[/QUOTE]Welcome to TBN
! I am curious as to what you intend to do with a JD 4520/4320 on your 5 A's
. Jay[/QUOTE]
[/QUOTE]Bottom plows are not recommeded in some areas as they promote soil loss. Chissel plows and disc harrows are more appropriate for "farming". However, on 5 acres, why not just get the KK 72" gear drive tiller ? You can easily till your property from edge to edge with your choice of tractor in a morning.
Then again, we don't know what you are attempting to grow.....
jb[/QUOTE]
[/QUOTE]Ken, welcome to the forum and congratulations on the new place. Like John said, it sounds like a tiller would do the job for you. That is a lot of tractor for 5 acres. Do you plan on working more land besides the home place?
MarkV[/QUOTE]
Thanks, I am really glad that I found this forum
before I bought my tractor!
I plan to use the tractor to garden about an acre of previously farmed bottom land; plant and manage about 1/2 acre of black berries, raspberries and blue berries; plant and manage a 1/2 acre apple/cherry/pear orchard; and to farm (don't know what crop yet) another 1/2 acre of bottom land now in pasture. Landscaping uses include terracing the acre that will have the berry and fruit orchard; moving soil from the terraced area to make a pad for a barn; putting in posts for new fences; developing an old trout pond (full of sediment); and developing a spring that I have started uncovering by hand. I really enjoy this type of outdoor work, but I am almost 60, so I don't know yet whether my mind can learn the art of making a profit farming or if the old body can take farming on a larger scale. If they can, I may attempt to buy or lease additional land from a neighbor for commercial crops or pasture.
Now when it comes to tillers, discs and the various types of plows, I am so green that I don't think I even know how many different types of plows there are
, so forgive any stupid statements I may make here. I was considering a tiller, but I have seen very few used here in the mountains (because of rocky soil?) and a local farmer told me that his experience with a tiller up was that the soil was very fine immediately after the tilling but soon settled and became very hard to work. He recommended a disk, and I am planning to buy one. As for why I am looking at plows, the practice up here is to turn fields with a plow in the fall and in mid-winter so that the freeze-thaw cycles in the winter will break up compacted soil. I figure that a plow might help in loosening soil when I do the terracing and berry/orchard planting. Also, I may experiment with "no-till" farming at some point, and I understand that requires use of a sub-soiler.
I don't anticipate buying another tractor in my lifetime and I don't want to find myself with a tractor that can't even meet all my present needs. The reason for John Deere is that they appear to not only hold up extremely well, but their resale value seems to be really good -- can't hardly find a used one on the market here. The reason for picking a JD 4x20 series tractor is that it appears to have enough weight when using wheel weights and/or filled tires to do the tasks I want to do. And going to the 4520 rather than the 4120 not only makes more implements available, but a 23% increase in hp (30% in PTO hp) for a 15% increase in price seems like good investment. But I may be wrong.
I hope this additional information clarifies things. Any new or additional thoughts/advice?
Ken