Do you use a Power Harrow

[betweenthelines]

take a minute to watch this video

What was the point of that?

DD land becomes hard and lumpy whereas cultivated land becomes crumb like? I'd rather have fine crumbly seedbed than lumps that won't break down, dry out and don't cover the seed properly

I think a lot of people are throwing HP and heavy, multiple, or forced (PH) cultivation at seedbed prep is simply because not many people can plough like @Selectamatic. As someone said, using a 10inch plough a few inches deep will leave an almost-ready-to-drill finish

 

[Flat 10]

Because it settles after you worked it, and, i feel that the tractor leaves too much of it's mark, and if you travel across the way it was power harrowed, you feel every bump, although it looks a lovely finish. I do have a leveling board, but find that it ends up giving a too fine tilth. My land will cap after a heavy downpour, so I like having a few clods in the seedbed.



Yes, this, I am not particularly bothered for arable fields, but for reseeding I want something better than a power harrow can give me.

Reseeding gives a tilth quickly and easily, but for level and compacting, it's not the machine in my experience

I ploughed this last year...
View attachment 760768

Well packed furrows, that you could travel along ok, without leaving much of a mark.

View attachment 760770

I power harrowed it, to get a tilth to bury some barley seed. It was hellish rough to travel across it, i recon dual wheels, or a lighter tractor would help...?

Reseeding, I draw this though after the power harrow, I think it helps get a level seedbed, a cambridge roller finishes the job.

View attachment 760772

View attachment 760774

Different soils, weather, timings, etc etc etc. This is not the right way to do it, but it seems to work for me.

I believe in shallow working, been taught by my father, ploughing deeper than 6ins is a arse kicking offence. I think that the modern no till, min till, no plough, shallow till system has it's fans because many of the ploughs today are not doing a tidy job unless they are ploughing 10 ins deep. The ones that look and laugh at this antique kit are often guilty. 5 furrow reversibles ploughing 20ins wide with 180hp powering on is not really what ploughing is all about, not IMO anyway.

I'm going to be an arm chair critic and say that your ploughing is amazing (looks like a ploughing match entry) , the power harrowing good but the following 2 passes a bit average. Use a dutch(level) harrow instead of the tines and it will fill any holes if you keep a bit of soil in it and firm up better for grass seeds and fit duals/cage wheels to your rolling tractor plus a set of pups for the rolls and you will elevate a very good job to an excellent job. In my view. Sat at a computer 300 miles away

 

[colhonk]

I use a Power Cultivator. nowhere for me to tick

 

[Flat 10]

I use a Power Cultivator. nowhere for me to tick

What do you mean?

 

[Shutesy]

Because it settles after you worked it, and, i feel that the tractor leaves too much of it's mark, and if you travel across the way it was power harrowed, you feel every bump, although it looks a lovely finish. I do have a leveling board, but find that it ends up giving a too fine tilth. My land will cap after a heavy downpour, so I like having a few clods in the seedbed.



Yes, this, I am not particularly bothered for arable fields, but for reseeding I want something better than a power harrow can give me.

Reseeding gives a tilth quickly and easily, but for level and compacting, it's not the machine in my experience

I ploughed this last year...
View attachment 760768

Well packed furrows, that you could travel along ok, without leaving much of a mark.

View attachment 760770

I power harrowed it, to get a tilth to bury some barley seed. It was hellish rough to travel across it, i recon dual wheels, or a lighter tractor would help...?

Reseeding, I draw this though after the power harrow, I think it helps get a level seedbed, a cambridge roller finishes the job.

View attachment 760772

View attachment 760774

Different soils, weather, timings, etc etc etc. This is not the right way to do it, but it seems to work for me.

I believe in shallow working, been taught by my father, ploughing deeper than 6ins is a arse kicking offence. I think that the modern no till, min till, no plough, shallow till system has it's fans because many of the ploughs today are not doing a tidy job unless they are ploughing 10 ins deep. The ones that look and laugh at this antique kit are often guilty. 5 furrow reversibles ploughing 20ins wide with 180hp powering on is not really what ploughing is all about, not IMO anyway.

I would agree with @Flat 10 above, can't fault your ploughing or the following passes to get the seedbed level, but surely your undoing all your good work by using a 2wd drive tractor with such narrow tyres on to roll it in after? I know its a nice light tractor but its still sinking in a fair way, looks a bit rough if you were to travel across the direction of rolling in the future.

 

[Will 1594]

Although I agree with your post entirely the no tillers won't. If I were to plough again I would go in search of one with 10" furrows and plough at 4" deep.

Just what we been looking at doing then through with low disturbance subsoiler

 

[Fraserb]

Because it settles after you worked it, and, i feel that the tractor leaves too much of it's mark, and if you travel across the way it was power harrowed, you feel every bump, although it looks a lovely finish. I do have a leveling board, but find that it ends up giving a too fine tilth. My land will cap after a heavy downpour, so I like having a few clods in the seedbed.



Yes, this, I am not particularly bothered for arable fields, but for reseeding I want something better than a power harrow can give me.

