Road Side Mowing with a Sickle Bar

[Gordon Gould]

I spent the last couple afternoons doing my annual road side mowing. I do it late because of the large number of migrating birds that feed and rest in the high vegetation along the road and small fields during September and October. I use a 30 hp L3010 and a 7' sickle bar with a hydraulic lift cylinder

It reaches under trees nicely

It is good for up banks

down banks

Small field we keep rough

Not just weeds, great migrating bird habitat

gg

 

[diesel85]

Very nice! I like that road you got there.

I remember when I was a kid, that's all municipalities really used to tame the ditches and roadsides.

Now they use these 100+ hp huge tractors with boom flail mowers.

I thought the sickle bars did a fine job on a fuel-mizing 30 hp tractor.

I can't imagine how much a 100 hp tractor guzzles fuel with 48" boom flail mower.

 

[Sawyer Rob]

I have two sickle mowers. One is on an IH140 that the state of NY bought new to cut roadsides, it's a "belly" sickle mower. My buddy bought it from the state, and I got it from him.

The second one is a NH451 3-point mower, and I use it to cut around my ponds ect...

SR

 

[TerryR]

Nice post. Thanks.

 

[Smokeydog]

Nice job!

 

[Gordon Gould]

You don't see many sickle bars on here. It used to be anybody with mowing to do had one. Mine is 25 years old now and I'm still happy with it. Thanks for for the comments.

gg

 

[SmallChange]

Beautiful!

How do you keep the small field rough, and not reverting to forest? Occasional high mowing? It's always been a daydream of mine to have a few fields kept rough, with different kinds of plants, which I would mow yearly at different seasons.

 

[npalen]

I recall our neighbor mowing the roadsides back in the '50's with a sickle mower. It was a 2.0 horsepower.
I also recall mowing them myself with an 8N Ford and a New Idea PTO driven mower. My dad frowned a bit saying something like I didn't need to be mowing the whole township.

 

[Gordon Gould]

Beautiful!

How do you keep the small field rough, and not reverting to forest? Occasional high mowing? It's always been a daydream of mine to have a few fields kept rough, with different kinds of plants, which I would mow yearly at different seasons.

Maybe rough was the wrong term. It has a grass base and would be all grass if I mowed it several times a summer but it grows up with milkweed, golden rod, black berries, goats beard, and all kinds of other stuff if I only mow once in the fall.

gg

 

[Gordon Gould]

I recall our neighbor mowing the roadsides back in the '50's with a sickle mower. It was a 2.0 horsepower.
I also recall myself mowing them with an 8N Ford and a New Idea PTO driven mower. My dad frowned a bit saying something like I didn't need to be mowing the whole township.

For us it is good to have a clear place to cast the snow when plowing. And the snow settles a lot better if there isn't a bunch of brushy vegetation holding it up.

gg

 

[Oaktree]

You don't see many sickle bars on here. It used to be anybody with mowing to do had one. Mine is 25 years old now and I'm still happy with it. Thanks for for the comments.

Now that you mention it, I don't see many anymore either. Depending on who gets the contract with our town for roadside mowing it might be done with one...seems to vary one year to the next (and some years they don't do it at all).
I wouldn't mind having one if I could pick up a good used one cheap.

Maybe rough was the wrong term. It has a grass base and would be all grass if I mowed it several times a summer but it grows up with milkweed, golden rod, black berries, goats beard, and all kinds of other stuff if I only mow once in the fall.

That's more or less what I do on my property. There's one section, easily visible from the house that I do twice a year, rest gets done only in the fall for the same reasons you mention.
A sickle bar would be nice for the section that gets done twice...it's mostly grass and the bush-hog just knocks down probably half of it.

 

[Oaktree]

For us it is good to have a clear place to cast the snow when plowing. And the snow settles a lot better if there isn't a bunch of brushy vegetation holding it up.

Not to mention small trees crowding ever closer to the road.

 

[bearthebruce]

We have one for sale - an NH415. We don't really have a place to use it any longer. As best we know, it runs.. Probably needs some TLC. It is and had been kept indoors.

Located in SW Virginia - Floyd County. If any has interest, I will get photos and such for you. PM me.

We are not planning to put this on the sales threads at this time.

 

[Baby Grand]

Great photos, Gordon! The respect you have for your land and how it supports a web of wildlife is greatly appreciated. Since getting an NH451 a few years ago I haven't put much time on the brush hog. The sickle mower cuts our field much faster at lower power, using less fuel. It also lays the cuttungs down whole and spread out, providing filtered light for the new grasses to start regrowing the field quickly. The cuttings also make great mulch for our vegetable garden and are easy to collect with a rake and wagon. I also like that it doesn't indiscriminately pulverize all of the insects that live in the field. The field is also looking better - it was getting very uneven from the rows of cuttings that the hog left and the rows of half cut grass that the tires flattened before the cutter gets to them.

 

[Liquidsilver]

I always wonder how those sickle bars hold up against tougher terrain and rocks hiding in the grass. Probably why in my neck of the woods, they use a 15' batwing with one side disengaged.

 

[IndyIan]

I always wonder how those sickle bars hold up against tougher terrain and rocks hiding in the grass. Probably why in my neck of the woods, they use a 15' batwing with one side disengaged.

This summer a fellow with a ~40-50hp tractor and a side sickle mower must've got the contract for my municipal road. I run along the road and the sickle bar seemed to mow pop cans and plastic bottles quite well, and skipped over some higher stumps from the tree mangler thing the municipality uses to trim back branches. In years past it been a very dull flail mower on a much bigger tractor.

 

[JJT]

Nice job. When you get done, can you swing by and mow the bank on my pond?

 

[mo1]

The state highway department used to have 2WD open station tractors in the 50-90 HP range with a hydraulically-driven sickle mower bolted to one side to mow ditches. They also had guys on stand-on riding lawnmowers and guys with weedwhackers to get the areas too steep for the tractors. They got rid of pretty well all of those about 10-15 years ago in favor of ~130 HP cabbed MFWD tractors pulling 15' and 20' batwings. The only boom mowers I've seen are run by the electric co-op and run with the blades perpendicular to the ground to shave trees that get to close to the power lines.

You don't see too many sickle cutters out any more. About the only place sicklebars are used any more are on combine grain heads. I see an older self-propelled windrower with a sickle head or an old sickle Haybine occasionally, but it's been 10-15 years since I've seen anybody mow a ditch with a sicklebar and even longer since I've seen somebody cut a hay field with a plain sicklebar. Brush hogs or just spraying herbicide to "chemically mow" has replaced sickles for cutting ditches and disc mowers have replaced them for hay cutting. Sickle mowers are pleasant to use though, as they are quiet and raise little dust. They just aren't anywhere near as fast or forgiving to use compared to rotary mowers.

 

[big bubba]

admirable place you have, & that you give deference to wildlife in your management. take care on the slopes.