Plowing with a single horse

This topic has 13 replies, 3 voices, and was last updated 15 years, 5 months ago by Anonymous.

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May 11, 2009 at 6:19 pm #40546
Anonymous
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I’ve been hesitent about plowing with a single horse because I don’t know how much off set I can get with out geting side draft on my single tree and I’m afraid I wont be able to get Rosie to walk close enough to the furrow. Their is alot of info on plowing with a team, but not much barley any that I can find on plowing single. I’ve got an 8 inch plow so I know my Belgin mare can handle it but, since I’m going to be doing it as soon as the weather permits. I thought I would ask for advice form you guys.
Blessings to you all
Russs5099
May 11, 2009 at 7:21 pm #52313
Shepherd
Participant
russ I am not exp..ert on plowing. have plowed my garden and small corn patch for last three yrs with a single belgian mare she is apretty large girl. I set the single tree clevis all to the left of center and walk the horse on unplowed ground I also walk on unplowed ground no problem with side draft . As I use a oliver 02a single plow it is a 9inch plow the frow is to small to comfortably walk in works no problem. does not take horse long to learn where to walk. good luck Harold
May 12, 2009 at 7:58 am #52308
grey
Participant
I plow with an Oliver 10N and a single horse. The horse walks on the land, fairly close to the furrow. It can be a bit more challenging initially to plow with a single horse rather than with a team because walking “near” the furrow isn’t as cut-and-dried, isn’t as easy to teach, and isn’t as easy for a horse to remember as walking “in” the furrow. But it isn’t too tough and I feel that it might perhaps be a bit more rewarding than plowing with a team. But I’m a bit biased! 😀
If you and the horse are both fairly green at plowing single, I recommend you do one of two things:
Either have someone handle the lines while another person handles the plow, till the horse learns where he is supposed to walk
OR
Open a fairly straight furrow however you can and then drive the horse alongside the furrow, without the plow. Teach the horse to walk alongside the furrow and use the first furrow as a guideline. Drive the horse back and forth alongside the furrow several times till you find that you aren’t having to do much to guide him.
Then hitch to your plow and you shouldn’t have to do as much steering of the horse and can pay attention to your plowing. When the horse knows where to walk and shifts down into a nice slow granny-gear and you’ve got your plow set up right, everything goes smoothly and it’s a really beautiful thing!
Good luck! I love to see people working single horses.
Oh, one other thing: single horse plows are smaller than those plows designed to be drawn by a team. They cut a narrower furrow so it will be a little more difficult for you walking behind the plow in the furrow. When things get going smoothly, you might try stepping out of the furrow and walking on the land with the horse and just putting one hand on the plow to steady it. If your horse doesn’t go quite slow enough, you will find yourself stumbling in the narrower furrow and giving unintentional signals with the lines. This moves the horse and frustrates everyone. So for maximum success, keep the horse slow.
Edited to add: sorry Shepherd, didn’t see that you had already covered the narrow furrow issue.
May 12, 2009 at 8:12 am #52309
grey
Participant
All of which didn’t address your question about side draft. Sorry. Got all excited about someone wanting to plow single.
I’d say just try it. If you find that you are fighting the plow too much, move the clevis to the left or kick the heel of the beam over if you have an adjustable beam plow. If you can’t get it to straighten up and fly right, you might have a worn landside. You could also possibly get a horizontal bridle on the front of your plow that has a wider range of adjustment. Some plows only have a few holes in the horizontal bridle, some have many. So much of the adjustment on plow performance is most effectively done as trial-and-error rather than trying to reason it out ahead of time.
Don’t get me wrong – measuring and doing the math is good when trying to figure out if you should buy that old plow or if it’s only going to be good for decoration in someone’s garden. But if you’re sure the beam isn’t sprung and there seems to be enough wing and landside and suction on the bottom, hitch up to it and give it a whirl. The proof is in the puddin.
May 14, 2009 at 3:03 pm #52314
Anonymous
Inactive
I get excited to so dont worry. I’ve got another thread going on starting a saddle horse to drive because I need a team on the wagon and want to get a spreader going but my garden spot is in what we call the orchard and it is a 2 1/2 acre patch with 9 peech trees in it so its got some tight spots and I thought a single would work better and its what I’ve got. my plow is pretty good I bought it a the Kingman KS fall draft sale (awsome sale if your a bargin hunter for equipment I paid 25 bucks for it) I think it was a flower bed reject because it had a pine land scape timber for a beem. but it must have been sitting on cement because the share molbord frog and land slide were good. It had the verticle adjustment but no horivontal and the handles were there but bad. I took it all apart looking for some way to ID the thing with no luck, although I have have seen simaler plows in the small farmers journal clasic equipment photos. I replaced the handles fitted an oak 6×6 in for the beam and made a horizontal adjustment for it. Man am I ready to try it.
Russ5099
“Respect those who seek the truth, be wary of those who claim to have found it:Mark Twain”
May 14, 2009 at 5:16 pm #52310
grey
Participant
Since you aren’t sure how your plow is going to perform, I’d say have someone else drive the horse at first so you can focus on feeling your plow.
So it’s a wood beam. Did you have the original beam to use as a pattern for the one you made? Can you post a photo of your plow?
May 14, 2009 at 5:58 pm #52315
Anonymous
Inactive
No I didnt have the orignal beam I used the length of the one that was on it. I havent Figured out how to post a pic yet it keeps telling me they are to big. I’ll try using my phone to get a smaller size file mabye get one on tomarrow. I love this site. I got hooked this morining digging in the older threads and read the “Training Them Old School” thread all 11 pages of it. Wow it read like a book. All that went on before I started coming to this site so it was new to me. How funny if you had that talk at the coffe stand at the sale barn it might have been a fist fight. I guess it just goes to show you how strong the oppinoins are among us who do this stuff. I know mine get storng some times.
May 14, 2009 at 8:35 pm #52316
Anonymous
Inactive
I think I got somthing going on the picture thing here are 2 pic’s of me and Rosie out Harrowing the sweet corn patch a few weeks ago.
I’ll try for some of the plow tomarrow as promised.[IMG][/IMG]
May 14, 2009 at 9:01 pm #52317
Anonymous
Inactive
Here is a couple PIC’s of Rosie and I out harrowing in the Garden its not the bigest spot but it was chalenging because of its small size. It looked huge till I got in there. I had a blast doing it. I borrowed the neibors tractor to do the plowing because I didn’t think my teamster skills were up to the single horse plow yet. What a man killer that was it was an old JD model G with a hand clutch and no power stearing I defentinly think I’ll do it with Rosie in the future. Its alot less work.

