Re: Best practical tractor for 40-80 acres

Posted by cdmn on February 26, 2005 at 20:54:50 from (66.228.230.36):

In Reply to: Best practical tractor for 40-80 acres posted by Dave From MN on February 26, 2005 at 18:46:34:

I grew up among a lot of 160 acre dairy farms. Much of the land was pasture, hay, and woods. So they didn't need big stuff. By the 50's most had two tractors. The "big" tractor would be an A JD, M IHC, U Mpls; the "small" tractor would be B JD, Allis B or C, Farmall H or C, Case VAC, Mpls Z. M's H's, and F20s were real favorites and used until the bitter end of milk-can dairying. Usually kept till the owners' retirements came to an end. There must have been a few Fords and Fergusons around, but none that I can remember close to us. Same with Oliver My dad's big tractor was a 444 Massey diesel, his small one a 540 IHC. The Massey was used for plowing, digging and disking; for running the silage chopper, feedmill, and for running pto-powered combine. He did a lot of custom work. The 540 was used for planting, corn cultivating, mowing, raking, baling, wagon towing, running elevator or auger, or sprayer. Along with these we also had an H loader tractor, and later an M loader tractor. The 540 was not well-thought-off, and ended up being traded for a new JD 4020. Went John Deere from then on till now. The Massey worked hard well into the 70's, when my Dad no longer wanted a tractor without a cab or power steering.
If you look around the world today, the small Massey Ferguson and Ford-type tractors dominate where there is still small scale farming. Of course there are dozens of tractor brands we seldom hear of in the States. On my own little place, I use my Mpls JetStar 3 loader tractor the most. But for 3 point stuff, I use a Ford 3000.

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