First Timer

[HFDfireman]

Ok,
I have just tendered an offer for a 73 acre farm here in Texas. The farm is is horrid condition and has a 1952 Ford tractor included in the purchase price. It may take me a while however, eventually I plan to purchase another tractor. Most of the property (about 60 acres is cleared with scattered oaks) will be grazing pastures. The place has not been mowed in the last 2.5 years. What size tractor would be best suited for a farm of this size? I will need a mower and brush hog and may add other items with time.

 

[ejb]

Its tough to say, it depends on what you want to do. My suggestion, is to do as you say and wait a while. Assuming the other tractor works, use it for a while and see what it can and cannot do. Then you'll have a much better idea of what you need.

Also depends a lot on what you spend.

That said, I'd be looking in the JD 5000 series tractors. Can do just about everything except finish mowing. within that series you can go from about 40HP up to about 75HP, but once you start looking, I check out that line of tractors.

 

[Bird]

Would that HFD mean Houston Fire Department? We'd need more information about the property, where it is (level, flat ground, hilly, rocky, or what) and what you intend to do with it (just mow the pasture, fertilize, plow and plant), whether you're talking about both a finish mower and a brush hog, whether you're going to build house or other buildings, build fences, etc. before we could be much help to you, but as already stated, if you've never used a tractor, try the one that's there and see how it does. Put more information in your profile; lots of guys on here that'll help you with almost any question you can come up with.

 

[HFDfireman]

Yes, 17 years with the fire dept. and counting.
Thanks for the replies. I am jumping into this property thing with both feet. The land has a house (it looks like a bomb hit it), three old barns, three ponds and is fenced. It has rolling hills of a sandy loam type soil. I must admit that I have no idea of what I will need to make this a second home. I would like to get the place cleaned up and eventually build a retirement home as my career winds down. I realize that I have much to learn. I really appreciate all the advice I can get. I will be a frequent message board attendee.
Thanks

 

[Bird]

Are you an experienced tractor operator? If not, I'd suggest visiting local dealerships to test drive various tractors. Relatively small tractors can do most jobs; just takes longer than it would with a big tractor. If I were you, I wouldn't consider anything without 4WD and a front end loader, and personally, I'm strongly partial to hydrostatic transmissions (personal preference; kinda like the difference in a manual transmission or an automatic in a car or pickup). And of course, I'm partial to Kubota, but think you ought to go look at the New Holland and John Deere, too, to see which suits you best. Good luck with it.

 

[dmccarty]

HFDFireMan,

Welcome to TBN! /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

Bird gave you good advice. Think about what you need to do or might need to do. That can be pretty hard since it does not sound like you have taken on this kind of project before. Before TBN got so big, I was able to read and follow all the discussions for Kobota, JD, and New Holland tractors. Now its all I can do to keep up with the JD, attachement, Safety, projects, rural, etc., threads.

I learned quite abit just reading the safety, attachment, projects, and rural threads. You will see lots of discussion abouts projects, tools, problem/solutions, that will fit into your situation. We TBNites have a habit of taking a thread about one subject and end up far, far away from where we started. /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif Now this is good but it can be bad in that there is some excellent information buried in discussions you would not think to look into. For instance someone might say I have a JD 4300 tractor and I need to do A, B, and C. Well, we might go off topic and start talking about septic systems. You might be interested in septic systems and would never think to read about the JD 4300 tractor doing A, B, C....

So what I'm longed winded getting to, is start out on the Attachments, Rural, and Project discussions. Start at the beginning and read all of it. /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif Seriously. You will learn more than you thought possible. As an example, I have 53 acres and I'll eventually want to put in lots of fence. When I started researching tractors a few years ago I figured I would just get a PTO operated three point hitch auger to place the fence posts. Then I read about hydraulic augers than can be mounted on your FEL. OHHH, much better and safer. THEN I read you can mount the hydraulic augers on a back hoe. Hmmm, Now what do I do? I never knew such a think existed... THEN, I found out about post hole drivers. Never knew about post hole drivers. Now I'm sold on getting a post hole driver when it comes to building my fences. I just had to read and follow the discussions to find out all this information. I NEVER would have even remotely guessed that there was a machine that would point posts into the ground. And it would work.

So you need to figure out what work you have to do and how a tractor can help you get the work done...

Are you going to build a house?
Are you going to build the house, or parts thereof, yourself?
Are you going to put in pasture?
Are you going to need to build fences? What kind of fences?
How much road/driveway do you have to build/maintains?
What are you going to do with all those trees? How to remove them?
Do you need a wood chipper to chop up the trees?
Are you going to try to grow crops? What kind and how much?
Are you going to grow hay and bail it? Are you going to want square bails or round? How big?
How big is the growth that has not been mowed in 2.5 years? If you have sampling under 1 inch most any
rotary cutter can handle it with no problem. More than 1 inch you will need something heavier which means a certain PTO HP.

Whew, finally PTO HP. By figuring out what jobs you have to do or might want/need to do, you can then found out what attachments will do the work. Attachments will tell you how much PTO HP you need or how many GPM you need on the hydraulics. Which finally will tell you if you need a small tractor, say a Kubota BX2200 or a JD 5000/6000 series. Or a HUGE JD 9000! /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

So start reading! /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif And ask questions. Most of the people on TBN are in the same shoes you have on or have already worn them out and gotten a new pair! /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif TBN is pretty amazing in its breadth of knowledge and experience. TBN has a way of answer my questions before I ask them. And I'm not kidding. There has been more than one problem/concern I had about my property. I would go to put the question on TBN but I would find that someone just asked the question and the answers were already out here. It really is an amazing place.... /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

Good Luck and Have Fun!
Dan McCarty

 

[Boondox]

And Muhammad's book is a great place to start!

Pete

www.GatewayToVermont.com

 

[Bird]

<font color=blue>And Muhammad's book is a great place to start!</font color=blue>

That's a fact; don't know why I wasn't thinking enough to suggest that in the first place./w3tcompact/icons/frown.gif