Another shifter question

Hey all I have another problem and as of right now yall are
batting 1.000 on my post. Took my tractor yesterday to get
new tires put on finally getting rid of the turf tires and the last
obstacle to have my tractor ready for the garden. Anyways I
back the tractor out of the shelter and drive onto the trailer
strap her down and head down the road and arrive at the tire
place and back the tractor off the trailer and pull it up to where
the guy tells me to leave it and head off for the day. When I
come back to get the tractor it fires right up push the clutch put
it into what I believe is 1st and nothing it Boggs down and I
press the clutch and try again until it finally goes into a gear
which I have no idea what it is but it seems like it's 2nd and
back on the trailer and leave it in gear for the ride home. When
I arrive i soon discover I can't find reverse to back it off the
trailer. Looking for neutral so hopefully I can roll it off the trailer
it's bowhere to be found so I just hold the clutch in and roll
myself off the trailer and finally get it into a forward gear to
park it under the shelter. hope it's simple...

I looked for your other post but did not see it so don't know what tractor you have. But yes, it is common for the shifter to become worn to the point it slips out of the rail.

The smaller 4 and 3 speed tractors have a Ball shaped tip. Jim

It's simple.

The tractor is in whatever foward gear, and any time you try to shift it into another gear, you end up with the tractor in two gears at once.

Search on "stuck in two gears" and you will find a plethora of knowledge and discussion on the subject.

What happened is the end of the shifter is worn, and you moved the shift lever "diagonally" instead of straight back, and slipped the shift lever out of the fork before the tractor was out of gear.

The shifter needs to be removed from the tractor so you can reach down in with a large flat screwdriver and pry the three shift rails back into their neutral positions.

If you can't build the shift lever back up right away, just be careful shifting. Deliberately move in a straight-forward, straight-back motion from a gear to neutral, then straight side-to-side to select a different pair of gears. Make it a habit and you won't need to worry about fixing it. Pretend someone is going to throw a rock at your head if you screw it up and you will learn quickly. Ask me how I know.