I am feeling guilty

[Ed Thayer]

I will be purchasing my first tractor soon and I am feeling guilty because of it. I know it probably sounds silly. I have been trying to restore our homestead and our way of living and incorporating the use of our draft horse in the process.

I will continue to log, spread manure, drag pastures and hopefully pull a sap scoot with my horse. But there are some tasks that just aren’t possible with my work schedule and the reality of our farm with draft animal power.

Moving snow in the winter and turning my compost piles is a couple of examples of work that could not be accomplished with the horse. I try to justify my dilemma with this tractor by telling myself this is a once in a lifetime purchase that will make my life easier as I get older.

But the bottom line is I still feel uneasy about it. I am not looking for justification here with this post, just expressing some thoughts.

Ed

[Carl Russell]

Thanks for sharing that with us. We all go through these dilemmas in one form or another. Keep up the good work.

Carl

[LStone]

Ed, I don’t think judging is why we gather here. We all do with what we can do with, and do all we can how we can. Our desire is to use the animals but sometimes it may not be practiccal for any number of reasons. I understand, respect, and admire the purist; but I for one have a tractor and use it because of a lack of time and or horse drawn implements. I am working towards an all horse power end, but at the end of the day I have my doubts. Realistically I think if I achieve it I will not have a full time job, and a windfall of adequate money to purchase the horse drawn implements I would need. Couldn’t we all use an extra couple hours in any given day? Just my thoughts. Don’t get down on yourself man.

Larry

[jac]

Have to agree with Larry.. you might find that a big percentage of folk on this forum has a tractor.. ours is a 1950s Fordson that I’v spent years gradualy doing less and less with as my skills and equipment levels built up..definaitly dont beat yourself up over it.. enjoy the extra time the tractor might free up for you to work the horses..
John

[mitchmaine]

i’m with all above, ed, you probably put a lot of folks here at ease. if it ain’t a tractor it’s a job or something. we just try and do the best we can, right?

[Scott G]

It seems to be a given that having a piece of equipment with a front end loader is almost a necessity if you have any volume to deal with. Not much of a draft/manual equivalent for this one besides a shovel. Its not a cop out man, its reality. You are to be commended for trying to substitute draft power for every task where it is realistically feasible.

A big skidsteer is one of the most universal & handy pieces of machinery IMO.

I would equate knuckleboom log loaders for horse loggers to your situation. Any of those that move much volume and are looking for efficiency where they can are using self-loaders or the equivalent.

Draft animals excel at skidding, loaders excel at loading.

Maybe one of these days they’ll make mounts on a set of hames for loader arms 🙂 , but until then hydraulics are a wonderful thing…

[near horse]

I’m guilty too – I use a tractor but try to find ways not to. Going to all horse power is a little more involved than just switching the power source. Some jobs require a team, others 4 horses (or more) and more people. While you can keep more horses it can be a challenge to find more willing help at the necessary time. So in comes the tractor.

Ed, I wouldn’t beat mtself up over using a tractor UNLESS you traded in your horses for it!! Take it easy and enjoy the things you can do with them.

[sanhestar]

Ed,

I had to ask my neighbor to come with his tractor and front end loader to help us move the wasted hay the bucks left on their winter paddock. My hubby and I started to load it with forks but we really underestimated the amount of hay that had gone to waste (another lesson: use feeders next winter!) We would have spend weeks (!) to get the work done, with his schedule and my bad back while neighbor and his tractor got the work done in one hour. I spend another hour to fork up what he couldn’t get.

I’m a bit glad that others here have similar experience when it comes to using a front end loader because I really couldn’t see a way how to do this type of work with draft animals.

[Donn Hewes]

Well, I use a tractor for the bucket, too. I try to keep it out of my fields, but once you have one, they can be really hard to fence in. I believe our energy use is important and will become more so as time goes on. I try to think of new alternatives that may be five or ten years in my future. Personally, I need a bigger barn for hay, and using my old hay barn for winter housing of sheep might allow for pigs turning the bedding before it is pulled out and spread. But that is years away.

