Can I harrow my own feilds?

[Limbo1]

Unfortunately the chap who was going to harrow and roll my fields died. Everyone else is pretty booked up now. Wondering if I buy a chain harrow on ebay or similar if I can do it with my Car (landrover freelander). Rolling is less essential as a pretty flat field and dry so has not been poached etc.

Will this do the job?

 

[JillA]

Why not? I always used to use my 4x4s to do mine, I got a 4ft harrow and TBH it isn't big or heavy enough. Spreads to poo though. And I have a small water filled roller, again not really heavy enough but rolling is as much about bruising the grass to encourage it to spread as levelling the ground.

I say "used to" because they were elderly, I now have a nearly new car so I invested in a quad to take it's place and get filthy!!

 

[cundlegreen]

I think it will cost you quite a bit to buy the sort of harrows that you want. Second hand ones are rare. A farm sale might have something. I use my 4x4 to harrow, but have to put a pallet on top to keep the harrows from flipping up.

 

[Tiddlypom]

Indeed you can . Pictured are a 6ft set of Logic chain harrows, which I sold recently on eBay. They sold for £212. I bought them new about 15 years ago for £300.

I towed them for years behind a sorned Montego estate, so a Freelander would be well up to the job.

I've upgraded to a set of grass harrows, which I tow behind a Shogun. They do a better job than the chain harrows, but are more costly.

http://www.arenamate.co.uk/grassharrow.html

 

[MissTyc]

I use chain harrows on 40 acres and it does the job and def helps the land!

 

[Limbo1]

Thanks all for replys, classified here I come if I can't get a `man' in. Have one possible lead.

 

[Gift Horse]

I borrow a set of harrows from a friend and drag them behind a 4x4 pickup. I only use them once a year in spring so don't feel I need my own harrows.

 

[Dry Rot]

You can make do with mocked up machinery for lots of jobs. If I didn't have a set of chain harrows, I'd link several railway sleepers together with rope and drag them around. I already have one railway sleeper attached to the trailing edge of my chain harrows and it makes a great job of smashing up the clods and flattening the mole hills. I could do with a couple more.

I mentioned to a neighbour that I was using a length of old chain link fencing to harrow in my grass seed. He started to laugh until an old boy chipped in saying a hawthorn bush is what they used to use when he was a boy!

If it works, don't knock it. If it free or cheap, better still.

(For the sleepers, the best way to fasten them together is to drill a hole and thread a rope through, then drag the sleeper sideways, i.e. broadside on).

 

[case895]

Towed unmounted chain harrows are a waste of time. At best they tickle the top, at worst they do nothing. A mounted chain harrow on a tractor is better. A mounted spring tine harrow on a tractor is best as it really gets in there and breaks the top soil.