Cleaning lawn of branches

[gmgm]

I have a spring-tine harrow (UK term) on the 3pt, it picks up the smaller branches pretty well. Anything I can drive over, it will drag along.

 

[kenmbz]

I found my little spring tine dethatcher just clogged up too fast with little stuff.

 

[Thomas]

I would use bucket only because land not level you may dig in,which means another thing added to your things to do list.

I've used the rake before and work ok,just go slow on uneven ground.

 

[WinterDeere]

I had the same problem. On my 4 acres I had 21 big mature trees and 8 of them were black walnut. I was out there picking up sticks nearly every time the wind blew.

You got me curious, so I just went out and counted. Lot with the house is 4 acres, with approximately 3 acres of that being grass. Just counting trees in or overhanging the yard, I counted 99 trees, with 68 of them being mature black walnuts. I pick up a LOT of walnuts in the fall, like a pickup truck load per week. But you can understand the branch issue!

Here’s something that might work to push small twigs & branches to a pile

Zero turns can be used for lots of things other than mowing

I like that! In fact, I already have a mount for my JR Co Blower Buggy, which could adapt to a rake like this. Do you think branches would get tangled up too much in the front casters, though? Anyone here use one of these?

4 acres of lawn would be way more than I want.

Same. It was about 6 acres of lawn when I moved in, including the adjacent empty lot. I've got it paired down to about 3 acres of finish mowing now, having planted more than 100 trees and converting large swaths to gardens. I've been optimizing the mowing/trimming routine to where now in under 2 hours, I can mow the entire lawn, string trim half of it, blow off the driveway, walks, and patios. I string trim half the lot on one mowing, the other half on the next, mowing every 4th day during peak growing weeks (May/June, and again in September). Zero weeds to mow, so I can back way off in our usual summer heat and drought, sometimes almost skipping the whole month of July.

 

[Diggin It]

I pick up a LOT of walnuts in the fall, like a pickup truck load per week.

Is there a market for you to sell them as a crop?

 

[groundcover]

Everyone that has one of these in the tree business swears by them. Set up to go on the Branch Manager grapple but probably wouldn't be too tough to rig something to the JRCO .

Branch Manager Mini Grapple Rake

Shop the Branch Manager 53" Mini Grapple Rake at SHERRIILLtree.com

sherrilltree.com

 

[oldballs]

Here's my routine....

On the "front yard" of my three acres, many Sycamore, Soft Maple, Black Walnut trees drop lots of stix/limbs just like the OP. The trees are about 50 years old. Also, my place has Cedars and Pines along the property line on three sides also about 50 years old.....and I have a 50 x 100 garden.

I'm over 90 YO and consider picking up the larger stuff a PITA...but is also good exercise. I stack the debris in a couple locations along the perimeter....and ...then run it thru a MacKissic chipper/shredder (SC1650-HTE) when I feel like dealing with it. Occassionally I hand rake the small stuff and spread it under the cedar hedge

Really big limbs either go into the burn pile or are run thru my Woodland Mills WC-68 chipper. Chips/shreds from either machine are spread inside the cedar hedges, or in the garden...or along paths. I'm doing less and less burning however.

These machines have aided in other projects that turn up.
Cheers,
Mike

 

[4570Man]

I just pick up the one bigger than a few inches diameter and mow over all the small ones.

 

[Torvy]

My trees make a nice bed of needles that prevent many other things (like lawns) from growing . No need to mow or pick up branches before I mow.

Either remove the trees or remove the lawn. Which do you like better?

 

[jjeff]

Kids work great they have amazing little pea pickers, gets them outside and off I pads pick up sticks all day throw them in the bucket or garden trailer, wife or I drive the L2850 or the old 212 in the end we all win cause we usually get ice cream. Lol

 

[japody]

Kids work great they have amazing little pea pickers, gets them outside and off I pads pick up sticks all day throw them in the bucket or garden trailer, wife or I drive the L2850 or the old 212 in the end we all win cause we usually get ice cream. Lol

Best one yet!

 

[jyoutz]

That could easily happen. If your yard is perfectly flat, it might work to some degree. If your yard pitches and rolls, you'll probably wish you had just raked them the normal way and put up with the ones that get crushed into your turf.

