Dealer's theory on initially clearing land

[charlesw]

LOL! Hey, it's ok - I've got the time more than the extra cash! And it's good exercise!

 

[john_bud]

{snip}

Any idea why our ancestors died so young?

Farwell

Yeah, no fertilizer, no herbicides, no preservatives, no machinery = lots of work for little food that goes bad fast. Not the urban myth of pre-industrial paradise, but the reality of 12-15 hours per day of extremely hard physical labor that resulted in a life expectancy of 48 years. Which didn't change until well into the 20th century...

jb

 

[Doc_Bob]

Any idea why our ancestors died so young?

Lack of indoor plumbing, no antibiotics for infectious diseases, no vaccines (polio, smallpox, typhoid, tetanus, diptheria, etc) no way to control high blood pressure, treat diabetes, lack of safe water, no cardiac bypass surgery, and the list goes on. Hard work does not kill folks early, but lack of medical care sure does.
Bob

 

[daTeacha]

Lest we forget,






Lack of internet forums!

 

[N80]

Lest we forget,

Lack of internet forums!

Oh, the humanity!

Yes, life must have been hard. In the woods all over my property a big piles of softball to cinder block sized stones that were cleared out of fields by hand. It must have been back breaking.

However, our city ancestors died just as young for various other reasons but including hard physical labor as well. Probably the two most endangered species were preganant women and children under 10.

Back to the OT, another option in this area is to hire immigrant workers. All political opinions aside, the county hired a crew of migrant workers to clear the densely overgrown slopes of the dam on my 10 acre pond. The dam is about 150 yards long and 20-25 feet high and was covered with small (and some not-so-small trees), briars, vines, etc. A bunch of them came through with chainsaws and made short work of it.

 

[charlesw]

Not as much an option in this part of the world... Besides... Seriously... I look forward to the exercise! And I will definitely value the end result MUCH more.

 

[rutwad]

I've already done this work a few times. On the 4 acre lot it was all 1" trees - I did those with a brush wacker. On the 1 acre lot I used the chainsaw... That was somewhat similar to your lot in that the trees didn't always fall! But those were more like 10" trees - a lot of them. And they'd been there long enough that there weren't any brambles beneath. Then I took the backhoe and my Bobcat and got all of the roots out... The main bit of work (cutting and burning) took 2 weeks. I did the roots a bit at a time over several months. That was seriously a lot of work. I think that it was worth it - it definitely paid for my Bobcat!

If you have a tractor, a backhoe, and a Bobcat, then you should definitely be able to figure out something better than a chainsaw. But again, a machine like I run will leave the best results with least amount of work. It may cost more than you want to spend, but estimates are usually free.

 

[charlesw]

If you have a tractor, a backhoe, and a Bobcat, then you should definitely be able to figure out something better than a chainsaw.

Ha! Had... Had is the key word... Working on getting another tractor. Should be pretty fair sized (leaning towards a NH 3930) but... Just having a tractor isn't going to get those trees out of there! There will be a fair amount of work involved, too!

 

[npaden]

Am I missing the part where you described exactly the size and thickness of the brush on your property?

I think you can use a medium duty rotary cutter to clear some pretty big stuff. I took down some 3 and 4 inch Elm and Mesquite trees pretty easily. They weren't completely thick though, probably 10 feet apart. On the largest ones I had to back into them in low gear but it just blasted them to bits.

If you have 15 acres of 3 to 4 inch trees spaced 1 or 2 feet apart then it might be something that would be better left to some type other type of equipment.

 

[IslandTractor]

I have been clearing overgrown land full of briars, vines, scrub trees (3-5 inches) and a few big trees per acre. I actually timed myself over the summer using the combo of bush hog, grapple, 21hp tractor, chain saw and finally a backhoe (traded out with the bush hog). I could clear the land at a rate of a third an acre per 8hours not including going back for the stumps. I ripped out a lot of the trees whole with the grapple so I had about 20-25 moderate to small stumps and a couple of big ones per acre. That takes another day and a half approximately with the BH. The whole clearing process ends up taking about 4-5 days per acre with my equipment and leaves the land covered with mulched stuff from the bush hog but otherwise ready to move on to seeding (except for still needing to fill in some stump holes).

I'm sure a dozer would have made quicker work of the project but 5 days work per acre cleared seems pretty good considering how long it would take without a tractor or the right implements. I could not have done it nearly as fast without the grapple and could not have managed the moderate and larger sized stumps without the backhoe.