tractor vs lawn mower

[kwagner21]

okay,so I think I know the answer, but I have to ask. is it possible to mow the lawn with the same tractor you use to make hay. Yes, I know, it would be different attachments, but if you got a finish mower and the haying attachments, could you get a tractor to do both- not too big to be able to handle the lawn- about 2 1/2 acres- but big enough to bale. We need to get a new mower and the things are so expensive just to cut a lawn. we have a hay field that the neighbor hays for us, but would like to hay it ourselves. any thoughts...

[Curtis B]

I would think it depends on what your yard is like. I would hate to have to go around trees, a garden, and everything else (could be very bad if you have children and dogs like mine). I don't cut hay, but if I remember from when I was looking into it, your going to need something in the 30hp + range to bale small squares, bigger if you do the large rounds or square. It is up to you, I think manuverablity would be your problem depending on the yard.

[Harry Chickpea]

Maneuverability is a big issue. It means you will need a walk behind self propelled mower to finish up mowing. Second issue is that aggressive tractor tires will do a number on your lawn if you make any sharp turns or mow when the soil is wet. Third issue is learning to change attachments without having to fight your way through the process. Fourth issue is that your lawn will never look as good with a finishing mower than a riding mower.

The positives - if you have a bush hog, you can let your lawn go for a year and then whack it back into submission. Using a bush hog with a sharp blade can get close to what a finishing mower can do - otherwise generally you want bush hog blades a little dull to shatter woody stems, rather than turn them into tiger spikes that will puncture tires. If you use shear pins properly, you'll never ruin another motor by hitting a rock. You have one less bit of equipment that can fail. A tractor has a LOT more uses than a riding mower.

[FarmboyBill]

U dont say how many acres of hay uve got. I do all my lawn mowing, with a Farmall Cub. It has a 4ft belly mower. I also have a cultivator/spring tooth harrow, that I can either take out tines, or resituate them in the frame to allow for rows, or just for spring tooth harrowing. Now, If I wanted to put up hay, I could get the 5ft belly sickle mower for it. I have used it to rake hay with my JD steel wheeled side rake, up hills, so I know it will work with a standard rake. I wouldnt use a hump back rake as thats extra weight on the rear end, and the fronts kinda light to start with., UNLESS It has a 3rd wheel for the tongue. Id find a hay rack 4 wheeled to bring in the hay, and youll probably only be able to haul 2 doz bales with it. As to the bailer. IF, and I say IF, cause your not likely gonna find it anymore, but if you could find a light new holland, or JD bailer W I T H a engine on it, and a wheel for the tongue, and your hay field was mainly level, You might be able to bale with it. That goes also with a A Farmall also, But with it you could use a 6ft sickle, a hump back rake, and no doubts about the bailer setup listed above, and you should be able to haul 3doz bales on a wagon, and 2 doz on a trailer. Same with a AC B/C

Should your field be say up to 3/4 acres, Then you could either put it up loose, by hand, or use a hay loader on back to bring the loose hay up to the wagon.

Now, With a AC B/C I know for a fact you could

[sammyd]

I would do away with the 2 1/2 acre lawn. Then I would look at a 35-40 HP tractor for haying and a push mower for my smaller lawn.

[kwagner21]

hay field is about 7-8 acres. i was working on shrinking the lawn, letting some of it go and bush hog 1x a year basically, but between DH and all his toys and DS running all around, I can't do away with it totally. anybody know what the minimum hp would be to hay? my guess is the baler is what needs the power, so how much for a small square baler?

[wy_white_wolf]

I think anything big enough to bale hay with would be to heavy to mow a lawn. The tires would tear up too much sod.

[FarmboyBill]

As WWY said Any tractor really able to pull a bailer with a PTO, would be too wide to mow with, as Ive never seen a belly mower over 4 or 5ft. The outside tires would mash down the grass in there tracks, that the mower wouldnt get all of, And in 2 weeks time you could see the trails of taller grass where the outside wheels had gone.

You can do both, as I said, if you have a bailer with a front wheel on the tongue to hold the tongue weight, AND a wisconsin, or Koler engine running it. Without that, You can do it loose, Tho, with over 5 acres, Id deffinatly want a loose hay loader to pick it up with. AND, There hard to find, But once found, are rather easy to fix up. I bought an old IHC loader when I was a kid, mayby still a teenager. Hauled it home, Picked up the teeth as the old wooden arms shattered and fell as I hauled it 8 miles over dirt roads. When I got it home, I went to a sawmill, had the miller cut me out 8 3 X 2 lengths, and replaced the teeth back on them. I forgot how long they were. Think around 8ft. Worked great. Seemed like, in the wagon, the loader was bringing up 2 windrows instead of just one. Kept me working.

[kwagner21]

okay, thanks, that was what i thought, couldn't help but hope...

[Windy in Kansas]

My dad purchased his first tractor with hydraulics in the 1960s. It was rated over 100 horsepower and we mowed the farmstead with it---and a push mower where the trailing Bush Hog brand of brush hog style mower couldn't get to.

One of us mowed while the other moved machinery out of the way and then back into the normal parking space after that space had been mowed.

It can be done but I am opinionated and think you would be better off to have a push mower or a riding mower for what you can't get to easily because of branches, etc.

[Ramblin Wreck]

If you had a 50 horse power tractor with turf tires, you could probably make it work for both purposes. It would be way overpowered for one task and bordering on too small for the other. The real answer, I think, is to keep your yard small and natural...and avoid mowing altogether! I wish I had done this.

[FarmboyBill]

Turn your goats, or a milk cow out onto your yarde. Easier to scrape up CS than to mow yard, and your getting a benifit in milk or meat, or both.