If your limbs are big enough and you have enough of them to justify the cost, there comes a point where a grapple is nice to have because you can carry more limbs in a grapple than a bucket and the grapple can compact the limbs a bit for you. The bad thing about a grapple is some small pieces can fall out unlike a bucket.

Would guide wheels on the rake help?

 

[Diggin It]

Forgot to say, my first pass was with the FEL down, skimming just above the ground to push the bigger stuff to a main pile.

If you do that, you have to be very careful to go slow and not dig the lip into the turf and bend something expensive.

With the bigger stuff gone, the rake did the rest. No concerns about driving over stuff.

 

[Spike56]

Every spring, I spend at least a full afternoon cleaning up downed branches from my ~4 acres of lawn, mostly from the more mature walnut and maple trees. I get to repeat this exercise after each major storm, all summer long, and I'm getting awful tired of the routine. Presently, I drive the FEL to an area with a bunch of downed branches, pick up each larger one and put them into the bucket. Then I rake up all of the smaller bits, and scoop them into the bucket. Very tedious.

I'm wondering what automated options might be possible. A landscape rake with float (anti-scalp) wheels would do half the job, at least gathering them together. Although driving over them in the process is just going to make them harder to pick up, in the end. Perhaps a tooth bar on my bucket, fitted with large swivel caster mounts on either side, so that I can drive around gathering branches with the bucket floating just an inch off the lawn.

Ideas? I can't be the only one hating this chore.

I feel your pain! Have numerous Post Oaks that shed branches/wood/leaflets during every storm or high wind event. Unfortunately, I have found no mechanical solution to the problem. Only manual efforts here with the Gator, a rake and branch pruners. One improvement for me was the purchase of Dewalts 20V pruner since I am all in on the 20v tools already.
The pruner works great and allows effortless chopping of branches into suitable size to put into Gator and head to the burn pile. Still a lot of manual pickups on smaller stuff, so I can offer no "easy" solutions.  So far, the battery pruner has saved me a LOT of time and energy.

 

[lman]

Kids work great they have amazing little pea pickers, gets them outside and off I pads pick up sticks all day throw them in the bucket or garden trailer, wife or I drive the L2850 or the old 212 in the end we all win cause we usually get ice cream. Lol

Where can you rent those? None available around here, so I spend an afternoon like the op giving my back a workout loading sticks in the Ranger and dumping them on the burn pile

 

[Yander]

I have a new stick picker upper. It is about 40"" tall and picked up all the sticks in my yard in about a half an hour (not too many this time).

And it only cost me an ice cream sundae. We call it Ethan.

"Do I have to pick up all the sticks pa pa?" Yes you do.

 

[jjeff]

Where can you rent those? None available around here, so I spend an afternoon like the op giving my back a workout loading sticks in the Ranger and dumping them on the burn pile

Well they are very expensive may cause some occasional mind boggling frustration. It's coupled with unconditional love and pride. I'd never upgrade my stick pickers.

 

[oldballs]

Now that you mention it, I too, used to use my little pea pickers (4) to pick the stix....when we lived in the city. But that was a long time ago. .... paid them really well too........0.01 cents per stix.

Cheers,
Mike

 

[Smokeydog]

I'd be extremely impressed to witness anyone pickup up a pencil with a grapple.

EA 54” wicked grapple tines touch point to point. The long bottom gives you good line of sight to see the smallest stick or rock. Dual lids give 4 contact points. Easy to control without gouging the ground in rake mode. With HST not only pick up a pencil size stick but can could write your name ;-)

Larger but similar skid steer grapple has bypass tines suitable for the big gnarly trees. Deal with tons of trees every year.

 

[lman]

View attachment 788359

EA 54” wicked grapple tines touch point to point. The long bottom gives you good line of sight to see the smallest stick or rock. Dual lids give 4 contact points. Easy to control without gouging the ground in rake mode. With HST not only pick up a pencil size stick but can could write your name ;-)

Larger but similar skid steer grapple has bypass tines suitable for the big gnarly trees. Deal with tons of trees every year.

Was there a pencil in your Picture? I missed it.