Ill try to get some shots of the plow up tomarrow as promissed.
May 15, 2009 at 12:39 pm #52318
Anonymous
Inactive
I Got some longer lines since the picture was taken and used them the other day, but I’m still looking for a disc small enough.
May 15, 2009 at 2:26 pm #52319
Anonymous
Inactive
These Pictures aren’t so great I didn’t get back to the house before dark and left before daylight this morining. So my wife snapped these with her phone and their not so good and they don’t show the Horizontal adjustment bracket I made but you get the Idea. I measured it and its a 9 inch not an 8 I think I called it an 8 previously Sorry.

I’ll get the new bracket on it and Post some more tomorrow or saturday we have church on friday night and so it gets pretty busy in the evening on friday.
I would really like some feed back on this thing if it looks like junk tell me and I’ll save up for a new one. I&J maks an 8″ don’t now how much but I’m sure its les than the agravation of wasted time which is my most valuble resource.
June 11, 2009 at 8:57 pm #52311
grey
Participant
Hey, how did this plow work out for you? Any updates?
June 15, 2009 at 9:19 pm #52320
Anonymous
Inactive
It ended up working I’m still playing aroungd with the set up trying to get the plow to stablize so I can walk beside it. I don’t have any body to drive the horse so I can plow I’m by my self. My 5 year old son is convinced he can do it but I am un convinced and my wife just had our 5th child 2 weeks ago so i’m still just practsing I’ve been working with my horse though getting her used to the I dea of walkig up the edge of the Furrow. I’ll get a better up date on when I get it realy working.
Blessings
Russ
June 18, 2009 at 5:30 am #52312
grey
Participant
Sounds like how I went about it. Didn’t have any one to help, so just muddled through alone.
Wanted to mention that I’m not sure about the shape of your beam. Let me take a photo of mine so you can see what I mean.
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