Field Cultivating Failures!

[@kdaniel59]

I am a 5th generation farmer in NW Iowa. I just started full time farming last July so take my advice for what it's worth. I have been doing most of the tillage since I learned how to run a tractor. We do all of our tilling in the spring. We have always used a mulch finisher and we love it, it does a really good job for us. If you are interested, we just updated ours with a bigger one this year. We currently have our last one listed for sale. It's a John deere 726, 24 foot wide, new hydraulic lines 2 weeks ago and was ready to go to work. I would love to help you out if you are interested in buying one. If you read this and have any interest please reach out to me and I'll get you my contact information. Anyone else who sees this and knows Grant personally let him know. Thank you and keep up the good work, I absolutely love your videos!

[@granthilbert5632]

Thanks! Not sure if I'll be looking for a Mulch Finisher yet. I may look for an old disk, and keep FC, or look for a good used VT Tool. It helps that I have a lot of neighbors who rent out some of their implements. It works really good that way!

[@kdaniel59]

@@granthilbert5632 sounds like you have a plan! I just started tilling today, going good so far! Should be planting corn this week. I'm excited to see how your field work progresses 👍

[@smittycreations5475]

@@kdaniel59 those mulch finishers are amazing we have a 30 ft jd 726 we farm about 2000 acres in northwest ohio and it gets the job done very well

[@trevoryerges6103]

One thing we do for whenever we do corn on corn is sell the stalks off the field. So basically after we combine someone pays us and they come in and chop stalks bale them and take the bales then you have very little left of the stalks. Just an idea for you.

[@farmertim3937]

Don't have to get fancy. Just run threw it with an old school disk for this year.

[@xBrodeurguyx]

For the algorithm. Likes, comments, shares, and subscriptions help your content creators more than you realize. Keep it up Grant!

[@aTrippyFarmer]

You might consider getting some chopping rolls for your corn head. That would downsize the corn residue quite a bit, and it would be fun to watch you take on and put off snap-n-rolls 🤣🤣

[@granthilbert5632]

I'll check them out! Sounds like the install might be a pain the *ss :)

[@iowafarmhandanf2266]

I think you made the right call. Running the VT will do wonders. Keep up the good work.

[@ToowokeforFlorida]

I’m glad I watched it to the end because your plan is exactly what I was going to suggest! Farmers really like helping each other.

[@brettk5762]

In west texas we call those “witching” rods. That’s how we find streams underground for our irrigation wells.

[@dylanlavey6231]

I am a farmer from Wisconsin, we do most tillage in the fall with a moldboard plow we have been doing it all my life and for us it works good with getting rid of the corn residue.

[@joey6070]

our neighbor has an 7.5 inch spaced international disk and he goes over the field in the fall then again in the spring and then plants and it leaves the field nice and smooth

[@haydenmyskiw5841]

Hey Grant we run a old 1600 cultivator on are corn ground up in Manitoba with lots of stocks and it works best to cultivate on a 45 degree angle to the rows so you’ll be cultivating on an angle, it buried trash way better and we try to run the cultivator as deep from 4-6 inches

[@austinkrohn2179]

Thanks for planting Becks that what our family sells and plants

[@johndanielhoho1248]

Love the videos. Take me back to my farming childhood. Tell me though how do you manage to stay clean and always so presentable? I always ended the day with more grease on me than the equipment! I wish you both the best of success.

[@farminstoltzfus]

2 ways to weld on a diesel tank. The way you did it and absolutely full of fuel. I've done the later after the bolts that hold the seat suspension rusted/broke off on our Allis Chalmers 200. Vented the fuel tank and went at it. Fumes are flammable and absolutely wouldn't try that on a gas tank, but they say diesel will help keep the steel cool.

[@tomburlingham1212]

Life is so much better after being flung off the merry-go-round of tillage. It's not a yield enhancing event. Plenty of room in the no-till playground...add covers and life gets even better. Good luck Grant, I enjoy your content. We failed at tillage too....no yield gain here.

