Just Little Bites ...

Eagle1 · Sep 6, 2025

I have a 3 cell system a little over 2 acres of poop ponds... always fun to maintain.... but works well. Since closing shop only one stays wet unless we get those big rains...

Shawn T. W. · Sep 6, 2025

I got to stay home this morning ... Worked on a couple of other projects, then went back down to the creek ... We got .16" of rain, not sure if that is what this puddle is from, or if there is a seep of some kind?

I decided to try my ripper tooth this morning ... It's usually pretty good and loosening up the rocks . . .

The "problem" though is while it really loosened it up, I couldn't really move the spoils out of the way, and while I do have a "Quick-On" it would mean I'd need to have the bucket down there with me, and then I'd probably loose/bury the ripper, and going back up out of the creek bed meant having to set back up ...

So I switched back to the factory 12" BH bucket, I could get a much bigger pile of spoils before needing to haul them away with the loader ... I was pleasantly surprised that in some areas, I could really scrape up the "bedrock"!

Done for now, should hold quite a lot more water for the fish and me too!

civilian · Sep 6, 2025

What capacity are those water tanks? And are they both full? Most we can carry on our BX2230 3pt mounted forks is about 50 gals in a 275 gal tank. Jon

Shawn T. W. · Sep 7, 2025

The totes are 275 gallons, I only fill the front one to 50 gallons, as that's all I can lift with the loader, (I use a self-built 707 Lb rear ballast box with the trailer hitch built in) the rear one I put 150 gallons in, while tires on the little trailer are rated at 1000 Lbs each, it gets top heavy, and I have uneven hills, it's starts to slosh around in there ... In the trucking world we call it "surge" ...

While my little SCUT gets the job done, it's much better and faster than walking around with 5 gallon buckets of water, even though I have to take more loads than if I had a bigger tractor, like the old joke goes ... How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time!

Originally I was looking for a much bigger TLB, but in the spring of 2022 there wasn't much available ... I actually laughed at my local dealer when he suggested this little tractor, he told me I'd be quite surprised at what it could do! My brother has the next size up TLB, and his son had a BX TLB (SCUT), and he also told me that these little SCUT TLB's could do a lot, just gotta take smaller bites ...

Inch by inch, it's a cinch, yard by yard, it's just too hard!

Bob64 · Sep 8, 2025

Shawn T. W. said:
I got home late this morning, and put on the backhoe (BH) on my Little Baby Fergie as it was starting to sprinkle, I've only gotten .62” of rain in the past 2 months, so it was very welcome, but I was hoping to clean out the creek that has been dry, and hopefully widen, and maybe deepen it, it has what I call “bedrock” that I have dug down to before with the BH, but it's like sand stone . . .

I cut the creek banks back some to be able to get across a couple of years ago, as my tiny tires couldn't climb the banks, and just up stream of there I had tried digging a “watering hole” to have a deeper spot to suck/pump water out to water my trees … this was the deepest spot on my property, and earlier this year there were fish up to 3"+ in there, as it dried up, I saw raccoon tracks ... Hopefully I can get it deep enough, and enough water to get the fish through the next dry spell ...

This is what it looked like today … looking upstream ...

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This is the access I had dug to get to the watering hole, but heavy rains washed it out, as the back pasture drains into the creek …

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So I turned around, and started to make it accessible, as I wanted 2 ways in/out, in case I got stuck … the other way in/out was the lower end of the creek …

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I noticed the deer have been trying to paw at this one spot that was damp, I think I'm gonna try to dig out that spot if I can, not sure if it's a seep or maybe a spring … ? But wanted to get the other stuff done before I get it too wet in there!

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Once I got down in the creek bed, I started downstream, scooping up the rock and gravel that had accumulated …

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Once cleaned out, I turned around and was able to get the tips of the Piranha Tooth Bar under the edge of a lip of some of the “bedrock” and I broke up several pieces!

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Turned around and tried to get it with the thumb, but, couldn't get a good grip on it, or lift it high enough …

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So I tried the bucket, and just barely got it wedged in there to carry it off to a pile I'm making a back stop for my rifle range . . .

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Here in the northeast where we get a fair amount of rain & snow I have seen more than once where we use any flat rocks to put on the wheel tracks where we cross any creeks on a regular basis. Of course where I live I have way more flat rocks then I want except when I need them.

I know & can appreciate your effort since many years ago I had a Kubota B7200 (17 hp) and did an awful lot work with it. After I reached a point where my projects were too big for it I traded up for a 2nd hand L3010 Kubota (approx. 30hp). There are times when I had kept my b7200 for certain projects even though I certainly enjoy my L3010.