30 Acres of Rocks to Farmland Land in 10 Days

[Luremaker]

Well, it's good to know the glaciers left a few rocks in Canada, I'd have sworn they all came to Maine. :laughing:

We have rocks like that here. They were just too big for the homesteaders to move, and/or they have come closer to the surface in the last hundred and fifty years. You don't seem to have millions of smaller rocks that make up the old stone walls around here.

Sometimes, you can find someone who wants to buy nice, solid big rocks for landscaping. I saw a rock the size of car strapped onto a lowboy equipment trailer going down the road not too long ago.

We actually have all sizes of rocks around here. Stone walls are more popular about a half mile north of me. They have better wall stones.

My pastures were cleared in the late 1800's before any heavy equipment. It was farmed by horse drawn equipment for about forty years then was turned into cattle and hay pasture. After we purchased the land we spent a large number of weekends dragging a chain harrow and picking up all the loose surface stone. Finally said enough and decided to work it all up once and for all.

I've tried everything to get rid of my stones. No one around here wants stone.

 

[Luremaker]

Those are some big rocks! I have something similar I need to do. Where are you in Ontario?

I am Grey County not too far from Owen Sound.

 

[Luremaker]

Today we pulled more stone. Sorry I left the camera on the kitchen table. Some of the stones were the size of small cars. The backhoe could only push them to the fence line. Neighbor hopes to have all the large stones pulled and moved before the weekend. Somehow, I think pulling them all by the weekend is going to be wishful thinking.

 

[dave1949]

We actually have all sizes of rocks around here. Stone walls are more popular about a half mile north of me. They have better wall stones.

My pastures were cleared in the late 1800's before any heavy equipment. It was farmed by horse drawn equipment for about forty years then was turned into cattle and hay pasture. After we purchased the land we spent a large number of weekends dragging a chain harrow and picking up all the loose surface stone. Finally said enough and decided to work it all up once and for all.

I've tried everything to get rid of my stones. No one around here wants stone.

Thanks for the picture, that is a nice stone wall! I don't have any that nice. Plus, over the years skidders have gone over/through them here and there, making a mess.

That's quite a project but that field is going to be nice when you are done, heck, it already is nice by local standards. :laughing:

 

[Luremaker]

More progress today. We did not put a full day in but we did manage to pull and move around 200 more today. More than half way through round one. Remember these are only the rocks we can see from walking/driving around. Round two comes when the disc starts hitting the buried ones.

 

[scollins]

One of the guys at work has his own Bobcat and he uses a round bale spear to pop the rocks out of the ground off his trails.

SC

 

[MarkV]

You have some serious rock there my friend. It will be interesting to see what disking brings up. For you I hope not much.

MarkV

 

[westcliffe01]

I think repetitive freeze thaw cycles have a tendency to displace hard unyielding objects towards the surface. Usually there is a plentiful supply waiting down below. I moved a pretty large bounder this summer and it was certainly one of the hardest jobs I have even done with my machine, but then my machine is just in the 1 ton category (loader and backhoe). Your backhoe is a few sizes bigger but then it looks like it has a lot more work to do...

 

[Luremaker]

I think repetitive freeze thaw cycles have a tendency to displace hard unyielding objects towards the surface. Usually there is a plentiful supply waiting down below. I moved a pretty large bounder this summer and it was certainly one of the hardest jobs I have even done with my machine, but then my machine is just in the 1 ton category (loader and backhoe). Your backhoe is a few sizes bigger but then it looks like it has a lot more work to do...

Around here the ground is still de-compacting from the last ice age. Those large glaciers really compacted the land. Old time farmers tell me the rocks are being pushed to the surface by the land actually rising and less so from deep frosts.

Ground is really moist so that also helps a lot. Most of our rock is soft limestone that is very lumpy type rock. Lumpy rocks tend to hold on to the surrounding ground and not as easy to pull out as the hard smooth granite rocks. Well lot's more work to get done today. Snow in the forecast for Saturday.

 

[forgeblast]

Well, it's good to know the glaciers left a few rocks in Canada, I'd have sworn they all came to Maine. hehe I though the great rock migration that took place from Maine to Pa had stopped in my garden, but those are some big boys!! nice job.