Spike Tooth Harrow Questions

[Newgenerationdeere]

Around me they basically went out in the horse days. Tractors went to field or chisel plows, disk harrow too.

None of those are a replacement for a harrow

 

[Newgenerationdeere]

Anyone have or ever use a drag spike tooth harrow? The one in the pic is from the internet and appears to be green and maybe John Deere?

What was the typical use for these things and were they effective at smoothing out the soil?

Thinking about buying one and using it after disking to smooth out the seed bed.

Any sage info/advice is appreciated!

We still use them .

 

[rustred]

Definitely use harrows. Got the versatile model from the 70’s about 45 ft. Always Harrow after seeding. Then got to be prepared to pick rocks.

 

[dixon boy RL]

i still use i what was called feurst harrow,real flexibled floating harrow, pull it behind soil finisher and use it to cover new broadcast seeding. but they are not near the fad that they were. too call vertical tillage seems to be the fad now,personally not fan of them. they really fill the fencrows and ditchs with last years residue.

 

[paul]

Disk blades pack clay based soils over time - plow pan results. When my neighborhood discovered reasonably good field cultivators in the late 60s, disks were parked in the fence rows and only used when needed. Anything with a shank, from ripper to chisel to field cultivator to harrow does a better job of working our wet clay soils than a disk or vertical tillage.

The one exception was 2012, when the clay baked so hard and dry couldn’t get a plow into the ground. Then the really big Whishik disks got popular for a year, they could slice through the hard clay that a plow skidded on and a chisel plow busted apart on.

Paul

 

[Texasmark]

On plow pan, surely chisel plows/cultivators with sweeps that give 100% ground coverage horizontally, surely would be instigators of plow pan problems......why wouldn't they?

 

[paul]

If you till ground in some conditions you will make some sort of plow pan with about anything I guess.

Here we get frost to 4+ feet deep some years. We typically have mud that deep a good part of spring. So plow pan comes and goes.

A shank machine will lift up and break up any plowpan it gets under.

A bladed machine tends to sink in to the current plow pan and stop there, packing it even harder.

In very general terms. Any one year, any one time of certain moisture conditions can be all different.

But, generally, average, a machine with shanks will lift and dry the ground and May break up any plowpan it can get under. A bladed machine on average will pack and compress the ground where it meets resistance.

Paul

 

[cleddy]

Anyone have or ever use a drag spike tooth harrow? The one in the pic is from the internet and appears to be green and maybe John Deere?

What was the typical use for these things and were they effective at smoothing out the soil?

Thinking about buying one and using it after disking to smooth out the seed bed.

Any sage info/advice is appreciated!

I can see by the responses the spike tooth Harrow is all but a useless implement from the past??? In my young days back in the 70's we pulled a 4 - section harrow over the freshly Disked land several times until it was perfectly smooth and even as a kid I was proud how nice things looked. I remember my Dad saying the disk caused the lost of Moisture but he seem to like the Harrow. As time went on and I moved on from the farm Dad switched to chisel plows & field cultivators came in with No-Till planting and the wore out Drag Harrow's ended up in the junk piles. As I cleaned up the Farm recently in my older age and with fond Memories of Harrows have accumulated 3-4 of them plus saved all the broken parts- Thought when there is time I would restore them to good condition and scrap the broken stuff. I can gather my time should be spent on a better goal??? I do have a single section I drag around behind the 4-Wheeler when replanting lawn grass. (Note) Pictures are for visual interest. I have some land I rent out but not enough lawn or garden area to use this 4 section mounted Harrow!!!!

 

[paul]

I’d think a 3pt like that would be popular with the food plot crowd! Don’t ever see many 3pt models.

Harrow sections are always popular at auctions, a section or two for dragging the driveway or small seeded areas.

Actual farming so many of us went to having the harrow in the back of the field cultivator, that we don’t use an independent harrow so much any more. But glad I have a 6 section around, use it on a few acres every year.

Paul