Hello. I own about 90 acres. I need something to groom my trails and visit food plots in the woods. I am wondering if it would be better to but a tractor to use of get an attachment for my quad.
My help would be qppreciated. There are steep hill, rocks, logs, etc...

 

myself i would go with a pull behind brush mower they seem like there more stable then asmall tractor would be .i made a pull behind mower out of an old rider with abroke tranny works good and cheap

 

Tractors are notoriously unstable devices on anything but level ground. If the ground is rough, forget using a tractor. I have a very nice JD 1050, but my farm is so rough there are maybe 20 acres total (out of 150) that I can take the tractor to, and live to tell about it.

I also have a Swisher pull behind mower that I haul behind the quad, but be aware that it's ground clearance is no better than any other mower, so you may have trouble getting it to where you need to mow. I ended up having to smooth my trails out enough to get the mower across.


--John

02 Cat 500i
96 Big Bear
90 Lotus Esprit
82 Honda CBX
70 ZR1 Corvette

and a whopper of an insurance bill...

 

Probably the best way to groom a wooded trail is to ride it regularly with your ATV. To blaze a trail you might have to get out some pruners or a machete and cut away some brush or saplings. When it comes to navigating in areas of steep hills, rocks, logs, etc., an ATV would be a much better choice over a tractor (which could be downright dangerous in those situations). Pull behind ATV mowers are OK as long as when dealing with hills you are going up / down the steeper hills rather than across the side of the hill. However if there are a lot of rocks in the areas where you mow and it’s inconvenient to drive around them then the ATV mower is not a good choice (the maximum clearance on the ones I know about is around 6 inches). Also you have to take into consideration how many acres you will be mowing. Generally when pulling an ATV mower you are restricted to 5 mph or less.

If all you are trying to keep clear are trails and the trails are pretty much free of rocks and tend to grow up in grass / weeds / brush you may find one of these really handy (I own a 14 HP model and I find it very useful).

Deanz400, did you make any modifications to your riding mower with the broken tranny to turn it into a pull behind? That is an interesting concept. I've always felt my 12.5HP Swisher ATV mower was underpowered, but I have an 18 HP rider that has a broken transmission...

 

no modifacations really nessasary just took off any excess stuff like the seat and made sure the tranny would free wheel , like take the chain off the drive system the front was a little harder i used castors from northern hydralics and my dad did someting like swapping the front spindles around , side to side and his pulls like a hay wagon system mine has more manuvarability then his .. alls we do is turn the key from behind the mower and have it set to the heught you want ,get on and pull it around i also have it set up to pull ether strait behind or off to the side works good . i've got another old rider set up to mow heavier grass and light brush . [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-smile.gif[/img]

 

Thanks for the tip Deanz400, the 18HP Lowes lawn tractor I have was a freebie (except for the cost of putting a new starter and battery in it) and worked fine for one season, until something broke in the transmission. Now it’s sitting in the field rusting away. I think I’ll salvage it and put it to use like you did…