My third post: Best way to clear brush

[LBrown59]

web page=== > Grubbing

<font color="green"> Done a lot of it this winter using nothing but my tractor and 2 12 foot chains. </font>

 

[riptides]

Hey welcome to TBN.

</font><font color="blue" class="small">( BTW, the leafless bushes that form a crescent shape in the photo mark the location of a Confederate field house from the civil war. I'm always digging up mini-balls, tent stakes, ceramics, and other stuff when I mess with the soil in the field just on the other side of the fence from those bushes. )</font>

That is way cool.

On the issue of clearing, woods is woods and pasture is pasture. I think your going to have to come to grips with clearing the woods where the fence is. It will be easier in the long-term.

Get a toothbar for your FEL. Plenty of posts in the attachments forum on this.

Trees, horses and pastures have their own particular order in the world. Sometimes without the complement of the other.

Just rambling thoughts.....


Again, welcome.
-Mike Z. /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

 

[LBrown59]

1* <font color="blue"> I can't figure out a way to then clear all the brush and debris effectively.

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1*The FEL pushing and the chains dragging the downed trees and brush to the burn piles cleaned up a lot of this stuff for me.
***********
Be very care around dead treeas.They're a killer. They don't call them widow makers for nothing.

 

[Glenn9643]

I'm not familiar with the capabilities of your tractor, so my thoughts may not apply.
A toothbar was added to my bucket before the tractor left the dealer, and has been one of the best things I bought imho.
I have a place in MS that was clearcut 10-12 years ago and it's since grown up in privet hedge and sweetgum, with the occasional pine or oak, all surrounded by briars about 7' high. I've found that the toothbar will help to get the brush up by the roots when pushing with the teeth just beneath the surface with minimal soil accumulation. When I encounter the larger saplings 4-6" they may require a little deeper attack with the teeth to make the surrender when I push them over from higher up on the trunk. Some small trees are easy, and others difficult. I've found that locust require more digging around to cut the roots and are tough to remove that way. When I'm faced with something like them I put on my pallet forks and push the forks together on the mast. The ends of my forks are sharpened, and I can force them into the ground around the tree easily cutting through most of the large roots, weakening the tree's support and allowing me to push/pull it out.
If the terrain allows, I've found it's quicker to push brush piles to the burn site with the fel/toothbar than to try to pull. As I push the pile usually accumulates smaller stuff and carries it along. If my load gets unmanageable, I separate it by angling some of it off with the bucket and push a smaller portion. Trees that are too large to push through your standing timber or too heavy for your tractor can be cut into smaller sections using a chainsaw. Anything that will allow you to work without having to get on and off the tractor to hook/unhook a chain is better.

 

[1bush2hog]

Another complicating factor is that I have to drag each log up, out, and around the fence to get it it any sort of area to burn.


Is it possible to remove some of the fence boards to gain easier access to the brush/debris from the pasture side instead of the woods side?

Also, what about several smaller burn piles? They do take a little more effort, but saves transport time -

 

[JimMorrissey]

The FEL is definitely not "essential", it's just easier as you are pushing forward to pull and drag stuff out. It won't hurt the machine. Little saplings are not match for the tractor/loader and it won't hurt the hoses (withing reason). Use the drawbar for the bigger stuff or anything that gives you some trouble. Most of it should come right out.

As others have said...if you can rip stuff out with a toothbar and push it into piles then that is certainly faster and better way to go.

 

[JimMorrissey]

LOL!

 

[Cottonhawk]

I hired an outfit with a brush eater looks exactly like the Bullhog you hired. It disintegrate brushes, blackberries, sapplings, and small trees like cutting butter. Fun to watch.

 

[Farwell]

Some where on TBN someone mentioned using real live hogs to clear the land. The advantage of using hogs is they will plow the ground and fertilize it at the same time. Get some portable fencing and some electric fencing, as the hogs clear the land, move the fence along with the hogs to another area that needs cleared. Not sure if they will damage the hard wood. It is amazing how fast hogs work up soil and clear brush.
Just another option.
Farwell

 

[miltrade]

Weekend update to my intro to brush clearing:

I will post photos later.

I decided to tackle it using the FEL (I don't have toothbar), chain, and chainsaw. I started by using the chainsaw to cut all the smaller trees (everything 8in diameter and under) up at about 4-5 feet high. Then I linked the chain as high on the remainder of the trunk as I could and popped them out of the ground by pulling with the chain using the drawbar. When I came to a fallen tree, I just linked the chain and dragged the whole thing.

In the process of pulling the stumps, dead trees, and top portions that I cut off out of the area, it dragged a lot of the tanglefoot and other debris out, but not all. I was trying to manage it with the FEL but it was useless. I decided to try my forklift attachment and this worked somewhat better. It managed to pick up a lot of debris that would get tangled together. There was no easy way to then rake up the remaining dead wood, branches, etc., so I went this morning and bought a six-foot tractor rake. It's still in the truck in the driveway and my wife left me to babysit twin toddlers so all I can do is stare at it.

I am dragging everything into a burn pile and will burn it later. Unfortunately, we have a 4pm burning law here at this time of year, so that means I can only burn for a couple of hours. I am going to use the strategy somebody mentioned earlier of creating a burn pile right where I am working and just doing that over and over, so there will be many burn piles as I go.

I only managed to get about 30 feet of several hundred yards cleared.

I will update with photos.