[@DefinitelyNWYT]

Loving catching your videos, reminds me of learning when I was a teen on the farm. Advice I have for you: 1) Never put your hands/fingers on the bolt heads of worn points when zipping them off. They become sharp as razor blades with enough wear. I had one spin and cut me through leather gloves before I learned. Use some leverage from the front of the point if needed to keep from spinning. John Deere offers a quick change system that is honestly worth it. 2) You need to grind your metal bare of rust/paint to penetrate the weld. What you have will break and likely to still break with a good weld. 3) You touched on each one of these as I was typing. Fall tillage pass with a VT etc will incorporate that trash better for the spring and they'll decay easier. (Great plan now too!) You look to be piling in front of your drag harrow. There should be a tension adjustment, probably chain length on that model. (You found it!) It should really just tickle and level. The cultivator depth looks deep in my experience. That'll pull more root ball up. Depth changes by soil types. Maybe chat with some local guys about depth tips. Definitely work it on a slight angle. 45 is more severe than we do, we prefer a 15-30 ish. Straight enough to be efficient but offset enough to distribute trash and work. 4) Can't wait to see your planting!

[@samuel6234]

Grant I recommend a McFarlane reel disc, we run one on our no-till farm in Tennessee and it works wonders, it chops the stalks into bits and pieces and still spreads them out without burying them, I sirously recommend looking at a 25ft, they pull hard so wouldn’t go too big

[@zaak243]

Rolling basket for sure on corn residue. I enjoy your channel.

[@LoefflerFarms]

Corn stalks and field cultivators don't mix well hardly ever, we always hit ours with the landoll disc and then sometimes you can use a field cultivator but better just hitting it again with the disc

[@Maverick-16]

Hello from France. Always a pleasure to see your videos 👍

[@Collinsfarmingarchive]

This is my first year around them, but all 3 planters have them and I’m very impressed! Can definitely tell a difference when planting corn then dropping the bean rows with the ordinary rubber wheels on the corn planters to plant beans

[@BandyFarms]

A lot of guys here in Kentucky run a disc over the stalks in the fall. Then vertical till with a rolling harrow running tandem in the spring. Seems to work pretty well at getting the trash under control. If they are strictly no-till they will just run a rolling harrow or Diamond harrow across the stalks then plant into it.

[@hfff1]

Well Grant, that was some entertaining, but what a cluster f___! I could not have done any better. Thanks for sharing your triumphs and tribulations.

[@davidlehman1909]

Love your enthusiasm

[@travelocity1477]

You should get a heavy disc. It'll chop up the stalks and also bury some of the trash. Its an extra pass, but in my experience, the soil responds pretty good to it

[@Call-Me-Ottwa]

I highly recommend Calmer Corn Rolls on your corn header. My dad's been doing corn on corn with deep ripping and mulch finishers for about 20 years and Calmer rolls have really helped take care of the leftover trash.

[@granthilbert5632]

Will check them out. A lot of people have recommended them!

[@Call-Me-Ottwa]

@@granthilbert5632 They seem to work excellently especially in heavy soils with that tillage combo like we have in Illinois.

[@samuelandersson9775]

As you said, it's probably a good idea in the next fall to run a vertical till to chop the stalks and then run the disc ripper to bury the stalks.

[@DocPortland]

Grant, something you may consider… Spend the $2000 to get a new fuel tank. Your tank might be structurally sound currently. However, it will be a nuisance and time consuming, and it will nickel and dime you. Also, it is better to have those up in the air, so gravity can help drain the tank fully, and you draw from the fuel at the bottom first. What happens with styles like you have, the fuel never fully drains and old fuel keeps mixing with new fuel. Just something we learned on our farm… just some food for thought. Fun vid…

[@Lithium104]

We call them witch sticks in Ontario Canada , basically water has an electric current so the sticks always follow the path of the water .We use them to find watermain when we are doing street work locating utilities . You can just use two bent coat hangers too haha . Works great if you know what you are doing .

[@davidd2613]

Get an old glencoe soil saver. We called them a disc chisel. They work great. We have had one forever and still use it on headlands periodically.

