mower service for pasture

[AllenF]

OK, so today I was bush hogging the pasture until the universal broke, and I said to my self, I really need to find some better way of doing this.  What I have a problem with is not the grass (the horses keep the grass eat to the ground)  it is with the sweet gum, blackberry and like bush and trees that pop up every year.  I have 2 4D but it is a bigger pain to spray than to cut.   My question, it there a critter out there that eats the broad leaf plants and not the grass as we need all the grass we can grow.  Are there any ideas for a new family member out there?

[iddee]

Goats

[Kathyp]

you might want to keep those blackberries for the bees :-)

what size bush hog?  i take down small trees with mine.  or is it just the time it takes?

[AllenF]

I had a goat once.  He loved the grass as much as the horses.   If there was a breed that preferred the trees over the grass.

[AllenF]

And on the bush hog, 6' I think.   It will drop lots of trees.   But when you cut a sweet gum, you will have 6 come up from the little stump left.  God's curse to the pasture.  So after several years, you have a whole lot of little sweet gums.

[jgaito]

 But when you cut a sweet gum, you will have 6 come up from the little stump left. 

it's not very cheap but a product called "sucker stopper" might cure that.  if not, cut the tree, drill a few holes down into the stump and fill the holes with pure glysophate (uncut roundup)   it's not toxic but cover the stump so rain and the animals can't get to it anyway.  i've been able to kill off holly, mimosa and scrub oaks with this method where nothing else would work.

[AllenF]

In 14 acres, I guess there are 1,231,155,456,321 very little stumps. 

[Irwin]

 But when you cut a sweet gum, you will have 6 come up from the little stump left. 

it's not very cheap but a product called "sucker stopper" might cure that.  if not, cut the tree, drill a few holes down into the stump and fill the holes with pure glysophate (uncut roundup)   it's not toxic but cover the stump so rain and the animals can't get to it anyway.  i've been able to kill off holly, mimosa and scrub oaks with this method where nothing else would work.

Thank's I'll put that on the back burner for when I need it.

[Keith13]

could you not disc the fields every year or so? i have a cousin who raises cows he disc his fields everyfew years to keep the soil compaction down he says it helps his grass as well

Keith

[Bee Happy]

it's not very cheap but a product called "sucker stopper" might cure that.  if not, cut the tree, drill a few holes down into the stump and fill the holes with pure glysophate (uncut roundup)   it's not toxic but cover the stump so rain and the animals can't get to it anyway.  i've been able to kill off holly, mimosa and scrub oaks with this method where nothing else would work.

Ha! I tried planting several times, and now I'm keeping my eyes open for a mimosa that no one will miss when I dig it up and transplant it.

[kingbee]

There is a thingy called a hydraulic hatchet.  It looks like a real hatchet but is hollow and hooks to the hose on a back pack Roundup sprayer.  Whap the sweetgum trunk with the hatchet and sink the blade in a little then hit the trigger and Roundup mix goes into the wound through holes in the hollow blade.  Never saw a small green and growing tree survive this treatment.
only takes a couple of seconds to "treat" a tree too.

[AllenF]

That sounds like a cool idea for big trees.