How to Brush Hog (or Bush Hog) for the First Time...10 Tips That Make it Easier and Safer

hi it's mike with asktractormike.com and backup me today is a field of mine that could really use mowing and I'm getting ready to brush hog or a bush hog if you will a bush hog he's a brand name but I'm getting ready to take a tractor to cutter and knock this down I'm doing a this video really kind of targeted to people that have never run a brush hog before never run a rotary cutter and you and your you're getting ready to get in the field for the first time and you're a little intimidated there's a lot going on when you're when your brush hogging and so I'm going to talk today about number one about how to get ready for it and what to expect it how how do you get the tractor in and get it going and then number two I'm going to give you ten tips that might make the experience just a little better and if you're a seasoned operator some of these you might not think about so stay with me first off today if you grew up on a farm I think most of us were itching to get on a tractor from a very young age and most of us our fathers didn't let us on a tractor and a brush hog the first time they they would let us drive the tractor around with them on it and then pretty soon we were driving a tractor around by ourselves and then it was a a smaller step to hook a brush hog or a rotary cutter on the back of the tractor and go cut with it but we had some tractor seat time before we were out there trying to cut with a rotary cutter and I feel real sorry for folks that buy a tractor and a cutter and they've never been out in the field and that's their first experiences go right out in the field and try to navigate all that around because there's a lot going on with the brush hog and a lot to watch out for here's a list of things to check both on your cutter and tractor before you cut consult your owners manual for more things I've done videos on most of these processes okay so now what do we do when we go to the field well the first thing I'm telling you on a tractor with a brush hog you may hate seatbelts and not wear them but if your brush hogging put that seatbelt on because there is a danger it's it's it's not a big danger but if a rock comes out from under that brush hog and kongs you in the back of the head and knocks you off and you know dive into the ground it's not gonna be pretty what your family finds when they find you in the field so put that seat belt on a lot of lot of tractors will shut the engine if you fell off but some don't so so make sure that seatbelts on so if anything it happens you stay on that tractor where you're safe when to engage the power take-off well first off there's you need to know there's two kinds of power take-off there's a fully independent power take-off where you just either throw a switch or a lever and your PTO comes on you don't have to touch the clutch and there are some PTO s that usually have what's called a two-stage clutch where you have to clutch to engage the power take-off and a two-stage clutch means if you push the clutch all the way down everything stops the power take-off and the ground speed of the tractor if you engage the PTO and let it up halfway the blades start spinning and letting it up the rest of the way and the tractor moves and and the opposite is true if you push it a half way down the tractor start stops its movement PTO continues to spin push it all the way down the PTO stops and the tractor stay stopped so that's a two-stage clutch now when you engage your power take-off here's another thing your brush hog is gonna have one or two types of protection in case you hit something that doesn't move it's gonna have a shear pin which is just a light gauge bolt that goes through that's going to shear off and it's going to let everything spin free and then you got to get off a tractor and put another pin in or it's gonna have a slip clutch and slip clutches have to be slipped from time to time to make sure they're worked or barney stinson barney so whenever you say that from time to time to make sure they work but when you're kicking in the power take-off try to gradually ease it in if it's a two-stage clutch you're gonna slowly let up on the clutch and tell everything catches and starts going around if it's a lever like I'll my tractor if I just throw the lever and I sure sure pin every time but if I gradually ease that thing in those blades just start spinning like this and then they're gone and I'm fine so be real yeah very deliberate when you engage the power take-off now you want to find the sweet spot of when to engage your power take-off I usually in my mind think you don't want to engage it at full throttle you don't want to engage it and idle or you may kill the tractor I usually think the sweet spot is somewhere around 1200 to 1600 rpm depending on whether you're in tall grass or not and so you're gonna rev the engine up a little bit to that speed and then gradually engage your pto or your blades and then you just drive but I'm gonna give you ten tips here that will make that driving a little less stressful because there's a lot of things to watch out for and a lot of things going on when you've got all that spinning back there and you're trying to watch the ground and you're trying to navigate the tractor and not hit anything or tip over or anything like that so here are the ten things I'd recommend to make your experience a little bit easier number one I'd recommend taking your tractor bucket off if you've got a quick attached bucket drop that thing in the weeds somewhere and then take it off because especially if you're a new operator that's that tip of that bucket sticks way out there and when you make a turn you could encounter a tree or a fence post and knock something down number two and this is kind of common sense drive slow if you're a hydrostatic drive put it in a low gear and creep along a while til you get comfortable if you're on a tractor with a gear drive transmission put it put it in a lower range in the lower gear and lower Numerical and and and and just kind of creep along until you get comfortable that's number two number three of course this is common sense watch for obstructions but not only down