Wow! So much to learn.

[Martian]

What do you plan on doing to feed the cows? Round bales require a larger tractor for their size.

A Max is much to small for your needs. I think you'd want no less than 40HP. You could get away with less, but in that range your doing work more comfortably.

I will always recommend HST. I've owned, and still own both. HST is MUCH easier and more comfortable to use. If you are noticing the difference between HST and gear, you need a larger tractor anyway as the power loss is so small, you'd be struggling with a gear as well. Loader work is much easier with HST as well, not sure how he sees it being easier with a gear.

Mahindra is a very good tractor. Built heavy and lift a lot of weight. Kioti would be another good brand too look at. I would be somewhat concerned without many dealers close to where your property is. Deere and Kubota are good to check out, but each will be slightly more expensive than Mahindra and Kioti.

 

[emcvay]

What do you plan on doing to feed the cows? Round bales require a larger tractor for their size.

A Max is much to small for your needs. I think you'd want no less than 40HP. You could get away with less, but in that range your doing work more comfortably.

I will always recommend HST. I've owned, and still own both. HST is MUCH easier and more comfortable to use. If you are noticing the difference between HST and gear, you need a larger tractor anyway as the power loss is so small, you'd be struggling with a gear as well. Loader work is much easier with HST as well, not sure how he sees it being easier with a gear.

Mahindra is a very good tractor. Built heavy and lift a lot of weight. Kioti would be another good brand too look at. I would be somewhat concerned without many dealers close to where your property is. Deere and Kubota are good to check out, but each will be slightly more expensive than Mahindra and Kioti.

Great post! Thanks.

If we get cows we can freerange them but I don't plan on that. I'm told that we can probably raise 4 cows/steer with our current land condition (free range in the area figures one cow/steer per 5-10 acres depending on where they are). So while we would probably still need to bring in hay at some point I'm thinking it wouldn't be a ton. Also, round bales might be tougher to get here rather then smaller square bales. The road isn't very wide and is pretty steep. There would be NO 18 wheeler of hay making it up there regardless of weather so I'm thinking more likely 1 or 2 ton truck with 100lb bales.

But I'm a newb frankly so have LOTS to learn still -- heck I still have to get a fence up:confused2:

 

[Martian]

Great post! Thanks.

If we get cows we can freerange them but I don't plan on that. I'm told that we can probably raise 4 cows/steer with our current land condition (free range in the area figures one cow/steer per 5-10 acres depending on where they are). So while we would probably still need to bring in hay at some point I'm thinking it wouldn't be a ton. Also, round bales might be tougher to get here rather then smaller square bales. The road isn't very wide and is pretty steep. There would be NO 18 wheeler of hay making it up there regardless of weather so I'm thinking more likely 1 or 2 ton truck with 100lb bales.

But I'm a newb frankly so have LOTS to learn still -- heck I still have to get a fence up:confused2:

Makes more since. I was wondering how you planned on feeding cattle 250 miles away from you everyday as well! Any tractor will handle small square bales. Do you already have a water source of some type then? A nice stream would be perfect but a pond would work as well.

Addressing the tractor: I don't think you have many great options to keep the whole package under $20k new. You might consider a couple year old machine. You want something bigger as what seems you'll have limited time there and need to get your work done faster. It would help if you told a little more on how much land moving/clearing you plan to do. If your just doing maintenance, you don't need as big of a machine as clearing/leveling and building.

From what I've heard I'd check out: Mahindra 4035, Kioti DK40, Deere 4120, Kubota L4240. All right around the same HP and pretty comparable machines. Deere/Kubota will be more, but if that's the only local dealer you have, it may be worth the cost.

 

[emcvay]

Makes more since. I was wondering how you planned on feeding cattle 250 miles away from you everyday as well! Any tractor will handle small square bales. Do you already have a water source of some type then? A nice stream would be perfect but a pond would work as well.

