Cultivation-how long to wait

I am in mid-Michigan and just hit about a 3 acre patch of in worked ground with my cultivator. There are some large clumps of green material through out the field. How long should I wait until I go back through with the cultivator?

It depends on what your ultimately trying to accomplish. If your end result is to have a nice smooth finished field I would take a disc and harrow in next to get rid of the lumps.

Shank implements are good at ripping things up. Chisel plow does a lot, a field cultivator is actually pretty light. I suspect you are in the south where they use an in between machine that is pretty aggressive but not a heavy chisel plow?

Anyhow, after a shank machine rips up something like sod it can be pretty lumpy. More passes with the shank machine just move the lumps around.

A disk would now cut the lumps down smaller, pack the ground a bit to level.

Or a harrow or drag would go over the top and roll some of the lumps smaller, break them up. Dad would put a heavy log chain on the harrow to make it do more, more weight.

The disk or harrow will work better or worse depending on how moist the lumps are, if your soil is clay, loam, or sand, and so forth. There can be a good timing and poor timing on this as far as moisture of the lumps, my clay dirt can set up hard and dry like bricks, but we usually get a lot of rain and the next rain helps soften them up.

Then after a rain, the field cultivator will break up the dirt again.

Sorry for the long winded answer, it seems like a simple question but so much in farming depends on the local conditions......

Paul

Thanks for the response it gave me a better understanding of what I can try

On heavy clay a packer is pulled behind the field cultivator to break lumps as you work the field and if wanting a nice smooth top then a couple or more depending on the dirt and moisture content. Sand will work out with just your field cultivator pretty good a packer will help with clods lumps or grass wads on the grass wads less than on clay's. Disking would help to cut up the sods for smoothing out faster.

Weather will tell you how long between trips. If dry a week if wet then as soon as it is dry enough for it. This is in mid MI also. Shiawassee county.

I see you gave your location first thing, I guess Im too busy combining to be reading responsibly! Sheez, sorry.

Paul