Sanhestar, for our 100% grass fed sheep I never think of the uneaten hay as wasted. It does several important things with out being eating. It goes into bedding that keeps sheep warm and dry. It means that the animals have effectively improved the quality of the hay by only eating the best part. This is most important and should be reflected in their body condition at the end of the winter. Finally it helps make a balanced compost.

[Carl Russell]

This discussion brings to mind another aspect of the comparison between animals and machinery. It is important in considering draft-animal power to think about the whole operation. The reality is that if you are going to move “large” volumes of material, or clean up winter packed bedding, then you will “have” to incorporate machinery. I am not saying that is a bad thing, the challenge is to think of animal-powered land-use systems outside the box of the current conventions that have been developed because machinery has been a cultural assumption for the last 50 years.

This has been the only reason I have never gotten equipment, because I don’t want to spend money now on something that I won’t have a use for later. What happens in the meantime is that my operation is held-back in some ways.

So, we all do what we need to do, and we all contribute to the cause by trying to find solutions that keep up doing what we want to do.

By the way, guilt is a strange and dangerous thing. I decided years ago that I would not accept any guilt for any decision that I made based on purposeful thought. I can admit when the decision was wrong, but I don’t throw away the lesson with a sense of guilt. I don’t believe that healing comes from a place of illness, and growth doesn’t come from a place of weakness. Make a purposeful choice, and work to make it be all that it can be for you.

Carl

[Gabe Ayers]

I think of it as doing my part to run the oil out.

We simply can’t compete in the conventional markets without some machinery, and we simply have no other markets for all of the material we produce.

Meanwhile we broke our loader truck frame in half day before yesterday trying to pick up a big red oak log, so we are looking for another tired truck to put the knuckleboom on to keep working. The u-bolts popped like a gun going off and shot the nuts right into the ground under the truck. Just about sent me flying off the tower, but fortunately it broke before I had the log far off the ground. We have borrowed a larger 4WD tractor to keep working moving wood to the various markets and processing we are doing. It won’t lift the big r.o. logs. We may try to roll them up skid poles with a parbuckle arrangement with a combination of the horses and the tractor.

I would prefer to process all this material into DRAFTWOOD Forest Products, we simply don’ t have enough markets to afford the processing cost and owning he inventory.

No guilt required from working with integrated systems. It is just reality in the modern world. The portion of the process we use that is exclusively animal powered are the ones that are most environmentally sensitive as in from stump to landing where the impact is greatest in conventional logging systems. Road building and skid trail construction in forestry create the greatest amount of sedimentation in streams.

Our biggest challenge is to keep the old machinery running without hydraulic oil leaks or killing us in mechanical failure as described above.

Keep working your animals when you can. Use the machines to keep you going, when you have too. We all have to live in the real world and this forum is more real than any I know of.

~

[Iron Rose]

We have used mixed power (Horses and Tractors) in are operation for years. We use tractors to do the heavy tillage, loader,and PTO work. While the horses are used for planting , cultivating, haying, feeding, etc. Not uncommon to have both in the same field at the same time. Fact is that a lot of are equipment can be used either way. While it takes more dedication to use horses if the tractor is there it can be done. We try to keep at least one team harnessed and ready to use everyday, if not we usually grab the tractor instead of catching and harnessing a team.

The pure economics of having mixed power is that we can cut down on the number of horses that we need. With one medium sized tractor can do the work of four or more teams. This allows us to have better horses that get used therefore are better broke, and always bring better price if sold.

Lets face it even a lot of the Amish are not purists and use some sort of mechanical power. So enjoy your tractor and hope that it always you to use your horses more.

Good Luck
Dan
SE MN

[Robert MoonShadow]

Um, what’s a “purist”, anyways? Sounds like some sort of elitist attitude. :rolleyes:
Personally, until/unless someone offers to come over and help you do the compost/manure/etc. moving by hand, I’m thinking they don’t have much ground to stand on. Where would you draw the HD/machinery line, anyways? I plan on keeping my old pickup – I’m not harnessing up the donks for a 30+ ’round trip to town and back for supplies anytime soon. I have more admiration for someone who has the intelligence to adapt to the situation they’re in and make use of the needed tools at hand, rather than being narrow-minded enough to try to force the situation in the name of be a ‘purist’.
Just my take on it all.

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