All done ploughing for 2014

Went back at it again today. 19F , and a bit of snow, but got
finished up. If I do any more ploughing in 2014 it will be snow
ploughing , we are suposed to get dumped on tonight. Bruce

Hi Bruce, nice job of plowing. Are you in Ontario? If you are planning for snow , it usually get's to our area in N.S. within a couple of day's. Cheers, Murray

Yes murray ,Ontario, just north east of Toronto. You are welcome to all the snow we can send you, , I still can't forget all the snow we had last winter.

Looks like its doin a nice job wish I could have finished got froze out before thanksgiving then it thawed in December but I had the tractor home

Ground has been a little stiff for that kind of stuff around here, either that or too darn muddy!

Looks good, glad you got it done!! After some posts the other day, I was afraid that Kubota would never pull a plow again!! Good for you, if I had the Cash, I'd have one too!

your making me jealous. I've only been able to make 6 rounds this year. This has been the wettest fall here for a few years.

Bruce
Did your Kubota make it through the plowing without needing an engine or transmission overhaul??? :wink:

I really like my Kubota M7040 and a lot of my neighbors must like their Orange tractors too.

Well you pulled one on the naysayers this time, did,n show that nice KUBOTA. Glad you got it done looks good. Have a great new year and enjoy that Kubota.

Not to sound dumb but what are the right conditions to plow frozen ground? I farm a little on the side and am a somewhat younger guy that was born after the days of commonly plowing and I usually chisel under ideal conditions if doing deep tillage. That being said I'm putting some grown up/CRP ground as well as some former hay fields into row crop and I didn't get a chance to work it this Fall with the wet weather. If I could do it this Winter then that'd be a huge relief. How deep of a freeze? It seems like if it was more than a 3 or 4 inches I couldn't get through but if it was just enough to get across then I'd be plowing a bunch of mud below the surface.

Hi Trevor, I don't know what CRP ground is , but
guessing it is some kind of "land set a side"
deal the tree huggers promoted. Ploughing in the
winter depends on many variables. Like was there
snow before cold temps came? Snow will keep the
ground under the snow from freezing down very
far. Was the field driven on when wet/and before
frost. Compacted wet ground seems to freeze hard
like cement.
When I plough out a old hay stand ,I like to rip
the field ,first one way, and then back the other
with my old Graham chisel plough. It is really
not much more than a heavy cultivator. This cuts
the old sod, and when you pull the plough through
,you don't have any trouble with big sod chunks
flipping back over, and the field will take very
little work to get a nice top for planting.
So you could try to chisel a little to get an
idea of the depth of the frost. The corn ground I
worked over in the pictures yesterday had 1"-2"
of frozen dirt. Last Sunday, no frost, and just a
greasy, muddy mess. I had to wait for some cold
to freeze dry the mud so I could travel on top,
and not just slip and spin mud all over. Corn
stalks run through the plough better when dry or
frozen too. But the head lands had much more
frozen dirt, and the plough wanted to ride up out
of the ground where the wagons had packed the
ends of the rows.
You shouldn't have these kind of problems with a
hay field, if you can get the plough to go in the
ground, you should be good to go. All you can do
is try. Bruce