[@fazeobama8872]

grant with this much residue u may wanna look into an actual cutter disc implement vaederstadt has one that looks like a cultivator disc but it also chops up the residue real nice for when the soil animals maybe dont do it enough

[@grant1221]

what we do for corn is run the vt landoll over the corn residues or a try tandem and then for beans you can usually get away with just going over it with the feild cultivator

[@johnperry5102]

you two are learnig as you go, and your doing a really good job of it

[@coreywilson6853]

to get rid of a lot of the residue it helps to brush hog your feilds that will be corn on corn then rip it then cultivate it. It seems to help us a good bit on our farm

[@King_Randy]

I’m so glad field work is finally started!

[@walterlaubscherjr2011]

Nice video I’d say for future tillage I’d invest in a Vertical Tillage tool hope all goes well this spring

[@AndrewDuff2188]

Should look at the Deere mulch finishers they have disk blades up front that you can raise or lower if needed. Or some of the vert till tools

[@dylan_tremont5870]

If your looking for a good welder starting out thay will last a long time and be versitile get the Eastwood MP200i, I've had mine for around 2 years now using it stick and mig weld and it works awesome around the shop on farm equipment big or small! The best part is it's not super expensive for what it can do!

[@sanderr5259]

I can also find water With those, You guys ever tried with a stick that is formed like a y, u hold it horizontally and when u find water it forces it self down. Nice video

[@travistresch8535]

I help farm in northern Iowa where we have lots of corn stalk residue after combining. I run a great plains 24' turbo chopper over all my corn ground in the fall first. the turbo chopper works well cutting and chopping up the residue.it only goes about 2 1/2 inches deep so you can run 8 to 10 mph. After I use the chopper, I go back over the cornstalk with a Sunflower 4412 disc ripper. this has disc in the front and behind the ripper shanks that you can adjust to help bury the residue. When the field is done, there is a little residue on top but in the spring we are able to run the turbo chopper over it again and have a great smooth and clean seed bed for beans. If we are going corn on corn, I run a 44' great plains discovator. This has straight cutting blades in front of the sweeps, drags, and rolling baskets. This will bury most of the remaining residue. Good luck with all your trash, we used to have that problem until I went to this tillage.

[@tractorman_8320]

We always ran field cultivators in rice stubble, with no harrow on the back. Seemed to clear the residue pretty well.

[@jinx8164_]

A good way to check for water lines is to wait after is rains really hard then get a view from the air, and wherever it starts to dry first is a tileline

[@jakebrady4133]

Ever thought of burning your corn residue off as a last resort? I’ve seen a few down here in south georgia burn the fields off. great job keep the videos coming

[@farmerkendawg3768]

I run our field cultivator on my family’s farm and on the second day of pulling it this year I had a hydraulic line blow out of a fitting on the rolling harrow that I tow behind the cultivator.

[@georgebillington6602]

Plowing gets rid and puts a lot of residue down in the soil and gives you a nice bed to plant once rolled or sumod.

[@landinmills5068]

Them closing wheel are pretty nice. We run them on our farm but they are a pain to put on. At least for us they were.

[@phillipsfarms4030]

We have one of the mulch finishers it real nice we run a ripper then disk then finisher leaves a really good seedbed

[@stevesteffens8151]

Most efficient way to reduce the stalk left on the surface is to get a chopping head for your combine. Then tillage will go much better. We use to have the exact same problem. Not anymore.

[@heinrichbouwer2522]

Excited for planting season to start, hope this year is even better than last year's decenr yielding down corn so Excited to follow along

[@afarmkid403]

You should usually deep rip beans in the fall before it freezes and then field cultivate(fc) in the spring. Rip at an angle on way then (fc)in the opposite direction but at the same angle. Also you can’t do anything to stop corn plug ups even in beans you’ll get them but not as bad.

[@MegaRusty1973]

Great content! Hey a bit of advice from one farmer to another. Do the best you can with what you have on hand. Don’t get caught up in the hype and all that jazz. You might have to go over that stuff a few times. Also have a look at how level your cultivator is. I think there’s some work there.

