welcome back to the rest of the story here's an implement you guys haven't
seen in a while and I've had a couple questions about it lately if it was
still around yes it is still here it is our harrow so we've had this for I think
this is the third year we've had it now it runs a lot better than those old four
section harrows we used to run those well, the last one we had was a lot of Lindsay
but it was those old four section bar tooth harrows that really didn't really
realize they were kind of well they didn't work as well as this thing this
is a drag chain type those Harrow section ones, most four section harrows
they didn't move enough dirt as far as being able to smooth the ground down
this tool you guys will see it here really quick that it works it does a lot
better job smoothing the soil off it doesn't take, well, and it is actually
easier to fold out then the old harrow sections were especially when you
have hydraulics here to help you it's a relatively simple design I mean
basically you fold it out and you drag it across the ground but with that
cylinder on it I think you guys are gonna I'm pretty sure I have it on
camera where you can raise the chain up enough or you can go between strips or
move around throughout the field and not drag the chains but you do have to be a
little bit careful with it I mean it's, we did a little bit of welding to it on
the back left tire if you're looking to the left of the screen there you can see
that one bar is kind of black it was full of water when we got it, it was
already cracked but what we found out was it was full of water
and it sat out in the cold well even throughout the winter and the water
froze expanded and it kind of it tore out the welds or sheared the the metal
open on it that's all we did is just heated it back up and did a nice little weld down
through it and it works, works out really well but there's a trick to folding this
thing out simply put when you're going to fold it out because you gotta get out
and manually do it I've got the back end of the Harrow tilted downhill because of
wings on the front here towards the tires they got to fold fold backwards
helps it helps you unfold it a lot easier and it's how it works the same
way when you're folding it back up - I don't have folding it up on camera I
didn't I'm aware of that but all you gotta do is there's some cables there
that keep the help support the arms when you're dragging it through the field and
you pull a pin on each side and so what I'm doing right now I don't know if you
guys are wondering why I'm walking out with the shop rag in my back pocket I went
through and I had to panic change the engine oil in the 4020 and the 7600
this morning before I could before we could plant oats today so I guess I
actually ran around with that in my back pocket all day I completely forgot about
it I didn't take too long to change the oil I mean you do it enough times and
it's pretty straight forward but about the part that takes the most
time mm-hmm excuse me about the part that takes the most time is the draining
of the oil and putting the oil back in changing the filters is like a non-event
but you don't see too many these harrows around I have never seen a
harrow like this with the chains in this area before this is the first one and we
drove out into Iowa and bought it this was a Craigslist purchase it was
purely by chance that we found it because the guy listed it six o'clock
one night and I saw it like right after he listed it and by nine o'clock the
next morning we were pulling it home we went through and put new bearings in
all the wheels because this machine, this implement really all the seals were
cracked out of the backs all the bearings were kind of dried out so we
went through and re-packed them, new seals and it works great the only
thing I have to do is pump the tires up from sitting all winter I'm still kind
of in the middle of the road if I want to drag this across the soybean ground
I don't know if dad's planning on it I was planning on doing all my soybeans
dragging across them once and just smoothing off any ridges that we may
potentially make I'm gonna wait and see how much residue that is left on top of
the soil from the VT because corn residue and bean stubble and you're
gonna see it I'll be going across bean stubble here it works down great the
only problem is if you get in too much residue like this manure the strip right
here is spread with manure you get through corn stalks with a lot of
residue what happens is if you hit it the first time it's not a problem it
smooths it off the problem is if you go back through and hit it again and the
residue doesn't flow through the chain which it really shouldn't because there
are there's hooks down towards the ground that's to agitate the soil it
fills full of corn and then the problem is that then the stalks kind of roll
up and you get clumps of corn stalks out the back of the Harrow if I would
have chiseled my corn stalks and then vt them next, chiseled my stalks in
the fall and then VT them in the spring it wouldn't have been an issue I
I know the stalks would have been buried and would have deteriorated a lot
quicker than what they are now it's not that they aren't deteriorating I mean I
know we could hit it with the VT we'll throw more dirt a little bit more dirt
overtop of what's there yet and I could plant onto the top of that and that may
very well be what we just end up doing another huh, to be quite honest guys in
