Rock Harvesting

[Jibber]

Ahh, that time of year. Time to dig up icebergs in the lawn. This one started out about the size of your fist protruding from the lawn.

 

[GregJ]

That thing is huge...... Did your 3130 and BH90 handle it OK?

Greg

 

[Jibber]

It was wedged in between other rocks.. my property is extremely rocky. That made it a bit tricky. I had to change tractor positions several times, but after about a half hour It popped up. What really amazed me was the fact that the loader easily picked the thing up. I did a number on the lawn moving it to it's new home in the front yard. The lawn is still soft and the added weight put some good tracks out there. But it wasn't the first time. Here's another shot of it going into it's new location.

 

[JayC]

That is a giant rock! /forums/images/graemlins/crazy.gif

 

[GregJ]

That's one incredible machine!

Greg

 

[Nasty135]

Jibber , So it sounds as if you would have been caught between the proverbial ROCK & Hard place
if not for that powerful unit you a sitting on, BTW is that a look of awe on your face or are you
concerned that your back wheels are going to come of the ground? /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

Isn't it nice to have equipment to handle the job...

 

[TBAR]

Wow.............what a job!!!

I knew someone that had one like that. They decided to jack hammer 12" off the top and overfill with dirt.


TBAR

 

[raynman]

Jibber,

Wow, well two weeks ago at my place up north I did about the same thing, moving small rocks with the FEL. I found one that was sticking out about 12", after playing with it for a 1/2 hour I got it out of the ground, but also bent the top edge of my new bucket trying to pick it up. Wife kept telling me I would never pick it up, but that just made me work on it harder. I did finally move it to where it is resting now and will soon be part of a flower bed boarder.

Great pictures, /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif
Nice tractor /forums/images/graemlins/tongue.gif

 

[Jibber]

</font><font color="blue" class="small">( Isn't it nice to have equipment to handle the job... )</font>

You said it!

Two years ago, life before TLB, I spent the better part of three days working a rock half that size out of the ground. I actually had to use a hydraulic jack just to get it to ground level so that I could drag it off with a movers dolly. That's what convinced me to invest in a tractor with a loader. The backhoe was added last fall, and this is my first real rock removing season. This past weekend, I removed 7 large rocks and numerous smaller ones. I had one that wouldn't physically fit in the loader bucket so I had to use the backhoe to "roll" it to a new location. Time consuming, but it beat dragging the thing. I need to fashion some sort of skid for moving these rocks.

I WAS concerned about bending the bucket because I have the standard duty square back bucket. But it held up well.

Not sure what a rock like that weighs, but I wasn't worried about doing any "handstands" on the front tires. Between the loaded tires and the backhoe I should have plenty of counterweight.

 

[boustany]

Big rock like that I dig a deeper hole beside it, nudge it in, and cover it up. A couple feet below the surface & nobody knows.

I've got loads of rock. Not far from me is a hoidy toidy development where then pay thousands for big rocks. I'm thinking of starting a 'pick your own' rock garden.

 

[Jibber]

Yeah, I thought about that too!

Neighbors of my in-laws in Ohio paid a fortune for a "decorative" rock about 3 feet in diameter. Shoot, I could make a fortune with the rocks I have around here. I have some that will never go anywhere, one the size of a BUS in the woods behind the house.

My property is criss-crossed with rock walls built by Dutch farmers in the 1600's. I also have a stone chamber on my property that was apparently used as a root cellar (although there are those who think these things were some sort of Druid ceremonial chambers). You can stand up inside of it, like a huge rock igloo built into the hillside. I constantly wonder how these people managed to farm this land and move all these rocks around.

Strong backs and an OX if you could get one!

 

[SPIKER]

Ya, here in Ohio, there are lots of rocks to buy. most of them are not cheap either, we have lots of dirt clay and such but mostly the rock is sand stone shale type stuff that is not good for walls or such. lots of small fist sized stuff too but it is had to build a wall with them. I have some nice big bolders in my creek bed have bene removbing moving them but it takes a lot ot digging & pushing for most of them as there are pretty big, maybe 2 per pickup and no more other wise a 1/2 ton would be over loaded ... anyhow got to get soem rose of sharron bushes that my mom had, my bro dug them up today... moving them to my farm. most of them are family plantings and can be traced bakc 50~ plus years.

Mark M /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif

 

[rockquarry]

I have hundreds of limestone rocks that size in my rock pile that were excavated from where my house now sits.

for those of you that are curious I found this one the web, it list the weight of just about anything by cubic foot (limestone, granite, gravel ect) so now you can judge how much that rock weighs by measuring it and looking it up on the list. If you know what kind of rock that is.

http://www.reade.com/Particle_Briefings/spec_gra2.html

 

[JDgreen227]

Thanks for the information, I did a lot of fieldstone moving with my JD loader during the weekend, I was getting curious about how much some of them weighed. We have thousands of fieldstones of all sizes on our property, the people who originally farmed the land piled them up in the lane and when we had a new basement for an addition excavated in mid-2001---guess what was underground? The fieldstone foundation of a huge old two story house that burnt down in late 1948. It's a good thing I like rocks.... /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

 

[Jibber]

Wow, great site.

well, I guess I'm glad I got the bigger loader and backhoe for the Kubota!

 

[raynman]

rockquarry,

Thanks for the info, JDGreen227 and I were talking about finding a site like this just the other day.

Thanks /forums/images/graemlins/crazy.gif /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif /forums/images/graemlins/tongue.gif