Rake landscape rake

[jand38]

I need to know if I can be successfuly using a landscape rake to pick up branches from pencil size to 2 in dia. some being a foot long some being 3ft long . I have a 4 acre area that has more trees than I want to count and the ground is always covered with limbs and wife just quit picking them up so I must come up with a successful plan
I am to old to do it the hard way so with all the vast experence from east coast to west coast I bet some one can solve my problem. MD

 

[Toolguy]

It sounds like a good idea to me. I would give it a try. Much easier to pick them up if they are gathered together in piles. Better than bending over for each branch. Some type of skid shoes or depth wheels on the rake would keep it from tearing up the grass. A regular, solid rear blade might even work if you don't have a landscape rack. I have done similiar things with the front blade on my JD 318. The trick is to keep it just off of the ground so it doesn't dig in. Good luck.

 

[InlineDieselFan]

It will certainly be easier than picking up each by hand. I cleared an acre or so area then landscape raked it, there were some 3"-6" pieces that mucked up the project so those couple of pieces were done by hand. When I had actual small branch pieces they picked up well. I did have to 'empty' the rake often, and I went in several directions. My project and amount and type of material sounds like a much bigger problem, but it worked and my back thanked me.

I would rather pick up 50-100 branches by hand than thousands.

steve

 

[Youare]

This will work as long as you have a set of gauge wheels. Set your wheels so the rake clears the ground by an inch or so. As you catch branches they will bunch up in front of the rake. You have to be careful the pile in front of the rake will get big enough where some of the branches will dig right into the ground. You can probably catch most of the branches with a landscape rake and then finish it up with a leaf rake.

I tried using my rake to move large piles of raked leaves from the lawn to the edge of the driveway. The leaves were a little wet and heavy. I looked back and found that in one place the grass was being pulled out by just the friction of the wet leaves.

Randy

 

[deereman64]

The land rake does a good job clearing between the trees. My first attempt was with the guage wheels to stop the digging in.Worked well, but I ended up backing into a tree and bending the shaft. Also I have Deere 2210 and that has a hst cooling fan underneath, that can get quite easily destroyed with a rogue stick, so be careful backing up over a dumped pile of sticks etc.

 

[Thomas]

Morning jand38.
When I try it had to keep watchful out so limb & branch didn't get caught between the tines which might dig into the ground and bend tine...also roots if the ground was uneven.

 

[Boiler74]

I use my rake for this all the time. I don't have guage wheels..... but I'm not trying to take care of the turf too much in these areas. I do, however, remove every other tine. It works better, and doesn't clog up with branches as much. I found myself getting off the tractor to kick the sticks out before getting smart and removing every other tine.

Hope that helps.

J.