ground leveling

[randy41]

i'm looking to put up another high tunnel (greenhouse) and i need to have the ground leveled. the last time i did this the excavating contractor i hired did cut and fill but this created drainage problems i didn't anticipate. this time around i'm building a retaining wall at the low end and along the sides as needed and i want to fill it in with topsoil. i think i need 30 yds of material. i've got 40 acres of land. does it make sense to hire someone with a machine to scrape up the necessary topsoil from my own land or to have the topsoil trucked in? i was quoted $200 per tandem dump truck load delivered.
i never bought topsoil before. should i expect the topsoil to be free of debris and rocks?
any other ideas for leveling the area? the high tunnel is 22x48.

the pics don't really show where it drops off very well but that's the area where it will go.

 

[tungularafishcamp]

It looks fairly level already, are you going to plant straight in the ground or do raised beds? Not sure if you have a tractor or ?? but you could just rototill the whole area and level the pad by hand or with the tractor or peel the sod and remove topsoil to put in the beds if your gonna go that way. A little slope is a good thing for runoff n drainage.

 

[randy41]

there's a 3' drop in the front 20' or so. its not a smooth transition from one level to the other.

 

[cartod]

Invest in a Box blade and do it yourself, you will save money and when you are done you'll have a box blade.

 

[Pops15]

By the time you hire someone to dig the dirt, load and transport it to where you need it, it would be cheaper to just have dirt trucked in.

 

[RDrancher]

I agree with Pops, its probably cheaper to truck in the dirt and two hundred a load isn't a bad price. If you don't want rocks in your loads make sure you're buying "screened" topsoil.