Lets talk about forest mulchers

[XM16E1]

I have a new Bobcat T770 on order and am debating getting a forestry mulcher attachment to go with it. Would be pretty much for personal use. The immediate job would be putting in a 320 yard road that is densely filled with 3 to 5 inch spruce trees. In the future I may put in another similar road, except it would be about a mile long. Plus random projects around the house property.

I've heard renting these mulchers can be very expensive, upwards of $1000 per day. How much could really be mulched in one day? I'm considering buying one but hesitant and spending 30k+. I could probably justify 10k but not sure if there are any decent options. Another factor is I live in Alaska. Hard to find used equipment compared to the lower 48. What do you guys think?

 

[mcfarmall]

Forestry mulchers are certainly an awesome attachment but they are also very expensive to buy or rent. I guess you'd have to figure how much you would use it on a consistent basis. I typically rent the items that I seldom use, such as a mini ex...I just don't dig enough holes to justify owning a backhoe/mini ex.

 

[mark02tj]

I realize that you're in Alaska.....

Around here I can rent a T750 with a mulcher for about $3200 / wk. I was told by a guy that's in the mulching business that you can do 1-2 acres per day with a setup like that. If you're looking at getting one, you can probably do your road in a day or two. It might be more cost effective for you to just hire it out. If you buy one, I think that the maintenance on those things is pretty costly. Tooth replacement, hydraulic issues, etc.

Have you considered getting a tree puller for the front of the Bobcat? A machine like that T770 would be a great fit with a tree puller and 3-5" spruce trees would not be much of a match for it. I have a "Notch Tree Puller" that I use on the front of my tractor. It's really too much for my tractor, but still does a good job for what I bought it for (invasive honeysuckle and buckthorn).

Advantages of the mulcher is that it's a lot quicker than pulling/cutting trees and you don't have to contend with burn piles or chipping. At the end of the day, you can look at what it's done and say "WOW! I've cleared a lot of property!". But, it also leaves little stumps at ground level. For the kind of stuff that I deal with, you have to treat the stump with Roundup or some other herbicide to keep it from resprouting. I don't know if you'd have to do that with your spruce trees or not.

Advantage of the tree puller is that you're pulling the majority of the root system out of the ground so no herbicides to deal with.

There's a YouTube channel called "Upstate Brush Control" that does a LOT of forestry mulching. They're located in South Carolina, so about as different from Alaska as can be. But, the videos should give you a pretty good indication of what kind of job a skidsteer with a mulching head can do. They talk about repairs and planning a job to not be "hard on the machine". Their videos are also a good indicator on how many times you might have to go over a particular area to get a good clean up job.

Good luck!

 

[RalphVa]

The neighbor to the left had been renting out his property to various people the last 17-18 years. He finally came back a couple years ago. Since his woods behind the house were very overgrown, he hired an outfit to bring in one of those forest mulchers. Actually, it was a Cat with very heavy duty flail mower on the front. Took them a couple days doing about 2 acres.

In the meantime, it's taken my wife and I since October, 2019 to do about 5 acres of downed trees and invasives here.

Ralph

 

[i7win7]

Operating Techniques: Skid-Steer Forestry Mulcher - Tech Tips - Diamond Mowers - YouTube
Disc Mulcher or Drum Mulcher -Which is better for forestry work and land clearing - YouTube
Marshall Tree Saw - YouTube
Danuser Intimidator: Take Control of Your Land! - YouTube

Forestry mulchers usually require high flow hydraulics.
Like the Marshal tree saw , no spinning blade, flush cut - you'll need to haul off trees

Small trees, look into the Intimadator tree puller, thought it was to big for my B2650 went smaller

 

[mattg43]

I just hired a company with a Cat 299D and a forestry mulcher for my property earlier this month. he did about 1800ft of property line, intentionally leaving bigger trees for me, but I would guess an average of about 25' wide. The directive was "I want to keep big trees if I can, but I want to be able to get a tractor possibly my truck from this point back, and all the way across the back of the property". There were quite a few cedar and a few hardwood trees, the biggest I noticed walking it and looking around was probably 16" diameter but many dozens in the 4-8" range, and quite a few in the 8-12" range.

Took him less than 8 hours, and he was working on other areas as well... They charged $160 an hour

In short, unless you plan on doing it as a business, it is probably cheaper - even in Alaska - to rent or hire it done.


With that said, if I had the need or cash to have a skid steer and mulcher set up hanging around just for fun and use once a year or two, there is a relatively high probability that it would happen...