Preferred Way Grade Property

[Dynasty]

I am new to tractors and need some opinions from you experts.

I need to grade and level my property to get the ruts out left from a much larger farm tractor. The property used to be farmed for soybeans and corn. Now, my home is being built on it and I need to think about a lawn next year.

The current condition of the land is mostly ragweed. I brushed hogged most of the 6 acres to tame the 3 ft + weeds. During the brush hogging, I noticed how rutted and overall bumpy the land is. It needs to be graded and leveled so when mowing occurs, it won't beat me up so bad.

The tractor I have available to me is a Kubota B2650. The implements available to me are: 5 ft blade and 5 ft box blade

Will these two implements get the job done or is there a better way? A buddy at work recommended a large tiller, but being new to this, I honestly don't know.

What would be your preferred way to grade the described property?

 

[4570Man]

Smoothing ruts with thick grass growing around them is hard to do. My suggestion would be to either fill them in or use a tiller.

 

[quicksandfarmer]

What's your soil like? Rocky, sandy, clay, loam? What's the terrain like? Flat, hilly, mountainous? Wet or dry?

 

[Jchonline]

Ground is going to start freezing pretty soon right? With such a light tractor you might want to wait until get a bit of soft soil (unless you know it is already soft enough). Tiling is probably the best idea initially to get rid of the weeds/grass, then if needed I would use the BB to move dirt around. Keep in mind this is going to take a VERY long time if you truly need to move dirt over 6 acres. If you get frustrated you can always hire someone with a bulldozer

 

[oosik]

Well - I was going to suggest a land plane grading scraper. Even the very heavy one I have is almost a zero when dealing with field grass or lawn. Does your box blade have scarifiers? Use the scarifiers deeply then the box blade. You will find - the box blade takes lots of experience to use successfully. After rigorous scarification then a land plane grading scraper OR a REAL HEAVY drag. Like a ten foot chunk of railroad iron or length of telephone pole.

 

[EddieWalker]

Step one is to kill all the vegetation and then cut it down as short as possible. Round up will take a week to start to show results, but at least two weeks to kill everything and a month is about ideal to wait before mowing. You really want all the plants dead and dried up.

For such a large area, I would use a disk. How much HP does your tractor have? The size of the disk will be decided by how much your tractor can handle. I have a 5 foot disk that I pull with my 37 hp tractor that is a little small, but it was cheap, so I've stuck with it. 6 foot would have been better.

Summer time dries out the ground and bakes the surface into a solid concrete like material. It is very difficult to disk dry baked soil. I wait until it's rained a few times and the soil becomes softer. You don't want mud, or so much moisture that the soil clumps up, but enough moisture to get through it and turn it into powder.

With 3 point disks, you have to go over the soil many times. You will also find that it's harder in some areas, and softer in others. You just keep going over it again and again until the magic happens and the soil starts to break up, and then grind up into powder.

Once the disk has done it's job, you will need a drag. A heavy log with a chain at either end that's looped over your tow ball works fine. I used a 12 foot long, 18 inch oak log for years until it rotted away. Then I build a drag out of angle iron with cement blocks on it for weight. The angle iron cuts off high spots and the blocks act like a blade to spread the dirt around. It's 10 feet wide and that seems about right to fill in the low areas and cut off the high areas. Biggest challenge is dealing with soft ground and too much dirt to pull. I barely have enough power some of the time, and sometimes I have to abandon my 37 hp tractor and get the 80 hp backhoe out to pull it. That always has plenty of power!!!

The drag is kind of an artform. You can build up areas, level out areas, and just smooth out everything. It wont turn a slop into flat ground, but it will make everything nice and smooth for mowing. If you have an area that needs a lot of dirt, or too much, you will have to pick it up with the loader and move it around that way.

Six acres is a lot of area to work. Plan on taking a lot of time to do this.

 

[Tractor X]

wife and i just started our home in appalachia. land was heavily overgrown with weeds, briars, 2"-6" saplings, etc. i hired my septic contractor to do all the heavy work. 2 operates knocked out 500' x 20' of driveway and 1 acre knoll (building site) using 95hp track loader and 85hp excavator. took his crew 2 days, including septic.

took me 27 hours (5' box blade and FEL) to finish grade for house slab, pole barn, drive and clean up. heavy equipment saved me a lot of time and $. this was not a job for a small 25 hp tractor.

can't hurt to get some bids on doing the heavy work... good luck!

 

[Fallon]

As noted you need to kill off the vegetation. Step 2 is loosen up the ground. Scarfiers on the box blade, subsoiler or something. Then smooth things out. You may need the box blade or may be able to get by with just a tiller. Smaller machines dont do well with a disc in my opinion. A 3pt rototiller is much more maneuverable & if you dont have the HP or traction you can just go slow. You need the appropriate speed for a disc to make things smooth & level.

 

[GLyford]

Can you hire a local farmer to disk it with bigger equipment to break everything up, then use yours to fine tune?

 

[dodge man]

Can you hire a local farmer to disk it with bigger equipment to break everything up, then use yours to fine tune?

This would be easiest. They make something called a Harley Rake(sp?). This is a brand name but other companies make them to. They are great for final grading and breaking the dirt up into very fine soil. They make them for three points and maybe you can find one to rent because they are pretty pricey.