my tractors and heavy disk part of it every fall till its completed. If I go the disk route it will make the ground soft and impassable (for heavy trucks etc) for a giving time till enough soil compaction returns and I would assume I need to buy a box scrape to finish smoothing the land. Maybe even spray roundup to help speed up the disking process by killing all the grass / sod.

Anyone have any experience and know which route I should take? I know this is a lot of land to mow but the property is so beautiful with all its lakes and scenic views that its hard for me to just let it grow up.


Thank you,

 

[fatjay]

48" lawn roller, or better yet make your own that can be as large as you want. Go out after a rain and just roll it. Alterntaively put a 7' grader blade on the tractor and run it around. When I did my yard I used a 7' blade with a few cinder blocks strapped to the top of it at a slight angle.

 

[jeff9366]

IF YOUR TRACTOR MAKE AND MODEL AND YOUR LOCATION ARE PART OF YOUR T-B-N PROFILE QUESTIONS LIKE YOURS CAN BE ANSWERED BETTER.


If you are willing to kill the grass, a Land Plane / Grading Scraper is the optimum implement choice.

VIDEO: tractor land plane grading scraper - YouTube


A Disc Harrow will work for initial smoothing. Adjust gangs for less than normal aggressiveness. You will probably need some sort of a drag to get the land really smooth. The best drag is a Chain Harrow.

A Landscape Rake or Cultipacker would also be good candidates to follow the Disc Harrow, but not as good as a Chain Harrow.

VIDEO: tractor chain harrow - YouTube

 

[Schoony]

If you get a set of old diamond harrows and a railroad tie with a grader blade bolted to it you can pull the tie at an angle and move the dirt either way. It is not fast but it will fill and pack the low spots.

Good luck.

 

[oosik]

I put a "polish" on about five acres of my neighbors - around his house. It started out to be around two acres but when he saw how nice it was coming out - the KNUCKLEHEAD expanded it - more than double.

I drove my tractor over to his place with my Land Pride GS2584 - land plane grading scraper. He had a chain harrow that we attached on behind the LPGS. All together it looked like the gypsies or a carnival coming to town. The chain harrow made making straight forward/back trips almost impossible. So I went in a "jelly roll" - then "reverse jelly roll" pattern.

His land had been plowed - then disc harrowed. It still had furrows, rivulets and large dirt clods. When I finished it was smooth and flat. The combo of the LPGS and chain harrow did an excellent job.

 

[Ortimber]

You might hire a guy that has a power rake on a skid steer. Those things only breakup the top 2-3 inches of soil and level out rough areas very quickly.

 

[airbiscuit]

 

[sawtooth]

How about disking then using one of these to smooth. Lastly I can pack with a cultipacker.

 

[sawtooth]

IF YOUR TRACTOR MAKE AND MODEL AND YOUR LOCATION ARE PART OF YOUR T-B-N PROFILE QUESTIONS LIKE YOURS CAN BE ANSWERED BETTER.

THIS IS A TRACTOR FORUM.

Done!

 

[jeff9366]

Live grass will collect in front of the two LPGS blades which will interfere with smooth flow-over from reservoirs.

Kill the grass.

Glycophosphate first, Disc once or twice after grass is dead which will commence smoothing process, then finish with LPGS.

MORE FROM T-B-N ARCHIVE: smoothing ten acres site:tractorbynet.com - Google Search


A Disc Harrow with pans at least 20" in diameter (for weight), periodically adjusted from aggressive gang angles to less aggressive gang angles, MAY smooth land to your satisfaction by itself. Cross the ground at 45 degree angles on secondary and tertiary passes, not 90 degrees. A Disc Harrow with 7" spacing between pans is especially good for smoothing, relative to a Disc Harrow with 9" spacing between pans. Ground is softest when moist.

If you have a Disc Harrow with 22" to 24" diameter pans it MIGHT be sufficiently heavy to chop grass without Glycophosphate. In north Florida, grass almost always returns after Disc Harrow has been run over it. Not knowing your exact conditions I offer this only as a suggestion, not a recommendation.

From experience here, most Disc Harrow owners adjust the implement only once during its operational lifetime.

DISC HARROW ADJUSTMENT: http://www.tractorbynet.com/forums/...ing-three-point-hitch-mounted.html?highlight=