Reseeding gives a tilth quickly and easily, but for level and compacting, it's not the machine in my experience

I ploughed this last year...
View attachment 760768

Well packed furrows, that you could travel along ok, without leaving much of a mark.

View attachment 760770

I power harrowed it, to get a tilth to bury some barley seed. It was hellish rough to travel across it, i recon dual wheels, or a lighter tractor would help...?

Reseeding, I draw this though after the power harrow, I think it helps get a level seedbed, a cambridge roller finishes the job.

View attachment 760772

View attachment 760774

Different soils, weather, timings, etc etc etc. This is not the right way to do it, but it seems to work for me.

I believe in shallow working, been taught by my father, ploughing deeper than 6ins is a arse kicking offence. I think that the modern no till, min till, no plough, shallow till system has it's fans because many of the ploughs today are not doing a tidy job unless they are ploughing 10 ins deep. The ones that look and laugh at this antique kit are often guilty. 5 furrow reversibles ploughing 20ins wide with 180hp powering on is not really what ploughing is all about, not IMO anyway.

We actually run a front pH, rotors slowed right down and tines barely in the ground, it levels and firms our ground far better than a press, duals all round on the tractor means it barely sinks an inch so rear power harrow can be set to do very little when needed.
We will have more power per furrow than yourself but we had 210 on 7 furs on Friday, the 4m drilling rig is on 215 boosting to 250hp.

 

[DrWazzock]

The problem we find going onto ploughed land is that even with duals on, the rear mounted power Harrow tends to fill in the wheelings and leave a soft bit in the middle, even though it looks level.

So, we tend to "split the wheelings", I.e. Do a run then do the next run with the front centre of the bonnet going up the edge of the previous run so that all the ground has had a dual wheel over it. Next run, do a completely new run, no overlap. We run twice as fast on the ground as we are harrowing twice but at least we are consolidating full width.

This must sound like madness to no tillers and in some ways it is, but if we can't avoid ploughing it's our only option. We have tried furrow presses but don't find them very effective for a big increase in fuel consumption. They also don't help with weathering and drying.

In an ideal world I'd go for a three wheeler with the front wheel in the centre as the Dutch do it. Proper job, not a horse with wheels on.

 

[ajd132]

I’ve got a reasonable crop of no till wheat drilled in stripper headed spring oats, this is on hanslope series clay. Won’t ever use a power harrow, the less we do over the years the better the soil gets!

 

[Selectamatic]

I'm going to be an arm chair critic and say that your ploughing is amazing (looks like a ploughing match entry) , the power harrowing good but the following 2 passes a bit average. Use a dutch(level) harrow instead of the tines and it will fill any holes if you keep a bit of soil in it and firm up better for grass seeds and fit duals/cage wheels to your rolling tractor plus a set of pups for the rolls and you will elevate a very good job to an excellent job. In my view. Sat at a computer 300 miles away

A Dutch Harrow, now there's an idea...

Im working on pups for the roller

Im struggling to get excited about cage wheels...

 

[Selectamatic]

I would agree with @Flat 10 above, can't fault your ploughing or the following passes to get the seedbed level, but surely your undoing all your good work by using a 2wd drive tractor with such narrow tyres on to roll it in after? I know its a nice light tractor but its still sinking in a fair way, looks a bit rough if you were to travel across the direction of rolling in the future.

Its not too bad, but I do see your point.

We'll see later this year, as it's due for haymaking and/or silage...

 

[juke]

What was the point of that?

DD land becomes hard and lumpy whereas cultivated land becomes crumb like? I'd rather have fine crumbly seedbed than lumps that won't break down, dry out and don't cover the seed properly

I think a lot of people are throwing HP and heavy, multiple, or forced (PH) cultivation at seedbed prep is simply because not many people can plough like @Selectamatic. As someone said, using a 10inch plough a few inches deep will leave an almost-ready-to-drill finish

In brief that shows you how bad and lifeless your land is becoming and how much of it is going down the drain.
The DD soil in that test has become more porous and has the ability to store and filter water properly as nature intended , your ploughed and smacked about land has the ability to turn into a Barron wet mess that's flowing of your fields with all its nutrients .... That's fine all you chaps continue doing the same thing and whine on about not making money and yields not going up or stagnating beacuse that's the way yous have always done it .

 

[Fraserb]

In brief that shows you how bad and lifeless your land is becoming and how much of it is going down the drain.
The DD soil in that test has become more porous and has the ability to store and filter water properly as nature intended , your ploughed and smacked about land has the ability to turn into a Barron wet mess that's flowing of your fields with all its nutrients .... That's fine all you chaps continue doing the same thing and whine on about not making money and yields not going up or stagnating beacuse that's the way yous have always done it .

Thats a pretty broad statement to make, we plough and smack about our soil as you put it but I'm fairly confident we yield as well or better than any other system around about us. Also ours never turns into a barren wet mess no matter how much rains thrown at it, can't say ive ever saw it flowing out the gate or down a drain either.

 

[DrWazzock]

A Dutch Harrow, now there's an idea...