on the ground but up above too because if you've got a roll bar and you go over a lone limb or I had a guy one time went through a one of those guy wires on a telephone pole you know those wires that keep the telephone lines or the power lines tight and it tried to peel the whole top operator area of the tractor off when it encountered the roll bar the roll bars are to protect you if it rolls over if you encounter something that doesn't move with that roll bar it could be ugly so be watching down below and up above a lot lot to think about there watch out for animals if you've got cattle a lot of times a mama cow hides the calves in the tall weeds where your brush hog and sometimes those calves don't know to leave so it's best to get all the livestock out you can number four don't start in tall wheat start your blades going if you can sometimes you can't do this away from the tall weeds and lack of the edge of the yard and then drive into the tall weeds so everything's kind of moving when you get started number five watch your temperature gauge if specially in stuff like this where there's seed heads like this those will shatter as the tractor goes over it these are not real ripe yet so they're not as bad but with another few weeks and they'll shatter and they'll they'll suck right into the radiator and clog up your radiator and pretty soon your engine is getting hot so keep an eye on your tractor temperature gauge ever ever a few minutes while your brush Auggie number six get some kind of sun protection there's nothing that'll cook you any faster than being out on a 90 degree day on a tractor seat but nothing to protect you from the Sun if you got a cab that's great if not I really like Rhino hide canopies and I sell them on my website the neat thing about them you can take them off if you're gonna go cut a trail back in the woods so get a canopy if you're on a budget an old car hood will work but your neighbors will make fun of you number seven keep people and pets away from where your brush hogging and livestock to if you can you can't always do that but I had a friend the other day that was brush hogging actually I was a guy did the video with where we helped start his tractor who ran over a wire and it cut up the part of that wire and through a piece of wire through the polyurethane fuel tank and started the fuel leaking out so if I'd have been up a little higher head level that could have been kind of ugly so you never know where that stuff's gonna go so keep everybody away while your brush hogging the next thing is if especially if you're new operator go down the center of the feel first until you get comfortable with how much that brush hog sticks out past the wheels and most of them stick out past the wheels a little waste you don't want to be next to a fence when you start trying to mow out a center and just mow back and forth you can flat ground if you can't and and get the feel of what it feels like to brush hog on a flat area where there's no obstructions or anything like that number nine avoid draws valleys if you when you're running the brush hog here's your tractor here's your brush hog and here's a tail wheel if you start down a valley and you get to the bottom and your tractor starts up when it starts up the tail wheels still coming down it puts that PTO in an awful bind and you can do real damage to your tractor your brush hog or both or at least a PTO shaft if you mow through a draw like that so mow mow on the edge if you can if you have to most through it kind of mow through it at an angle but I don't like to mow through drawers at all and it could because you can do some serious damage to a tractor or a brush hog when you do that and finally number 10 watch your butt watch your watch your cutter when you turn that cutter is sticking way out there and probably further than you think and if you make especially when you make a tight turn that thing is swinging around real fast and if you've got a tree or a fence poster or anything that's that's out on the way just a little bit you're gonna hammer that thing so keep an eye out to the back of you when your brush hog in and make sure that you clear all the obstructions when you turn and turn slow you know invariably when you get in the field I've heard lots of stories from my viewers about things that they ran over a mattress I've seen all kinds of wire tied up and brush hogs I've done it myself you could run over a stump you don't want to but but a lot of rocks I've run over a ton of rocks and and most brush hogs will take a few rock hits in fact most of them will take a lot of rock hits we my dad liked to mow really really low and I hated it we'd pick up rocks not only the rocks that were above ground but we'd kick rocks out of the ground and cut them up and I hated that and it's actually better on your grass if you mow a little higher like at least three inches four inches is better and let the grass grow back and and and help you out there so but invariably you're gonna grind up a few rocks and it sounds like when you're we haven't been an experienced operator the world's coming to an end but you're probably not going to tear up the cutter and you're probably going to be alright so those those are the things I recommend when you're running you're running a brush hog I've done a bunch of other videos about brush hogs and here's some links to a couple of my favorites right here and if you'd like to subscribe to my youtube channel click the mic face icon up at the corner and make sure you check the bell so you get notified when I post future videos thanks for watching

Channel: Tractor Mike

Views: 233,511

Rating: 4.8736959 out of 5

Keywords: how to bush hog, how to brush hog, how to run a rotary cutter, how to run a topper, how to run a slasher, how to turn on a bush hog, how to turn on a brush hog, how to run a brush hog, how to run a bush hog, woods cutter, land pride, bush hog, rhino, deere, kubota, mahindra, kioti, how to bush hog small trees, how to bush hog a steep hill, tractor time with tim, how to brush hog a field, bush hogging, kapper outdoors, rotary cutter, how to use bush hog, how to use a brush hog

Id: USSFq5I6B6U

Length: 10min 45sec (645 seconds)

Published: Thu Jun 06 2019