[@rcwayt4020]

We call that witching down here. I've used hangers to do the same. And when putting weights on we always take off a fork so less of a risk of stabbing a tire

[@plowboyperformance]

On the hitch looks like you could loosen those 2 bolts a put a washer or 2 inside the clevis on top of the spacer and it would work fine

[@braylinkenison8247]

Hey grant, I have a suggestion for you, instead of ripping ground up you should get a rake and a bailer and start selling some bales and then rip it up

[@d6joe]

It very hard, just starting out, to have all the tillage tools for all the various conditions. I might have all the different tillage toys I really want (used, of course) by the time I retire.

[@klugfarmsklug9323]

I have the same 28 ft. cultivator. I put on 10 inch shovels. Removed like 17 shanks or so, if i remember it got 55 of so shanks. Better thrash flow /no plugging. You should of chiseled plowed it last Fall. That;s what i do. From the far SE corner of MN. I chop my stalks too, for continuous corn.

[@jeremylewis1142]

For video quality of life, I've been thinking that there should be go-pro mounts that you can make work for mounting on the inside and outside of the tractors. I also saw that some drones have an auto follow feature, and it would be cool to have some additional drone footage as you go through these tasks. I know you have to make hard decisions on where every dollar goes, but I'm thinking these would be solid investments for higher quality videos. Love what you're doing!

[@denp54z]

Grants - Some of our corn farmers around here burn their fields (stalks & residue) every few years when the field gets so full like yours. I don't know if you all are allowed to burn but they do do it here in Louisiana.

[@austinmiller833]

On your shank welds, tack both sides before you weld it all out. When metal gets hot it expands and pulls, which is why you had such a big gap on one side.

[@385cat9]

You can use hangers for the same result to find the water lines and electric. Metal hangers of course.

[@lukedesselle2491]

You need to invest in just a good old regular disk, and pull the disk over it once then come back with your field cultivator, your going to fight those piles all year long!!, also always try and run on an angle to the way your rows ran the year before it gives the implement time to clean out

[@jakebrady4133]

Ever thought of burning your corn residue off as a last resort? I’ve seen a free down here in south georgia but the fields off heat job keep the videos coming

[@justinmillhouse4426]

So if worked a lot of stalks with a field cultivator and idk if you noticed but at night it plugs up a lot more than during the day also if you run a little deeper with the field cultivator it will help throw the dirt over the residue and it will go through the field cultivator easier I usually ran the field cultivator at 4 inches deep in stalks on first pass the shallow it up a fuzz for the second pass hope this helps

[@jacobh8113]

Miller matic is a really good welder. You get wire and stick AC and DC really nice welder

[@larsharris]

Have you considered a disc? I am looking at disc/springtooth. Ok you calling it mulch finisher. I have considered relocating springtooth shanks. Make it a inch wider. Iirc my old one they are 18” space on a bar. So 6” spacing. If I make it 7” they would be 21” space on each bar. Should reduce clogging.

[@general_master_sergent6373]

I've seen some people where I'm from bush hog there corn after harvest to try and mulch it up and from what I've seen bush hogging corn stalks seems to do a decent job in mulching up the corn and not leaving as much residue leaving a better seed bed

[@Dayz-st6qy]

Hi Grant I love your vid keep up the good work

[@levihemmel7798]

id recommend for corn ground looking into a turbo max or terrmax max by great plains they do a great job and you can change the angle of the cutting blades

[@levihemmel7798]

they also work good for spring or fall tillage

[@Bryer68]

Great Video Grant

[@dominicf626]

We have a Salford we run through our corn ground once in the fall and once in the spring. I also would like to say never reuse the old boots on the shovels. The heads can get so warm they will start Falling off and always wear gloves when changing I have sliced my finger on the heads many times

[@nickb8618]

The worn bolts are literally like razor blades. I don’t even like taking the sweeps off with an impact cause if that head spins and hits ur hand ur gonna get zipped open pretty bad. Ratchet to remove the old warn plow bolts. I’ll install new ones with a impact

[@Ethan-ck6iz]

Maybe going through the cornstalks with a mower would help after this year's harvest. Spent a few hours doing that when I used to do a lot of farm work. Made the mouldboard plow's job of burying the stocks easier. Not sure how much it would help tho. Just my thoughts

[@ahdhdej8831]

A disk works well with chopping corn stocks then barring them. It is good to just flip the soil to let it dry out.