Im working on pups for the roller

Im struggling to get excited about cage wheels...

Won't a Dutch Harrow with fixed tines tend to bung up with turf going onto a ploughed out grass ley?

Get some duals or terras on and split your power harrowing wheelings so it's all firmed down evenly after the ploughing. (Do a full width run one way, but overlap half a breed going the other way, usually). Leave the power Harrow on and hitch the roller to the back of it. Use that combination to roll the field. Sow the grass seed then go over the whole lot with the power Harrow and roller again to work the grass seed in. Comes up nice a even here with a good level well consolidated seedbed. Doesn't usually cap with Cambridge roller.

We use a grass seed box as a separate pass but I am trying to incorporate it somewhere in the power Harrow roller combo to save a pass. Maybe fit to front of tractor.
Helps if the roller is same width as power Harrow and seed box and both cover the duals/terras obviously. Never go at right angles to previous runs or you will end up with a chess board.

 

[fermec860]

We used to follow the plough with power harrow but now go with cultipress 75 percent of the time sometimes you might as well go once with the power harrow rather than twice or three times with the culti press time is the best cultivator though

 

[Fraserb]

Won't a Dutch Harrow with fixed tines tend to bung up with turf going onto a ploughed out grass ley?

Get some duals or terras on and split your power harrowing wheelings so it's all firmed down evenly after the ploughing. (Do a full width run one way, but overlap half a breed going the other way, usually). Leave the power Harrow on and hitch the roller to the back of it. Use that combination to roll the field. Sow the grass seed then go over the whole lot with the power Harrow and roller again to work the grass seed in. Comes up nice a even here with a good level well consolidated seedbed. Doesn't usually cap with Cambridge roller.

We use a grass seed box as a separate pass but I am trying to incorporate it somewhere in the power Harrow roller combo to save a pass. Maybe fit to front of tractor.
Helps if the roller is same width as power Harrow and seed box and both cover the duals/terras obviously. Never go at right angles to previous runs or you will end up with a chess board.

We use a small air seeder to blow grass seed in about the harrows on the drill when undersowing and straight drilling grass, often thought about making a light frame up to drop drill off and mount the air seeder direct on the PH, trouble is we can be undersowing in the morning, drilling barley after lunch then onto straight grass the next day so would be a bit of a faff.

 

[Renaultman]

Thats a pretty broad statement to make, we plough and smack about our soil as you put it but I'm fairly confident we yield as well or better than any other system around about us. Also ours never turns into a barren wet mess no matter how much rains thrown at it, can't say ive ever saw it flowing out the gate or down a drain either.

I do think that this statement doesn't apply quite so much to our island as it does the vast prairies of the main continents and although I am a firm believer in your soil being your most valuable asset I don't think there is any 1 cap fits all system. As someone said earlier 'the best thing you can do is get out of the seat and take a look'

 

[DrWazzock]

Certainly on our heavy land it is sometimes better not to cultivate it as you bring up intractable clay and lose the natural crumb that is left in cereal or OSR stubbles. These will direct drill drill quite nicely sometimes.

We run in to problems with direct drilling if it's wet or if we have harvested roots or the livestock have poached the surface.

Different tools for different scenarios. Everything in moderation.

The crop hygiene aspect is sometimes a benefit with the plough and may become even more important as we lose chemicals such as neonics. I don't really want to leave too much virus infected beet trash laid about ready to infect the next crop by aphid vectors.

 

[dannewhouse]

Change your ploughman.. , if you want to see powerharrows ,get down onto sunk island ,they still powerharrow , see loads of them , if used right, nothing wrong with them , on light land just run it in 540 , putting a drill mate under drill this year for light stuff ,

interested to see how you go on.
I want to do the same and possibly push something upfront.
at moment plough Cambridge roll with duels combi drill then roll with duels.
used to plough roll 6m KKK with duels (maybe roll) KKK again then straight drill (on MF 165) then roll duels.
I'm faster now as lost 2 passes but kkk is a lot faster. thinking plough roll kkk or straight in with drill mate + drill + front.

I like rolls for levelling and consolidating our light land, 1 heavy field gets 2x power harrow every year.
big thing I noticed with kkk you need a light tractor and duels, the tines don't lift the soil you run on other wise, or you have to go deeper then takes more dragging so makes bigger mark etc. no argument kkk is better for land but combi is good for us to "get on" expecially when not absolutely perfect.

 

[juke]

Thats a pretty broad statement to make, we plough and smack about our soil as you put it but I'm fairly confident we yield as well or better than any other system around about us. Also ours never turns into a barren wet mess no matter how much rains thrown at it, can't say ive ever saw it flowing out the gate or down a drain either.

soon as a plough goes in the ground its starts becoming baron, soil gets lost with a strong wind, water etc that's just a fact. im not gonna start going on about all the other organism bacteria and invertabrae that you all kill with your ploughs... wasn't so long ago I used to think there was nothing wrong with ploughing, power harrowing, combi drilling or other recreational cultivations that was before I seen the light.