cedar trees and small locusts in crop ground

[tomNE]

need idea's on a mechanical way to remove them.
right now i clip and spray them. it's back breaking work. wondered about a 3point peice of equipment that would do it without digging a big hole. the cedars won't regrow if cut off at ground level or below. i understand i'll need to spray the locusts. any ideas are welcome.....i've even thought of something that would mount on the front of a 4 wheeler. the 3point piece would be nice if it faced forward so u could just straddle the tree and lower the implement!
 

[504]

Bush Hog, if I can drive over it, I will mow it.
 

[JDseller]

There are commercial tree shears/knifes that would do what you want to do. Some of them shear the trees off. Then others are just like a flat serrated knife that you push beside the tree and it cut them off at or below ground level. I attached a picture of them both. The flat knife type I could not find a picture of the one I have seen. This one gives you an idea of how they work.


 

[da.bees]

You are correct that cedar will not regrow enough to be a problem. The locust will resprout from roots with a vengance. 2-4-D does a good job on the resprout locust. Both stumps will cure and be in place years later equvilent to rebar if run over by tires. Only good news is the locust has fixed nitrogen in the soil that will remain a long while.
 

[2x4]

box blade with ripper teeth
 

[tomNE]

keep the ideas coming.....so far nothing that strikes my fancy!!!
 

[charlie n]

I saw this advertised in Progressive Farmer.

http://www.drpower.com/prdsell.aspx?Name=treechopper
 

[JerryD]

If the cedars aren't too big you can use a weedeater with a small circular saw blade attached. Just make sure you know where that blade is at all times.
 

[Bradracer18]

We have a tree shear that mounts to our skid loader. It just pinches off the tree, but was also can replace the shear blades with little grabber spikes which we use for pulling fence posts. Anyways, once you shear the tree, we have a automotive windshield washer pump system that sprays tordon onto the stump, and it shouldn't be a problem after that.
 

[Dean]

Yesterday I removed 5 or 6 locust stumps from a plot that I intend to plow for the first time in nearly 100 years. (The plot has been farmed in the past.)

The trees were cut nearly 40 years ago and I cut the stumps flush with the ground about 25 years ago so that I could mover over them with a rotary cutter withoug hitting anything.

After 40 years I had hoped that the stump remnants would plow out but since the neighbor was here with his new CAT skid steer for another job I asked him to pop them out.

The wood below ground level was in surprisingly good condition and hard as a rock. There is no way that they would have plowed out.

All of the other stumps, e.g., elm, maple, box elder, etc., had long since vanished.

Dean
 

[bookemdano21]

how did you mount your windshield washer sprayer?
 

[Dusty MI]

There was an old story, locust make good fence post, they will last 100 years, I know I once built a fence using them.

Dusty
 

[old]

I was always told cedar tress and locust tress are a sign of poor soil conditions. If small brush hog or sickle bar mower. Of course a lot depends on what crops your putting in and what you do as for soil preparations.
 

[tomNE]

there is no soil prep. it's been no till for 20+ yrs. this ground surrounds the timber/waste ground on my farm. maybe i need to spend my time potty training the birds, not to leave the timber without doing there duty first!
 

[Kirk Affeldt]

I was watching Succesful Farming TV show and on their All Around the Farm episode, a guy in Minnesota made a hydraulic tree remover for his tractor. It seemed very simple to make and he didn't use much money to make it. He used it to pull cedar trees on his property. He didn't want to leave a big hole and his remover didn't. It just pulled them right out of the ground. You may want to check it out on their website.