[@onecrazytruckinfarmer]

You should get a stalk chopper that’ll definitely help when you get to tillage.

[@TheFarmingLife]

I would recommend the McFarlane incite equipment to do the job for you. I just purchased a 5112

[@masonranabauer4864]

The Miller multimatic 220 is a solid machine and very versatile

[@caseihmagnum279]

Don't know if you ever heard of them Grant but calmer is a company that had a problem a residue on their farm and they created a after market stock chopping roll for combine heads that you could look at too

[@tyson8375]

Its hard to cultivate in corn stalks anyway but i have had some pretty good luck with rolling baskets on the back of the cultivator it helps kinda too chop up everything.

[@randalldijkstra3558]

We use a lemken on the corn stubble and you have to really look to find a singe stalk

[@lachlannicoll6749]

Hey Grant start looking for a tillage tractor so the 8110 can stay on the planter

[@markuspoitra514]

Maybe use a field rake??? Get most if not all of the old stalks and use your skidsteer to haul it away and burn it or something?

[@bbfarms7230]

Instead of using the clevis hitch on the field cultivator, I would recommend getting a bull pull style hitch. It's easier to hook up in my experience since it is only one bar instead of two.

[@charlesberg6700]

Keep up the great work

[@matthewanderson8231]

Use the pin to hold the hitch up on field cultivator or disk reduces the risk of crushing a finger or hand

[@farmerguy99]

We chop our stalks every year. But we bale them too.😁

[@michaelmajor5098]

No short cuts-it cost you in the long run- you guys are working and trying hard-great effort and sticking to it!

[@ROB_DJOREOYT]

thats mamba jamba of yours is called a 1 inch gun PWERFUL impact gun. I use them on semi's, Tractors, every heavy peice of equipment

[@BergheimTom1]

For tilling those stalks you might try running a little angle off the rows, sort of diagonally.

[@rebeccabright9919]

With the cultivator shovels we just change them through the season as they need it just a suggestion

[@safarmer122]

You should consider buying a chiselplow or a plow to work that residue in easier.

[@joshjansen8429]

On our old cultivator we welded a plate in the hitch and just drilled the hole out. Then just use it with the hammer strap on tractor

[@prestonkrohn9186]

We had that same cultivator. Called it the dump rake

[@betadoctor]

imho .. fall tillage with a vt tool ..especially in corn .. Love the content btw.

[@ryanmccutcheon396]

Quick fix for the valve stem, rubber valve stem and some grease or Vaseline and you can pop it in from the front of the rim. Done it a couple times on our 5100 John Deere

[@tysonvandenbrink6025]

For a welder get a miller 50/60 hz1phaze it comes with wire and stick it is nice and it does a nice job

[@erikjohansson4390]

How is the powergain on the JD? Can u feel it? 🤠

[@masonmckenzie9328]

go on a slight angle against seed rows helps alot m8✅

[@charlesfuglie2491]

Diesel fuel tank you can weld with diesel still in as long its lower than your weld. Clean with cleaner first tho. I did it on fuel tank on a tractor that had a crack

[@billcampbell2943]

Learning as u go

[@larsdeb1]

you can still try and get a mulcher. Probably worth it, yield wise

[@brandonm6052]

I know it’s just an off handed comment but don’t anticipate necessarily going 8-9mph with traditional tillage tools. The goal is to get enough soil flowing to help trash flow. More importantly especially with a traditional disc, don’t go to fast or you’ll create these annoying waves in the field. Your butt will tell you the story, you got this 👍🏼

[@gregjames5070]

A field cultivator should be pulled no less than 7mph.

[@luckymboergoats4600]

@@gregjames5070 I stand corrected, ya I see guys recommending they flow better at 7-8 mph. I’m guessing my experience was a bad combo of tractor and machine in my early years