[iank]

We have a field of about 2 acres that we need to cut about twice a year to avoid it degenerating into scrub. It is flat, but a bit bumpy, has had cattle on it in the past I think, and has a few shallow ruts. We only want to stop it degenerating, and not to create a lawn, and will not be making hay. The grass is about 12 - 15 ins high at the moment.
I am thinking of getting a 2 wheel tractor with implements to do it rather than a ride on mower or similar. (have calculated that it would take about 4 hrs).

I have had completely contradictory advice from suppliers.

Scythe mower .
Supplier one ; this is the fastest way to mow a large area, because of the width available.
Supplier two and others; this is the slowest, as you can only go in 1st gear
Flail mower.
Supplier one; once vegetation is under control, this is a slow method
Supplier two; this is the fastest way to cut grass, as you need full throttle to run the shaft and then can go in 3rd gear on grass
Rotary mower.
Does this cope with uneven ground very well? The maximum length of cut is 10cm, which seems a bit short to me, and this would be slicing through the tops of some of the tufts.
Brush mower
No-one seems able to explain how this differs from a rotary mower.

Any advice from those with experience of any of these implements would be welcome.

[andrew ford]

for a field of 2 acres i would reccomend a tractor and a topper which is mounted on the 3 point linkage you probbrebly should be able to get a tractor and topperrelitavely easly

[lachlanandmarcus]

I would echo the topper suggestion, provided the field isnt full of large stones. If it were, you would need something tougher like a flail mower (think of weedy garden strimmer versus metal bladed monster strimmer) just to survive the stones. If not, a topper will be ok. A fairly cheap topper usually protects its mechanical bits by using shear bolts; if the ground is tooooo tough you end up replacing the shear bolts all the time!!

For info, The difference between a 'grass mower' and a 'topper' is that a grass mower cuts more cleanly and nearer to the ground, so you can then make hay. Also 'conditioning mowers' are seen and these are used where the clippings are prodded back into the ground. But for general cutting of grass to keep it tidy and stop weeds seeding and improve grass growth, a topper is what you want.

We bought a new 6 ft topper for just under £500, they can be got cheaper second hand. We have bought our mower and flail mowers second hand.

I havent come across scythe mower tho it might be what I think of as finger mower where the cutting arm sticks out from the side of the tractor.
Brush mower I would take to be similar to flail mower, heavy duty but heavy weight too
Rotary mower could well be a topper tho 10cm sounds a bit bizarre!

[SallyintNorth]

Also 'conditioning mowers' are seen and these are used where the clippings are prodded back into the ground.

Oh!  Now I thought our contractor said he had a conditioning mower, and that aerates the grass as it cuts it, which saves you needing to woofle it one time.  It definitely doesn't prod the clippings back into the ground, it's for making hay and silage!

[TheCaptain]

8 x  ?
 

[jaykay]

We went the two wheel tractor route and it was desperately slow and hard work. I suppose each field of ours is about 2 acres and they took hours and hours. We've now gone for a quad bike and a self-powered Quad-X mower which is great and does the job in an hour or so. Mower lives in the field, quad bike in the garage 

[lachlanandmarcus]

Also 'conditioning mowers' are seen and these are used where the clippings are prodded back into the ground.

Oh!  Now I thought our contractor said he had a conditioning mower, and that aerates the grass as it cuts it, which saves you needing to woofle it one time.  It definitely doesn't prod the clippings back into the ground, it's for making hay and silage!

round our way conditioning mower definitely means make little slits and also push the clippings back in, so you dont have rotting rows of grass and it is available as fertiliser to the grass crop. But its all jargon so it might also cover ones that just aerate I guess.

[waterhouse]

It's got to be a topper where you have a single heavy rotary blade, at least up to 6'.  A compact tractor and a 4' topper will deal with most scrub by cutting and leaving it.  My fleming leaves neat lines which then tend to rot in situ

A flail Mower will mulch the arisings but a twice the cost

A finishing mower is a large version of the garden rotary mower and won't deal with scrub ut will spread the arisings more evenly

A finger mower was designed for removing fingers and feet before torture was banned.

A drum mower is what you're supposed to use for hay making

The big advantage of a compact tractor is that you can lift the mower around signficant obstacles, and get there in the first place.  Toppers are widely available and versatile bits of kit.

[SallyintNorth]

A finger mower was designed for removing fingers and feet before torture was banned.

 

[iank]

Thank you for all these explanations
In reply to Jaykay. This is what bothers me, but i worked out how many strips there were of 0.7m, and from the speed of the tractor, how long to do each strip, and the answer came out that it should take under 4 hours.
Was there any particular reason it took a long time, eg you can actually only go in 1st gear at 1kph instead of at 4kph for example?
The problem with a proper tractor is that apart from this twice a year mowing, everything else we want to do can be done by a 2 wheel tractor, and actually most, manually, if push came to shove, to use an appropriate expression.
Thanks.

[jaykay]

We had the man from the company come out and demonstrate. But even after that, the machine wasn't up the job. We have seaves (rushes) and some bumps.
DH said it was about 80 hours to do 2 acres, compared with the calculated 5 hours, it was hard work and he was forever going back over and over it. The swearing certainly reduced when we bought the towed mower  

That said, we sold the two wheel set up quite easily on eBay for about half what we paid for it, so you could try that route first.

Hubby says try hiring one first.

[SallyintNorth]

This is what bothers me, but i worked out how many strips there were of 0.7m, and from the speed of the tractor, how long to do each strip, and the answer came out that it should take under 4 hours.

I haven't used a 2-wheel tractor, but with a 4-wheeler there would, over a large number of relatively short strips, be a significant amount of time spent turning.  (Not 40x the time spent cutting, grant you!)

We are all very polite, I think - but for me I am intrigued and so it is time to ask, why not sheep?  Or rent the grazing, or let the standing crop for hay?

[iank]

In reply to Jaykay
80hrs!! That really would be out of the question. (New to forums and the acronyms - does DH = dear husband?). Perhaps I will do what one other person suggests and hire one. We need some gadget to haul logs about, do a bit of ploughing and pump water from tanks uphill for irrigation.

In reply to SallyintNorth

There are sheep there at the moment, they belong to the farmer who has the field next door. The problem is that he has requests to graze his sheep from many scources - he probably could be a sheep farmer without actually owning any land! The neighbour says she has tried to get them onto her field for years. In about 10yrs, we will probably have our own, but right now, we like to go away for several days when weather is good, and do not like the idea of leaving them unattended (although the farmer never seems to check up on them now). The previous owner said they got a local farmer to cut the field for hay - financial arrangement never specified.

[Fleecewife]

The usual financial arrangement is that whoever does the haymaking gets half the crop, you get the other half, no money changes hands.  The downside is that that person will always make their own hay first, so you are more at risk of losing yours if the weather is bad.

My question is:  why is how long it takes to mow so important if you are only doing it twice a year?  Surely the difference between 4 hours and 8 hours is not great - although of course it would be if you were mowing every week.

We use a topper for that sort of thing, but if you are only cutting twice a year you will have a lot of cut grass left lying, rotting and preventing the new grass from coming through.

[jaykay]

DH is versatile. The H is certainly husband. The D can be darling, dear, dratted, damned (maybe even detestable or doomed  ) etc. depending on what he's been up to lately