Finding New Ground update

I have had a good week locating new ground. An older friend of mine sent me to a friend of his that has 50 acres. 40 of it he is already leasing out but did not want conventional farming done by his house. He is giving it to me free of rent as long as I plant non gmo and do not use herbicides or pesticide. That is fine as I already have the equipment to cultivate. I talked to the neighbor of this guy who has about 8 acres of grass that butts up to the first property and he is also giving it to me rent free under the same conditions. So now I have a fair sized field that is rent free I just have to keep it chemical free. I will finish plowing it down to day and let it set for a few days (4-7) and disk it several times and let set for about 5 more days disk heavy again and plant 1.9 or 2.2 beans on it. Half will get winter wheat and half will get a buck wheat/clover mix and be planted to corn come spring. I also picked up 2 other 3-5 acre parcels of tall grass while the owners were out brush hogging them simply stopped and asked if they were interested in having someone farming the lots instead of them brush hogging. They both said they had never thought about it and were happy to give it to me to farm rent free just so they did not have to brush hog any longer. So all in all I picked up about 20-23 acres rent free this week and still have half a dozen more to go talk to. It won't be much longer and I will not be able to get beans on and will start fallowing for winter wheat. Thanks for all the replies below on the original post!!!!


Matt

You have a good month to plant beans. 1.9's.

Picked up another 8-10 acre field yesterday. With this rain I may not be able to finish plowing all the new ground this week. I hope that I can get back to it by Wednesday. Still have about 5 acres left on the 12acres I picked up. The old 400D with 3-14 is doing a wonderful job. My dad tried to come help with the 450 and the other 3-14 but could not seem to get the plow to work right. He kept plugging the back bottom. I believe he had the plow out of level but he got frustrated and left before I could take a close look at how he had it set up. Plowing down 3+ foot tall grass can be a challenge. He seems to thing that because the 400D is a narrow front that it is knocking the grass down in front of the bottom making it easier to plow where as the 450 is a wide front and is not knocking the grass down making it harder to plow or more prone to plugging? I think that he will hook up the 10' disk and start disking while I plow when I get ready to go back out to the field. It is nice to see him out on the tractors. I know I appreciate the help as well. The price of off road diesel went up to 2.60 a gallon here locally from 2.44. The old 450 is a gasser so it is quite a bit more expensive to run than the 400D. But I guess in the name of saving time I will pay for the gasser to run just so I can hopefully get everything worked up good mellowed and hopefully planted by June 15. I need to go get more seed this week as well. I think I am done picking up bean ground as I now have about 30 acres of bean ground. I will start looking for ground to fallow for winter wheat once I get caught up. I think I can obtain about 20 more acres by September for that purpose. I am glad to be back to farming instead of off globe trotting in third world countries toting a gun.

Oh. The joys of spring plowing, and no herbicides for weed control on a quickly hurried late spring bean crop on such ground.

The nightmares are returning, I haven't quite forgotten.......

Good luck with it, sounds like you have a plan and are finding options. Good deal.

Be careful if you make any money on it, or have a good enough looking crop. Free rent turns into $250 an acre rent real fast around here, or I should say did in the past decade.

In my area there is very little land that could be row cropped that isn't. Very little. You could find a little bit of hay land that way, too wet to row crop but can get some ripe hay off of. Everything else is already worked. The concept of land just not farmed for a decade is strange to me, that just doesn't happen. Also in my state you would need to check the wetlands status, you get to restore those on your dime of you work those up without proper paperwork.

Paul

Hurried for plowing yes. I will still set it set at least 2-3 weeks and disk it at least every 5 days to try and slow down the weeds and grass. I have had pretty good success with this method earlier in the spring. The beans I did this way early are still almost weed free after 3 weeks. I may have to cultivate it for the first time this weekend. I have no intentions of putting out there how much if anything I will gross or net. Thus far out of 33 acres I am paying $50 an acre for 13.5 acres. The rest is rent free (for now) mostly so they do not have to brush hog it or because they want it done organically only. I know it will not stay that way but is a good way to at least get into the ground. Around here the BTO will not even look at most fields under 20 acres. My single largest field is 2 land owners combined to make 12 acres. I can pick up another 5-10 fields under 10 acres less than 3 miles from my house without to many problems and because not many have smaller equipment I am the only person knocking on the door. If I had the time and equipment I could clear and farm close to 50 or 60 acres of old pastures that have been let go for 20+ years. In my county any wetland that is less than 5 acres is not regulated. I did check with the regional biologist for the state. Thanks for the well wishes and I will periodically keep you all posted. Once I get caught up with what I have I am hoping to pick up about 20-30 more acres to fallow for wheat this fall. I start back to school for summer semester a week from today. I am working on my Bachelors in Agricultural Business Management.

Congratulations and best of luck with the new ground. I am in the same position and have been able to get some decent ground that had been sitting just because of smaller fields and I was the only one knocking on the door, some of it has worked out and some not too great. But don't get in too deep this year, the ground will still be here next year and the sod/weeds could be fall plowed for next year. I know they frown on Fall tillage but with these sod fields that's about the best way otherwise can't get worked down well in the Spring. And your best yield corn planting days were a month ago, and bean season will be over fairly quick. If the landowner is understanding then it might be worth considering taking a year to cut back brush and clean up edges, and start with fall tilled ground next year.

Up here in MN spring heavy tillage is mostly a disaster, we do as much heavy tillage as possible in fall. Our growing season is too short, springs are too wet, the ground is too cold. If you work the ground rough in fall, it stays put and is in great shape for a single field cultivator pass and plant it, often before any weeds are sprouted and even sometimes the frost is not fully out of the ground.

Trying to do plowing is spring, you are working on miserably cold, wet clay soil that turns into baked bricks.....

I forget warmer drier climates have better spring options, and your mild winters are hard on worked soils breaking down the nutrients and burning them away. We don't have those concerns here in the tundra zone.

Paul