Turning up an S300

[Amer Pine Straw]

I've had a mulcher in there and a mower in there. The stuff is 90% 3" stems or less. Since my first post, I have walked every stand in depth to make sure of this. Mostly brambles and things.

The giant dedicated machine that I'm an all day sucker for not getting is not maneuverable in the 6' rows and **** costly, especially for how slow it is.

The little machines and mowers zip right through the rows all day long with no problems at twice the speed and can zig zag between the trees and do everything I need.

In addition, even the small mulchers are slow. I had a guy come in with an FAE for 2 days. In comparison it is cheaper and faster to bring in a manual labor crew and use chainsaws to take out the 10% of the undergrowth that is large enough to slow the pace.

The maximum that total cleaning/clearing should cost is $90/acre and no less than 1.5 acres need to be cleaned per hour. Outside of that standard, mechanical methods for clearing are not feasible and manual labor is a better choice.

I know I asked which skid steers were the best choices. I'm not getting a machine with tracks that I have to rotate and lube and do whatever else too while it tears up the ground in the stands. I certainly don't want any un-Rx burns, I know Cat has bad problems and New Hollands have some and overheat a lot. Other than that, I have scoured this site and have not found anything bad about Bobcat. So I was looking there.

Thats the deal.

 

[radman1]

Have you considered using a tree shear rather than a mulcher or is that even a possibility? I clip a lot of cedars and pines with my dymax tree shear. Then return later with grapple, stack and burn later in piles. I can cut 14" trunks. Mulchers in my area are rare but we don't have the dense thick vegetation and trees like some areas. Could you mow the small stuff first, then later shear the bigger stuff? Tree shear doesn't require high flows or big machines to run. I can operate a skid steer and shear faster than chainsaw and work a lot longer with the skid. Most shears will run in the 5-6K range. IMHO, Dymax makes about the best I have seen. I will even grab a down shear tree with the shear teeth, bite half way through and pile them with the shear. They even make accumulators. After the tree is sheared, the accumulator can grab 4-5 sheared trees to pile later.

Lots of opinions about skid steer models. I try to stay clear of the arguments who is better. Kind of Ford vs Chevy arguments. Pro and cons with each. Everyone raves about the track loaders until they get a bad cut, slip off, wear out rollers or need to be replaced. Less than 5% of the time do I wish I had tracks. I did have a bobcat 873 and now 2006 S300. Bobcat still makes a good skid steer. They still have about 50% of the skid steer market. My repairs on both were extremely low.

 

[vegman]

I can solve your problem. If your 6000 acres is as you have described, and you want 6' rows mowed. I will do this for $90.00 an acre. Give me a contract on 1000 acres and I will get it done this winter. That lets you worry about raking, baling and marketing straw. Leave the mowing to me.