New Rock Bucket

[DeeDubya]

I bought this Armstrong Ag rock bucket to help with clearing prickly pear and of course rocks. I'm hoping the teeth on this bucket will grab the pear and tear them out by the roots. My regular bucket just slides over them. This is their smallest at 60" but a hefty 600 lbs. It's designed to sit flat and slide under the rocks. Anyone else try one of these. Can't wait to try it on the pear which are difficult to deal with.

 

[scoutcub]

looks good. A rock bucket is on my 2buy list.....

 

[jinman]

I think you'll be happy with that rock bucket design for grubbing up prickly pear cactus. I'm not sure how well it will work as a rock bucket because of how close the tines are spaced. If you have very dry loose soil, it will probably be great. Clay or wet soils will be a challenge to get the bucket to shed everything except the rocks. It's always a tradeoff and your bucket looks to be very good for lots of chores. If you put a simple thumb grapple on it, you'll double its usefulness too.

 

[DeeDubya]

This property is on a bedrock dome. Beneath the 2-3" of soil is solid rock. So this bucket will just slide on top and not penetrate any soil to speak of. As resilient as these native plants are, they are able to grow and prosper, but their root system just penetrates cracks in the rock. I still intend to sharpen the tines a little to get a better grip on the pear. Should work on Holly and some other brushy plants too.

 

[Midniteoyl]

Nice! Add a grapple :thumbsup:

 

[aginn]

As a happy grapple owner, I concur.
That said. Nice bucket. If that won't do the job for you, then nothing mechanical will.

Good luck and let us know how it works for you.

 

[creekbend]

Nice attachment. Best wishes.

 

[Tim Tucker]

How did the rock bucket work on the prickly pear? I have some land in Burnet and am thinking about using one on the larger plants, and spraying smaller ones. Any feedback would be greatly appreciated.

 

[DeeDubya]

I haven't had a chance to use it. I had to first put these brackets on so it will fit my Branson's quick attach. Branson's QA is good but it's hard to find attachments ready to go. Hopefully I'll get it up to the place this weekend.

 

[DeeDubya]

How did the rock bucket work on the prickly pear? I have some land in Burnet and am thinking about using one on the larger plants, and spraying smaller ones. Any feedback would be greatly appreciated.

I will spray some of those that are hard to get to with the tractor, but it just takes a long time for them to die. I understand Dow Surmount is supposed to be good but I don't have a license to buy it. What do you plan to spray with?

 

[Tim Tucker]

I have an applicators license so I can buy the chemicals, not sure if I'll use Remedy or Surmount. I have a friend who has a spraying company, gonna see which one he likes and go with it. I'll let you know what I find out. I would like to use the rock bucket on bigger pear and in areas where the pear is pretty dense, and then spot spray the smaller ones. I agree, it can take a long time for them to die, and then you have a dead plant that is not very attractive, and taking up space where grass could grow. That's why I was thinking about a mix of digging and spraying. I can rent a skid steer with a bucket for about a $1000 for a week, so I'm thinking about taking off a week sometime this summer and seeing what I can get done. I'll let you know on the chemicals, there is a pretty good brochure and pamplet by TAMU on pear control with spraying. Google or You Tube Brush Busters Prickly Pear Control or something like it and you'll find it if you haven't already. Thanks for the info, talk with you later.

 

[DeeDubya]

I've been using this attachment to drag out many of the pear. It's a 3pt adaptor for the FEL which has a 6' rake attached. I can reach in under trees and brush, drop the rake over the pear and back out. It tears them out by the roots and I then push them into a pile where I can pick them up with the bucket. It is time consuming but is the best way I've found to get at the hard to reach places.

 

[DeeDubya]

How did the rock bucket work on the prickly pear? I have some land in Burnet and am thinking about using one on the larger plants, and spraying smaller ones. Any feedback would be greatly appreciated.

I took it to the property this weekend and hooked it up. I was concerned about my measurements on the QA brackets but they worked. I dropped it in front of a few pear and put the FEL in "float". Being that heavy, the bucket lies flat and catches the root as low as possible. It works great. I even pushed out some Holly. Now to find some time to use it. These days, by noon it gets too hot to stay on the tractor and bake.