Dball, I am just getting started with a similar size winch - mine is a Uniforest, but they all work in fundamentally the same manner - on a slightly larger tractor than your MF1250. Here's what I've found so far. First, you really want to make straight pulls. Even a 10 deg. angle off center can toss the tractor around, even with these smaller winches. One or more snatch blocks are very handy. Farmi makes a self-releasing snatch block that makes pulls easy. It costs (drumroll) $300, and it's worth every penny.
These winches pull at a very high speed compared to an electric winch and things happen very fast, particularly if something gets hung up. A winch with 7,000 lbs of pull can easily flip the tractor if things get really out of hand.
Unless you have really large logs to move, 7,000 lbs gives plenty of pull to move logs up to at least 20". Nothing I have to move is over that size, so this winch is fine for me. If you have large, heavy, stuck timber, or need to move a lot of lumber at a time, a bigger winch would be preferable, although you don't want to overmatch what your tractor can handle in power required or weight.
You should have enough pto hp to run that winch. Because of the winch speed, it's an advantage if you have enough power so you can operate the winch at a lower engine speed without bogging or stalling.
