Spike Tooth Harrow

[daBear]

When would you use a spike tooth harrow versus a chain drag harrow?

I have decided on using a harrow next spring to break up some ground for re- seeding and to rough up some hard packed bare spots. Just a couple of acres to work with, but one harrow or the other will be useful at different times of the year for fertilizing, seeding, etc.

Spike or Chain?

 

[Fossil Farm]

Neither is really used to "break up ground." Depending on the ground conditions you have, you are looking at plow and disc or disc if it is mostly bare ground. The more sod you have, the best bet is plowing first.

Harrows are mostly used just before planting to "smooth" the surface enough for the planter to make good ground contact if no other soil conditioner equipment is used. A spike tooth harrow will leave ridges, so if it is an area you plan to mow as "yard," it would not be my first choice.

Soils conditions, such as crusting problems, can influence what final measures are used before planting too. If you are going to hand seed, you will want the ground smoother than what most spike tooth harrows can do if it will remain sod for some time, for uses other than hay.

 

[mark.r]

I just used a spike tooth harrow primarily to cut up and spread A LOT of horse manure in my pastures. Because we have had virtually no rain in the Mid Atlantic this summer I had it set in the must aggressive with the teeth pointed foward (towards the tractor) as a pulled it. It did an excellent job at dealing with the manure and also did a great job at dethatching the dead grass. It left next to no "furrows" in the fields and now since we had and hour or two of hard rain you can hardly tell anything has been done to the fields with the exception of the manure is still spread out and the grass looks "disturbed". If we were not having such a drought season on the east coast I would not hesitate to overseed right now doing nothing else but running a core aerator prior to spreading. I would not have set the teeth so agressively if I was dragging my yard but I would not hesitate to use it in a less agressive setting to dethatch some of the dead grass.

 

[daBear]

Thought so. I can run the teeth in the less aggressive direction and I believe it will work fine. The chain harrow will be a pain to move unless you put it in a 3 pt frame. Thanks.

 

[ScottOkla]

My new spike-tooth did an excellent job scratching up the soil for clover planting last week. gopher and mole mounds disappear in one pass also, unless they have been there long enough for sod to cover them, then it takes 5 or 6 passes.

When the ground was wet, my spike-tooth left little furrows, but when dry on top, the surface seemed to shatter enough to not leave the ridges, especially after the next rain.

If you have thick sod, and have larger ridges and dips, the spike-tooth won't do what you need. To me, the key is the amount of sod you have.

I have no experience with a chain drag harrow.

 

[MrJimi]

I made one a long time ago ( spike harrow ) to level some dips and low spots and hopefully pull out some small roots from brush and it did all of that just fine with very impressive results, I made mine from scrap RE BAR and it's 7 feet wide and 5 feet long and real heavy
I tried the chain link fence and all that did was ride over everything and did nothing for me
Jim

 

[mark.r]

+1 with everything everyone said. I have the same spike tooth that Scott has with the exception I believe his is 6ft. wide and mine is 7.5 ft wide so mine might be a bit heavier. correct me if I am wrong Scott. I believe mine is rated at aprox. 250-300lbs. The big deciding factor for me was not having to continually get off the tractor and unclog the chain harrow and/or buy 500 dollor three point frame for the chain harrow on top of the price of the harrow. I was so impressed with how the Marten's harrow worked for the manure I contact Mr. Marten directly and told him feel free to use my pictures and quote on his web site which he did.

 

[daBear]

Sounds like a winner. I have Bermuda grass which runs when it grows, then there are bare spots here and there because this is a new lawn. So next spring I want to re seed the Bermuda and break up the bare spots. When I harrow the Bermuda it will break up the runners and they will grow where they fall. The harrow can be used periodically to re work difficult spots and to de thatch when the grass gets to going strong.

I appreciate the information. There are pictures of my side yard in the photo library here under Kubota. For some reason I could not link to those photos in this post.

Ah Haaaa, figured out how to display images. See, I ain't no ordinary dummy.