Antique hay rake

[John T]

I actually owned a few of those (antique farm yard art) and tried it for what you said DIDNT WORK WELL left a lot behind grrrrrrrrrrrr

John T

 

[SkipperII]

Cleaning up my windbreak etc and have tons of little sticks and branches to pick up. Would one of these old hay rakes work to gather them in a pile? View attachment 5975

As others have said, a landscape rake would work far better. We had a bad windstorm go through a campground where i worked. It left a real mess. We went in with an excavator, and a backhoe to clean up the large stuff, but smaller branches and twigs were like a carpet. We bought a landscape rake from Northern Freight and put it on a small New Holland, and it worked great. We would rake up the debris into piles, and use the backhoe bucket and thumb to pick it, and load it onto a dump truck.

 

[herald h ia]

Cleaning up my windbreak etc and have tons of little sticks and branches to pick up. Would one of these old hay rakes work to gather them in a pile? View attachment 5975

 

[herald h ia]

a 3 point pto side delivery works pretty good, going slow.

 

[Brian G. NY]

I have both a dump rake and a "York" rake and have never thought of using either for that purpose.
Just for the fun of it, I think I'll try both when the snow goes and the ground dries up.
My lawns are very uneven so the dump rake will probably follow the contours better.
On the other hand, the "York"rake, over time, might level out some of the unevenness.
I have many Sugar maples on my lawns and they shed a lot every winter!
At 82, I guess I could use a little less bending over or........maybe it's good therapy?
My dump rake has been relegated to "lawn art" for years.

 

[1948CaseVAI]

Cleaning up my windbreak etc and have tons of little sticks and branches to pick up. Would one of these old hay rakes work to gather them in a pile? View attachment 5975

Those old dump rakes are very common yard art items in the rural parts of my area. Couple hundred bucks is not bad for good sized yard art which is the worst result if you buy it and it doen's pick up your sticks. Just park it and look at it then, and be prepared to move it back and forth when you mow! FWIW a decent lawn tractor or mower will easily pull it with a light chain - no large tractor required.

 

[Russ from MN]

Called a dump rake in my area, they were sitting all over. I never saw one used, but I imagine they raked the hay int a windrow, then used a hay loader to put it on a wagon. I cut one up when I was young and used the steel to build a trailer.

 

[Brown David]

Called a dump rake in my area, they were sitting all over. I never saw one used, but I imagine they raked the hay int a windrow, then used a hay loader to put it on a wagon. I cut one up when I was young and used the steel to build a trailer.

That's exactly how they were used.

 

[Brian G. NY]

We also used to use it to rerake the field after baling and bale anything missed by the side rake.

 

[MARK ROBKE]

Cleaning up my windbreak etc and have tons of little sticks and branches to pick up. Would one of these old hay rakes work to gather them in a pile? View attachment 5975

I am going against the landscape rake guys because I tried it in my hayfields. The experiment mostly was a mess. The grass in the hayfields was short but mostly bunched up in pile and the landscape rake did not gather as many of the sicks as I had hoped it would. If I only would have went a short distance it may have worked better, but I had to go several hundred feet. Luckily, I only borrowed the rake. Mark.

 

[Ohio88]

I used a Yorkrake when clearing. It did not get everything but it DI get about 60+% of what was there. It sure saved on the back when pickup time came.

 

[BarryfromIA]

A three point drag works pretty. well for clean in a yard.

 

[Caryc]

I have a County Line landscape rake I purchased at TSC and am happy with it. I also purchased the wheel kit that put the wheels in back of the tines. It works very well for smoothing out a big football size field after I've gone over it with a scraper blade to kill all emerging weeds. It leaves all kind of dirt ridges on each side of the blade. The landscape rake smooths it all out nicely.

 

[Hayfarmer]

Cleaning up my windbreak etc and have tons of little sticks and branches to pick up. Would one of these old hay rakes work to gather them in a pile? View attachment 5975

I had the same issue you do. I bought a landscape rake from a farm store and that works pretty good if you go different directions on it. I think the dump rake would leave a lot of branches

 

[rustred]

why not just rent a root rake or rock rake. it will put them in windrows . them dump rakes the teeth are not strong enough and they will hope over anything heavy. they are for windrowing mower cut hay with horses. i watched my dad use the horse mower and that rake.

 

[BarnyardEngineering]

I might, except I don't have one. Neighbor is selling one for $225 and not sure I want to experiment with that much money. Although I could use it as yard decoration. Ironically, I spent the 70's cutting up all of Grandpa's junk machinery, now people want that stuff to display. He had one of these rakes too.
Maybe a landscape rake from the farm store would work. I just know my back can't bend over enough times to pick that stuff up.

For $25, I'd experiment. Not for $225. There's a reason it's still for sale.