Who needs a forestry mulcher

When you have a Selma-made Bush Hog? Well, gear box was made in China and drive shaft in Italy, but I'm pretty sure they put the stickers on in Selma. I wish I had taken a better before pic, but I didn't think about it. It was a mess with a lot of pines and sweetgums over 15' tall.



Here's this field after I finished. Not quite ready to plant cotton on it, but it's getting closer. Been a work in progress the past 10 years.



I used to think that time was on my side and the stumps would all eventually rot and I would win. Now I realize the bushes are gonna still be there long after I'm gone. . I can maybe beat them back a few years. All of this was big pines in 2006.

Don't buy a used Bush Hog from me.

Lookin good.

If a tractor can drive over it, a bush hog will chew it up. That's my rule.

Looks good. I like doing stuff like that. Part of my "every acre will be used" philosophy. I have a spot like that that I discussed this afternoon with my dad that I was going to clean it up over the winter and plant fruit trees.

No sweat for a 2 series bush hog. Mine has dual tail wheels. I like to work in reverse and use them like accumulating arms on a tree cutter. If it goes between those arms, it gets mulched. Plus it keeps all the brush off the tractor. As a side note, if you're going to be running over stuff like that on that 5075e, you need to fab up a cover for the MFWD actuator. If you don't want to make one, you can buy one online.

And watch that PLASTIC fuel tank.

Indeed. But a tractor will drive over a stump but a bush hog gets tore up on them

No fun when that strong diesel smell comes through the AC vents on your 6410. Been there done that.

Thanks for that advice. I had not really considered how easily it could be damaged. I've been way more concerned with the hyd hoses at the center station. Scared to death I'm gonna catch all 4 lines on something and rip them out. I've thought of making a guard outa PVC sewer pipe and running them thru it. I try to compensate by always keeping the left side of the tractor against the brush.

Bush Hog has a stump jumper on it and I haven't had a stump to hurt it yet. Believe me, it has ridden over some tough ones. Slip clutch has gotten a lot of work the past month. I've got 2 other Selma made Bush hogs that are retired. One is a drag type from the 50s that will still run. The other is a 305 from the 70s that I pretty much destroyed. The gear box completely broke off the frame. It could be welded back, but a project for later. Gotta use this dry weather to finish up in the wet spots. I've gotten into places that are normally too wet to think of taking a tractor. Good cutting to all.

I'm afraid to bush hog at my farm. A blade skipping on a rock could start a hell of a fire. Plus my grass has been dead since September

True. We don't really have any stumps, I just meant thick brush and small (and not so small) trees.

I've got a BH 285 I run on a Ford 2000 I trim 4-wheeler trails with and I honestly don't think you can tear it up. That's a good bushhog. They still make some good ones.

My big trail mower is one of those FMC sidewinders with the tire on it instead of the gearbox. It will cut anything the tractor can drive over.

Well done poorcountrypreacher....I have a John Deere 82hp with a 6 foot woods bush hog that I abuse, but so far it has held up. I call it my poor mans mulcher.... one day I am going to buy a heavy duty Bush Hog bushog and I will really do some damage!

Woods makes several lines of rotary mowers just like bush hog does. I looked at a Woods cutter that was almost exactly like the one I wound up buying from Bush Hog. I would have bought the Woods but the Selma co-op wouldn't deliver it and Bush Hog would. Bush Hog was actually a little cheaper too. Your cutter is probably as good as mine. Both gear boxes probably made in the same factory in China.

I have always been surprised at what you can run over with one of them.

My best advice is:

1: Check your slip clutch to make sure it has not rusted together. Especially if you keep your cutter out in the rain.

2. Check the gear boxes for oil level before starting EVERYTIME. Also check them every hour when running over bad stuff.

We have some CRP that has to be cut every 3 years (well actually we cut a third of it every year and rotate it). I am amazed how big a sweet gun or cypress tree can grow in 3 years.

Good deal. Bet it was noisy

PCP let me know if you decide not to rebuild the 307.

I'd love to have one of the old pull type 7' Servis (owns Rhino) cutter. They had the little mushroom looking shear bolt. Good, stout old cutters.

There's a place in N AL somewhere called CR Manufacturing that makes forestry packages for JD (and other, lesser brand) tractors. They should make a STOUT belly pan that would protect your tractor very well doing what you're doing. They make full protection packages for those tractors that get used mowing highway right of ways and the ones that have boom mowers mounted on them.

They sell most all that stuff both in packages and a piece at a time. Beware, it is NOT cheap, but will usually pay for itself several times in damage prevented.

Robert, it's a 305, not a 307. I can't own one wider than the tractor, would be sure to catch it on a tree in the woods.

Thanks for the info on the protector, but I think I'm about done with this kind of cleaning up. That field was the last bad area I had. I'd been waiting on the stumps to rot out. Still have a few, but I don't plan to let it grow up like that again.

How many yellow jacket nests did you find with old stumps?

We use a Lowery 6' HD behind our little 40hp Massey. It will cut anything the tractor will run over or anything I can back over lol. However we buy shear pins by the pound at tractor supply. .

I can change a shear pin in under a minute. Wish I had a slip clutch though.

Best thing is to disc it up. Disc will run over stumps and will cut the little tree roots up. I have done this several times till I got all the stumps up and could run a turning plow thru it.

Never got into any doing the clean up. I got into a nest cutting one of the turkey plots and got stung twice. That patch didn't get finished.

I can run a disc over it now, but there were a lot of trees and bushes that needed to be cut down before I can disc it.

Maybe you guys were giving me good advice about buying a belly pan.

It had to have ripped this guard off in the last 10 minutes I was working. I checked it just before quitting. Went to change the oil yesterday and found this. JD probably wants $500 for a new guard, so I took some big washers and crimped it back into place - good as new.