Why a bush mower?
We have lots of hay land. It gets harvested by a farmer each year. We can’t afford the equipment required to harvest our own hay. But, we do need to be able to mow some pastures and clean up areas missed, or avoided, by the farmer.
My Son in law thinks we will also need a finish mower for around the house. I will wait to see once we are actually able to plant grass!
I did a lot of research about how big of a mower we could run with our small tractor, a Kioti CK3510SE. The consensus was we could definitely handle a 5 foot mower, and possibly a 6 foot mower. There was some opinion that a 6 foot mower would put too much stress on the tractor, but others said that could be avoided by overlapping your paths if mowing heavy brush. Obviously a 6 foot mower is attractive because you can mow a large area in less time.
I usually do lots of comparison shopping, but in this case I did not. I probably could have found a used mower at a much lower price. But I wanted it now… and I wanted it delivered.
I went to my local tractor dealer. He showed me the 5 and 6 foot farm king rough cut mowers. The 6 foot model was significantly more expensive, so I opted for the 5 foot – a Farm King 510.
Connecting it to the tractor
The rough cut mower was delivered the next day. The delivery driver did not show me how to hook it up – he said there are instructions in the manual.
I have never hooked up a 3 point hitch or a PTO attachment before. I read thru the manual… It did not say much.
I watched a bunch of YouTube videos. It seemed simple enough, but they all agreed that it is a “PITA”. Try and try again. It takes practice!
Hooking up the 3 point hitch part was simple enough. It took a while though, because it it awkward to get everything lined up. I learned that it is easier to move the implement, than to try to inch the tractor into alignment.
Then I had to hook up the PTO. OMG it was frustrating! You can’t see what you are doing, and you have to reach through the various arms of the three point hitch to reach the PTO shaft. I have bruises all over my arms from bumping the arms while trying to manhandle the shaft into place.
You have to line up the gears on the shaft, but you can’t see both sets of gears at the same time. Luckily I found a video with some hints. Using a paint pen to mark the location of the gears on the shaft made it easier.
Finally I got it lined up, and I thought it was locked in place. When I started the tractor and tried to turn on the mower it came unconnected. You have to push the two sections of shaft together, while pulling back on a lock collar. Then, push the lock collar back and pull on the shaft to make sure it is connected and locked. After some swearing and a break to watch another couple of videos, I finally got it.
Using the mower
Once I got the mower all hooked up, I started to mow the tall grass that was left all around the house building area. I have also mowed the area where we will be installing our first fence posts next week
Mowing is fun, and kind of relaxing… Or, it was until I hit a rough mound of dirt left by the builders. The uneven pile of dirt was hidden by the tall grass. That part was less relaxing, but still fun. I had to use the bucket and the 4 wheel drive to get myself out of there.
Next I think we need a box blade – to maintain our road, and to fix all the mounds and depressions left in the fields by the builders. Last year was really muddy, and it looks like they got vehicles stuck in the fields fairly regularly!
