Turning former pasture into yard

[hiroko]

I recently purchased an old farm in Indiana. I would like to reclaim the former pastures into grass yard (about ten acres worth). While cutting or bush hogging the old ground or the existing farrows or rolling rises are very hard physicaly and on the equipment. Makes it almost Impossible to cut. What would be the procedure to smooth this out? A dozer to remove topsoil, then level, then drag and seed? A box scraper? Roto till and harrow? Please help I cannot take much more abuse.

[beenthere]

Welcome to the forum.

If the old pasture is too rough (sounds like it is due to old plowing and field use) but it has been plowed and worked before, then I would have it plowed again, then disc it level, and prepared for grass seeding (maybe need a cover crop such as rye).

I would not bulldoze it, unless it is full of stumps and large rocks.

The old pasture that I turned into lawn, all I did was brush hog it, and mow it. Once in awhile I have rolled it with a heavy roller in the spring while the ground is soft, and a few places I have rented a tiller and tilled high spots, to move the tilled ground to low spots, then dragged it smooth with a drag harrow, and seeded it down with blue grass. That doesn't sound like it will work for you.

[Pat]

Since you mention bush hoging I assume you have a tractor. You could rent or otherwise get the use of a "LandLeveler" or "LandPlane." This is a tow behind implement with rodeworthy wheels and tires that raise and lower hydraulically. It has an extended tongue so as to alleviate the short tractor wheelbase problem that makes leveling land with a box blade such a challenge. You could run it over your land and let it find the high spots. You could knock the top off of the high spots and use the dirt removed to fill the low spots.

In theory you can do this with a box blade. In theory you can make your own gravel from bolders with a small hand held hammer. The implement I mentioned is THE RIGHT TOOL for the job. It is easy to use and much more simple to get a good job than with a box blade. The HP required will be reduced if you don't try to make the whole place a putting green right away and accept a SMOOTH but gently rolling finish. Applied vigourously, you could make the place very smooth if you have few rocks and no stumps but you will need a LARGE tractor to pull one of these while making serious cuts.

[img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img] Pat [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img]

[hiroko]

Thanks Pat,

The ideas you presented are great, and I am going to investigate them as well. Thanks for taking your time to help. We appreciate it.

Sincerely,

Wes

[GaryM]

Pat,

Good suggestion. Isn't that also known as a "pan scraper".

[beenthere]

The landplane is like
http://www.landplane.co.nz/

The landleveler looks like
http://www.webfarmer.com/adserver/vi...g.php?view=480

[ThistleKop]

Hiroko,
You can improve the levelness a great deal by using a good disc harrow and go across the ridges and furrows. When you're through, attach a drag behind the disc harrow and go in the direction of the ridges and furrows. This will take some of the loose dirt off the ridges and deposit it in the low spots. Works best after the soil is just getting dry after rain.

TK

[hiroko]

Dear BeenThere,

Thanks everyone for your help. Your kindness is appreciated. It appears this field had been both planted (hence the furrows) and had cattle graze or pastured on it at some point in time. I believe most of the roughness is the result from the cattle. I appreciate your keen insight and think I will pursue the recommendation to plow and disc. There are no stumps or rocks (plenty of quail and black snakes in the dense cover however). The farm is old (small cemetery in the woods has headstones dated early 1800's). I purchased only part of it, 127 acres. The open pastures are beautiful. This particular part of Indiana is the home of some very old farms. Only hope we can acclimate ok. No more looking out my bedroom window into my neighbors house.... Another city dweller makes the leap. Is there life after suburbia?

Thanks everyone for all your time and assistance.

Sincerely,

Hiroko and Wes

[SLOBuds]

Another question regarding this 'land leveling' - which I am considering as well.

My property is full of weeds. So I also want to level the property but the weeds are brush hogged and left on the ground. That would seem to make it impossible to drag implements over for leveling.

Do I need to clear the land of brush before starting all of these other procedures? Or should I wait until late winter (when the cut brush is nearly disintegrated into the ground) before do my leveling?

Thanks

[egon]

Sugest you cultivate the land and work at leveling it to your satisfaction, then seeding the type od grass you wish to maintaine.

Egon