learning to moldboard plow

after about 2 hours and a half acre I think i got it figured out. here is a picture after a few furrows

many thanks to all on here who have previously posted on plowing I got the ford plow book i used to set up my plow of an old thread here

the plow is a Ford with 2-14"'s being pulled by a JD 2010 gas

-Paul

Can't see the whole plow, but the ground looks plenty wet. Since you're turning over an old sod it's not going to break up like stubble ground.

it was very wet and hard going i got about an acre plowed like that hopefully is will dry out this week and i can go back and disk it


-paul

"Plowman's Folly": A book published over 60 years ago. Available through the Australian press. Read it and you'll never plow again.

Read the book, it has merit. But he wasn't dealing with compacted soils that need to be brought back into production. Moldboard plowing has it's place.

Zeb, looks like your left bottom is shallower than your right. Gotta level it out.

Our fields are only plowed once every 20 years so so, as little as possible really as its expensive, but you can't level unplowed fields and remove rock with a disc harrow.

There are a lot better ways to deal with compaction than moldboard plowing.

In my very meager farming experience, there is no tool or implement that is always the right choice, or one that is always the wrong one.

I don't know how you remove rock with a moldboard plow. I do remove a lot of fieldstones up to about 24" in diameter with a Brillion subsoiler and then just roll them into the loader. Follow with a field cultivator for leveling. Usually pull something behind the FC. A "chisel plow" will also pull up rock and leave them on the surface for removal. That seems better to me than moldboarding. "No one has ever advanced a scientific reason for moldboard plowing."

Very well stated which is probably why my shed is so full. No moldboard plow anywhere around, though.

I only mention the disc because thats what his book talks about using to replace the plow.

How do you pull a field cultivator in established sod, even ripped sod?

In established sod, such as the field that FarmerZeb is plowing, I would have taken the vegetation down with herbicide, (like Roundup, or, if it's all broadleaf, 2,4-D) disced it and planted soybeans. I do this with either a Great Plains no-til drill or, if I decide it would be better to apply liquid fertilizer, with a JD conservation planter. Deeper tillage will be automatic as the roots of the previous crop decompose. Subsequent tillage following the harvest of the soybean crop will be with a deep conservation ripper with no-til shanks and points and left until spring at which time the field cultivator will be utilzed just before planting corn with just one pass. In answer to your question as to how to pull a field cultivator in established sod, I haven't tried it but I do remember breaking up sod with an 8' JD quack digger many years ago. The trick is to use narrow sharp points and to just "hen scratch it" the first time or two and then go deeper. The field cultivators now days have ample trash clearance and with sharp narrow points, it would probably be very do able. But, with such tools as roundup and no-til planters and drills there is no need to do that. Also, with the many tillage choices available to the farmer today it blows my mind to see anyone moldboard plowing anymore. Many of the Amish farms I drive by don't even employ it. They just hire their neighbors with tractors and chisel plows.
Getting back to Farmer Zeb's field, he has taken what appears to be a nice smooth field and made a total mess of it. Discing, several times, with a cultipacker behind, might get it back into some semblence of order but think of the time, fuel, wear and tear, etc. You'll never convince me that moldboard plowing has any place on a modern farm. OK as a demonstration, like threshing, or chopping wood, or hand pumping water, or lighting lanterns or hand milking or using horses, etc.

So your avoidance of plowing depends almost entirely on herbicide? Not to mention the fact that there are many crops other than corn and soybeans in which plowing plays a big part. Rototillers have nearly repaced the plow in small veggie production, and now folks are figuring out that they have big disadvantages and plowing is starting to look good again when you need clean dirt with little residue on top.

Read "Plowman's Folly". It is as relevant today as the day it was written only today we have better tools to apply the principles it outlines. "No one has ever advanced a scientific reason for moldboard plowing".

(quoted from post at 07:30:13 05/08/12) Zeb, looks like your left bottom is shallower than your right. Gotta level it out.

Click to expand...

in this picture it was most definitely NOT level or pulling centered behind the tractor I made some more adjustments but I am still having problems with the forward bottom cutting in to deep causing the rear tractor wheels to spin.

thanks ,

-Paul

For Bill,

I have read Faulkner's work and understand it....However there have been many other books written in the last 69 years that make the case for plowing being disc, chisel or moldboard as a means of tillage. I understand all those too.

but that leads me to the reality of working with what I have which is 50 year conventional till equipment. Add to that the fact I have not decided on weather or not to certify this particular field organic lead me to moldboard this field and leave the sprayer in the shed.

and then there is the learning aspect for some one who did not grow up farming to actually see how different equipment works the ground