Thats what im going to do when I get my goats, and buy a cow maybe. Let them run the lawn and the machinery yard to get the most of the greass and weeds. Windy, I do what your dad and u did, by myself, and its a real pain. Moveing alla the machinery, and then mowing, then moveing it back. Only do it in the fall. Once a year of that is enough. Glad I got 2 tractors to do it with now.

[Old Vet]

I mow my yard with a 50 hp tractor. It is much bigger than 2 1/2 acres about 17 acres. A 6 foot finish mower is about $1000. And you will need to trim up around anything you have in the yard.

[francismilker]

Sure you can do both with a tractor. A tractor is a year round machine while a lawnmower collects dust in the off season. As others have stated though, some variable apply to your personal situation. Manueverability, turf tires, low-hanging tree limbs, and pto driven cutter type are going to factor in.

If you're going to spend more time trimming and push mowing around obstacles because your tractor is too big it may not be worth it. If your yard is square and flat it will save you worlds of time.

A 35-40 horse tractor is borderline Ag size in my opinion. I know the text books say you can square bale with that HP and it can be done (has been done for years). It's just harder on the equipment and slower to complete the task. The big question here is can you justify owning haying equipment for just 7 acres worth of hay?

[kwagner21]

I do turn my sheep and goats out on the lawn to mow it. but for the most part they would rather eat the bushes and trees then grass. and my dh has this thing with having the yard nice. i thought 7 acres was enough for haying, now you got me wondering. as i said the neighbor does it now but he hays so much, that he only gets to cut it once. seems like such a waste, and we use that much hay in 1 winter. then he won't take $ for the hay we use, so we feel bad using it. so how much do you think you need to hay to justify the equiptment

[fantasymaker]

Originally Posted by Ramblin Wreck

If you had a 50 horse power tractor with turf tires, you could probably make it work for both purposes. It would be way overpowered for one task and bordering on too small for the other. The real answer, I think, is to keep your yard small and natural...and avoid mowing altogether! I wish I had done this.

THEEES THE KEY! Turf tires. Heck they would be better on the hayfeild too! We used to mow 1200 acres of campground to lawn standards ,belive me we DIDNT use a lawntractor!

[J2E1]

Sycle cutter maybe? Especially if it's wide open.

[Ramblin Wreck]

Originally Posted by fantasymaker

THEEES THE KEY! Turf tires. Heck they would be better on the hayfeild too! We used to mow 1200 acres of campground to lawn standards ,belive me we DIDNT use a lawntractor!

Yeah, I use a small MF 1210 with turf tires to mow the biggest part of my lawn, and providing the ground isn't wet, it does very well. If I run across the yard in a tractor with ag tires, it can really rip it up. I still think the best idea is to fence it in or leave it as natural as possible! Mowing a big yard is for losers...and I've got a big "L" on my forehead.

[Jolly]

Originally Posted by kwagner21

okay,so I think I know the answer, but I have to ask. is it possible to mow the lawn with the same tractor you use to make hay. Yes, I know, it would be different attachments, but if you got a finish mower and the haying attachments, could you get a tractor to do both- not too big to be able to handle the lawn- about 2 1/2 acres- but big enough to bale. We need to get a new mower and the things are so expensive just to cut a lawn. we have a hay field that the neighbor hays for us, but would like to hay it ourselves. any thoughts...

Yep, it'll work. I did it for years with a 6' finish mower and I even had ag tires on the tractor!

Just couldn't mow the yard when it was wet and had to be careful with braking for tight turns. You will have to do some trimming by hand and it helps to round-up things like fence lines, etc.

You are going to need about a 40hp to do both. That's big for the yard and small for the field, but 8 acres of hay ain't a bunch. There are several value lines available (if you are thinking new tractor, many with 0% financing) such as Mahindra, JD, MF and New Holland. Price is going to be around $13K for the bare tractor.

If you're looking at used, there's a bunch of stuff around. One of my favorites would be a decent 3910 Ford, but a good tractor is where you find it.

Best of luck!

[FarmboyBill]

I and my X, and then my neighbor cut my 5 here many times with my 7ft MH horse mower, before I got a simi mounted IHC sickle mower. My X and later a GF cut my 12acre bottom with it in haygrazer, I have used my dads old JD steel wheeled hay rake for around 25/30yrs. He gave it to me cause the teeth at one spot on the bull gear had stripped off, and it would throw the bars outa where they needed to be when the bar was at the downward position. I brought it home, saw the problem, and welded back the teeth with an arc welder, and KEPT it GREASED. Have NEVER had a problem with it. Ive got another of dads later hay rakes, a steel wheeled Case, and have a junker for parts for it. I cant brag about my bailer tho,. It has an engine on it, and till I had the carb cleaned and rebuilt, I always had trouble with it. Ive got a junker bailer with a pto attachment for it, and , after haveing the carb reb uilt, if I still have trouble with it, I guess ill be makeing the trade.

My Case is around 32hp, and my H Farmall is around 28, My Cub is around 12. I have never had a problem with being shy of horsepower with the Case. Havnt used the H yet, in the field. Yes, I suppose its slow, and doing a small field dont help in that respect. I dont notice it, its what ive always grown up with, speed wise, and I dont think the speed would be a problem for you.

The money spent needent be all that much $3,500 $1,500 for a tractor, same for a bailer, and $500 will buy a mower, rake and wagon easy. Ad another $300 or less if u want a bale loader. Ive got one, only used it once.
If your going to spend the money on machinery, spend most of it on the bailer. A fair to good mower and rake, will get you through, and you can learn how to do the upkeep on them. You can buy a wagon running gear, and build a flatbed for not to much