three weeks we could be putting corn, beans in the ground it's well within the
realm of possibility so that's you know that's kind of why we're getting kind of
a kind of excited around here we're trying to get everything everything done
that you want done before planting before planting gets here like that
that we cut down the other day this is the field road and you can see on the
far left of the screen this is where we drive along the end of the strip's Ryan
went through and tore them all up the reason he did that is because we wanted
to seed it down and get it all smoothed out again there was nothing wrong in
doing this it's making sure we have enough of a road to drive up and down
when we're going through picking up hay and making hay throughout the summer
that right there is a perfect example of another fence row that has been
reclaimed by the wilderness that is pretty, it's not terrible but it's it's
not exactly the cleanest either I mean the fence is getting pretty bad
anybody that isn't aware or hasn't been around fences throughout their lives
they know that a fence that is full of trees like that is kind of a nightmare
for the simple fact that when the trees get to be that old and they start to die
out and rot out what happens is is that they fall over onto the fence and you're
left with having to go through and cut trees off the fence and patch fence and
over a certain amount of years that just makes your fences just, wrecks them it really
does then to the to the point where I mean the stumps are even if you cut the
trees off the stumps are still there as far as trying to go put in a new fence
you're pretty much left with I got to go through and hit it with the bulldozer to
clean everything back out we used to keep the fence rows cleaner but for the
amount of at the time when we were running over all the farms we were Plus
all the cattle we were milking and I can't remember an exact number we had dairy
operations on at least three of the main farms on three of the farms we were
milking I think over well over 400 head of cattle and you know when you're doing
dairy like that some of the minor jobs like going
through and cutting or spraying saplings and trees out of fence rows gets kind of
pushed to the back of the list of things to do now this is the outside round Ryan
did overlap out of the strip that's why that outside edge looks so rough is
he was digging up the sod he was trying to smooth everything out he did a good
job of it I hit it with a Harrow like six times really trying to bust up those
sod clumps because the sod, sod just the roots do not like to bust up and
it's kind of a pain but if you look on the right side of the video you can see
that we're out in the field and it's doing a nice job smoothing the soil off
it'll make a nice smooth even seed bed for for the oats to come up and more
importantly it will help with cutting the hay because cutting hay on rough
fields makes for a very long day I've done it and the smoother the field the
faster you can go I mean you're not trying to go mach chicken when you're
cutting hay I mean sometimes you do I mean I've gone up to ten miles an hour
before but I have around here at least on these strips seven to eight miles an
hour is gonna be pretty standard this is the lowest strip on the farm this is on
this piece right here where we're driving through right right now is the
steepest part of Ryan's place it doesn't seem that bad but if you look at the
tire tracks of the harrow it is being pulled down hill compared to the, yeah,
right there it's really bad we're compared to the tractor tires
Ryan's place is probably the second, like, Rockville the Home Farm is probably the
not the lightest what's best way to say that most gently rolling there really isn't
any for any steep ground at the home farm at all then you have Ryan's place
and then my place is the worst between the three home farms I mean yeah
we do have that satellite farm but that is steep in its own respect to if you
get on the lower end of it you can see on the far left before I end this video
you can see the corn stalks the residue are catching in the chains compared to
the right side where we're down on the bean strip a little bit better and this
view is giving a good look at all the water ways Ryan tore up is the
waterways and everything got torn up we don't do that during corn and beans
obviously but when you're going through and seeding grass and alfalfa down it
makes sense to go through and tear everything up and seed it down and get
everything smoothed out properly again that was a full round within the field
guys and I'm heading back up to where I started but that's all I have for this
video I don't know if we're gonna be do any more harrowing videos I'm sure Ryan
has some drone footage because I almost took the drone out a couple times while
I was working but that's all I have for this video
that camera mount that I have that was custom made specifically for my GoPro
from my sponsor was pulling in, putting in double time yesterday cuz it was on
basically everything and it worked out really well it didn't, I mean that's what I
got the camera on right now and it works out really nice
so that was a really really big help from my sponsor but that's all I got for this
video guys hope you appreciate it and hope you enjoy it I'll talk to you guys
tomorrow so until next time Take care Take it easy Keep in touch
you