breaking up hard/very rocky soil

Gary Fowler · Oct 30, 2017

Nolove said:
View attachment 526688

its about 20 acres i now have a massey ferguson 2615 4x4

my plan was to plow it up then disc then rent a rock rake ( not landscape rake ) to windrow everything then use a skid steer to load the rocks into a dump trailer
I'm just trying to see if there is a better idea to break up the ground.... I've done a few other areas by just discing it up but those where not as rocky as the area I'm about to do and my disc has taken a beating I'm not looking to make the area into a golfing green it would be used for cows and hay the photo is an older pic of the area

thank you

I think I would run a rake over it first to get all the rocks that are already on the surface. Any plowing is going to bury some of these. That subsoiler attachment that I and Ken Sweet posted will work well for bringing rocks to the top of the ground. I think a rock rake on the FEL would work very well after subsoiling with the TR7 ripper. By the way, those things will sink about 12" into the ground if you have the power to pull it. You can remove as many tines as you have to in order to pull it.

mike69440 · Oct 30, 2017

Suggest a Single Ripper with shear bolts.

http://www.tractorbynet.com/forums/attachments/327912-custom-3-point-attachment-2-a.html?highlight=

I use one stiffened up box blade ripper and go slow. it will pull a 200 lb rock in wet soil. Suggest doing it a few days after a heavy rain.

jenkinsph · Oct 30, 2017

Twenty acres to clean will take some time, why not start now? I would see how it goes on a small area maybe an acre so you can determine how large a rock you want to remove. Ripping with trip style shanks similar to what Sweet posted would be a good choice imo.

After ripping, raking and picking up the windrows of larger rock I would use a heavy duty cultipacker or heavy roller after seeding. Something to push the rocks down flush with the surface. The larger the rock you leave the deeper you need to loosen the ground to push the remaining rock down.

Z-Michigan · Oct 30, 2017

sweettractors said:
Something with spring loaded shanks probably would work well and then pickup the rocks manually. Ken Sweet

I second this suggestion. Or the subsoiler with shear bolts.

I've done similar work with a scarifier aka pasture renovator aka ripper. It works very well on compacted surface soil from a horse pasture, and it loosens and brings up rocks. But it requires a lot of HP and because there is no trip or shear bolt, you can stall the tractor and/or damage the implement. Mine was a Landpride and it got bent in its first use, being used as intended. That didn't impress me. That one and the one Sweet linked to have one-sided draft link pins, where the implement really should have clevis style pins as most better box blades do.

If you don't need to go too deep I would get a chisel plow with spring-loaded shanks. If you have to go deeper, the subsoiler but plan on dozens of hours to get it all done.

And yeah, picking up rocks by hand is tedious but I haven't found a better way. I imagine that if you get the soil completely pulverized you could go through with a rock bucket on the loader, but that's another $1500 item to get used once. You could also use a power rake, either 3pt or mounted on a rented skidsteer, although a wheeled skidsteer might have trouble on soil that loose. It depends whether you have more time or more money!

Tigershark · Oct 30, 2017

That is a ton of rocks. I thought I had it bad doing an acre, I used a box blade with the rippers all the way down and filled up 6 FEL buckets of rocks. It took hours to hand pick all the rocks. If I had 20 acres I think I would hire a small dozer and have them skim the top off into large piles on the edge of the fields. then go over it with a disc or rake, or plow either way its a huge task.