My boyfriend and I have taken it upon ourselves to plow 5 acres of our land in order to facilitate my horses living in their dream pasture at our home located in the beautiful and mountainous area known as the Kootenay region of British Columbia (located in the south east corner).
We have a couple of antique tractors, a disker, two mouldboard plows, a seeder and a lot of enthusiasm. Having said that its a bit like the blind leading the blind over here in Castlegar as although I have always had horses, I have usually boarded them out and although Dennis, my boyfriend, has many earthmoving machines (he is an industrial contractor) neither of us know much about tilling and planting with workable antique equipment and are basically just listening and learning to local old timers to learn about fertilizing and types of grass to plant.
Have said all that, what I would like is some good, clear instructions on how to use our moldboard plow. We've limed the sandy, acidic soil in the past couple of days, but when it came to hooking up the plow to our Dodge truck (having a wee problem with the picturesque tractor), we don't seem to be able to get the furrow thingys (sorry, don't know the terminology) to drop evenly into the ground. Of course, we've played with the two long handles that attach to the top of the plow, but there's some type of spring device attached one of the wheels that would allow both furrow things to drop evenly to plow the soil. Can you help us? Please!
Also, should we disk first, plow and then disk again? We want to plant clover and timothy grass before the end of September so it germinates before the snow flies and hopefully comes up again in the spring to give my horses a tasty pasture around May and help suppress the ragweed and dock that we spent 8 hours mowing last month.
I'd appreciate any information at all as we're flapping over here and getting a wee bit frustrated since time is of the essence.
We have a couple of antique tractors, a disker, two mouldboard plows, a seeder and a lot of enthusiasm. Having said that its a bit like the blind leading the blind over here in Castlegar as although I have always had horses, I have usually boarded them out and although Dennis, my boyfriend, has many earthmoving machines (he is an industrial contractor) neither of us know much about tilling and planting with workable antique equipment and are basically just listening and learning to local old timers to learn about fertilizing and types of grass to plant.
Have said all that, what I would like is some good, clear instructions on how to use our moldboard plow. We've limed the sandy, acidic soil in the past couple of days, but when it came to hooking up the plow to our Dodge truck (having a wee problem with the picturesque tractor), we don't seem to be able to get the furrow thingys (sorry, don't know the terminology) to drop evenly into the ground. Of course, we've played with the two long handles that attach to the top of the plow, but there's some type of spring device attached one of the wheels that would allow both furrow things to drop evenly to plow the soil. Can you help us? Please!
Also, should we disk first, plow and then disk again? We want to plant clover and timothy grass before the end of September so it germinates before the snow flies and hopefully comes up again in the spring to give my horses a tasty pasture around May and help suppress the ragweed and dock that we spent 8 hours mowing last month.
I'd appreciate any information at all as we're flapping over here and getting a wee bit frustrated since time is of the essence.