Addressing the tractor: I don't think you have many great options to keep the whole package under $20k new. You might consider a couple year old machine. You want something bigger as what seems you'll have limited time there and need to get your work done faster. It would help if you told a little more on how much land moving/clearing you plan to do. If your just doing maintenance, you don't need as big of a machine as clearing/leveling and building.

From what I've heard I'd check out: Mahindra 4035, Kioti DK40, Deere 4120, Kubota L4240. All right around the same HP and pretty comparable machines. Deere/Kubota will be more, but if that's the only local dealer you have, it may be worth the cost.

Thanks for the reply.

We have a stream that runs most of the year though it dries up in late July early August however we also have a well with a solar powered pump (including controller), a cistern and cistern float valve and I can set the cistern up with an overflow to water animals from (though I don't know how much yet I'll need for 1 cow/steer per day I'm sure I can easily provide 200-300 gallons a day without even working the system).

Of the 20 acres I'd say about 5 are pretty rocky pine forest (cliffs, bluffs) and a swampy stream runs through one corner of the property (comes from a spring just 30 yards from our property line). The remaining 15 is sparse pine forest and natural meadow with perhaps as much as 5 acres being open meadow without much in the way of trees (one of those trees is a Ponderosa that is 4 feet wide but it's almost a lone tree in that area).

I plan to mow as much of it as I can though it's a hill with benches (I'll see if I can post a picture in here for you) and turn the 5ish acres into pasture/crop field (either or)....

 

[emcvay]

Upper Meadow (3200' in altitude)

Drive way (notice slash pile that needs to be moved and burned).

Here are two shots of the land, one shows the 'meadow' (or what I call a meadow anyway) and one shows the driveway about halfway into the land.

Thanks for looking

 

[Martian]

Thats quite a grade you got there. In my opinion I would definitely go with the frame size tractor I mentioned as they will give you good stability and plenty of power. They might kill your budget (again) though:laughing: You don't want to get caught with your pants on the ground and need to upgrade to a larger tractor. Let me tell you from experience, I'd rather swallow a little more money once that a lot of money twice...

 

[emcvay]

Thats quite a grade you got there. In my opinion I would definitely go with the frame size tractor I mentioned as they will give you good stability and plenty of power. They might kill your budget (again) though:laughing: You don't want to get caught with your pants on the ground and need to upgrade to a larger tractor. Let me tell you from experience, I'd rather swallow a little more money once that a lot of money twice...

Thanks -- just so I understand, you're suggesting something larger then a NH1520 or Mahindra 3616?

 

[emcvay]

Thats quite a grade you got there. In my opinion I would definitely go with the frame size tractor I mentioned as they will give you good stability and plenty of power. They might kill your budget (again) though:laughing: You don't want to get caught with your pants on the ground and need to upgrade to a larger tractor. Let me tell you from experience, I'd rather swallow a little more money once that a lot of money twice...

Looks like the 4035 is almost 2000lbs heavier then the 3616 but PTO power is only 2hp difference....engine HP is 5hp difference.

Interesting how much heavier the 4035 is.

 

[Baby Grand]

Nice looking land! With those slopes, think wide & low .... wide & low.
Weight alone isn't the answer - you'll be wanting a low CG to stay on all 4 wheels.
Try to get a machine with tires set wide and get as much weight as you can down low.
Spend some extra time searching and reading threads on ballast and the consequences of not ballasting properly.
For stability, I think you may want loaded R4s.
You'll be trading some traction for stability, but you can get a lot of that traction back with tire chains.
Definitely don't plan on using this machine to cut the lawn.

 

[Martian]

Thanks -- just so I understand, you're suggesting something larger then a NH1520 or Mahindra 3616?

Yes. I think you could get away with that size tractor, but to do what you plan in limited time not living on the land and such a slope, at least I would want something larger with a wider wheel base and I would still plan on getting spacers or flipping the wheels. You'll get a lot more stability in the 4035 vs 3616.