Search results | Farm Hack

Bed Shaper

I built this bed shaper from an old 2 row cultivator purchased for $200 from craigslist. By adding disc hillers I could hill beds but still had to rake them before seeding or planting. I created this bed shaper from salvaged lumber. It has allowed me to fully shape the beds (sometimes with multiple passes depending on soil conditions) using the tractor. It took me only a few hours to build. For the time and money involved it is a vast improvement. It also acted as a practice build, as I would like to build a more permanent bed shaper from steel this following year. After one season of use the shaper has held up well, but I imagine it will start to deteriorate in a fairly short time given that I have no place to store it indoors. Materials: 1. Old culitvator (often on craigslist for very cheap) 2. U bolts- to attach shaper to cultivator 3. Disc Hiller (various suppliers on the internet. I purchased mine from Agrisupply. Cheap but the shanks have bent. Consider better quality hillers) 4. Scrap lumber: 2x4's, 2x6's 5. Lag Screws

Croptracker

Croptracker is a crop and farm management software company focused on the fruit, vegetable, greenhouse, and specialty crops sectors. Croptracker helps producers and processors with labor tracking, traceability, spraying, harvest, packing, storage and shipping of their crops. Integrated sensors help growers measure micro-climate weather, and soil conditions, while RFID systems keep track of product automatically as it moves through the supply chain. Croptracker's powerful mobile farming apps help keep team members up to date and on the go. Farm, organic certification & food safety audits are painless, integrated pest management (IPM) is built in.

ELECTRIC TRACTOR

working on ELECTRIC TRACTOR

Responsible Management of the Collateral Value of Your Land

Certainly, you would agree that if you left half of your fields unplanted year after year, you are under utilizing the value of your land. Yet most farmers are unaware of the fact that they are under utilizing the collateral value of their land for expanding their real estate holdings in a reliable and safe manner. This is an free educational tool that will broaden your mind and help to safeguard your family farm as a legacy for your children and grandchildren.

Pastured Pig Hut from re-purposed materials

I wanted an easily moved mobile hut for my pastured Piggy's. It needed to shed water, block wind, take they're abuse but be light enough to handle. I came up with this repurpose idea. In our area of the country there's lots of decommissioned feed bins that end up being scrapped....I noticed this and felt I could repurpose a couple and get years of use from them while serving my Piggy's well, and other critters possisbly too. If you can envision the cylindrical body of a grain bin, then cut it in half, and then into quarters. These quarter cuts are the basis for my Hutt. It needed stiffening to be highly mobile, so I used repurposed Conduit to bolt sled runners to the side. I added Conduit accross the runners to increase stability and to keep it from spreading.. We used a peice of 1" x 1/8" flat stock bolted to the front edge for extra support but it doesn't need it. We took off all the supporting leggs ladder ECT. I used a 4" grinder and zip blade to cut it apart..... Remember to use a face shield and leather gloves. Currently because we're in the middle of winter I'll put a couple tractor scoops of sawdust down under it and then a couple of layers off a round hay bale inside.... face it south and The Piggy's are warm and comfy....And best off all I have less than 20$ in two guys .... Not counting my labor of course.... One possible improvement I think I'll try is to add a rough cut oak board floor so they can completely get off the ground... This improvement would be great for smaller pigs allowing us to throw hay on a raised floor where they're high and dry.

Pig Tractor/mobile Breeder sow pen

I came up with this SOW Tractor after giving some thought to the issue of having sows highly mobile, highly contained and safe healthy and happy. It also solves a problem I've seen in pasture management. If you'll notice alot of hay farmers get further and further from the feild edge every Cutting to avoid damaging their cutters. Running a pig tractor around your feild edges and pasture fringes allows you to make use of otherwise fallow ground harvest soft mass, legumes, and grasses improve sow health and cut down on actual feed inputs. This improves efficiency and effectiveness making it more cost effective to keep breeder sows herd and a boar. It also improves the ground was well. I use repurposed 71/2" I Beams as my sled runners. (3-4" pipe would work just as well... Aluminum would be better as it would reduce weight) I built it 10' ID x 24' long. Thus will fit on top of most 16' utility trailers for easy transportation to a different site. I used 11g 11/4" Square tubing for my upright supports. 3/4" black pipe for my horizontal supports. The side material was 2"x4" x 20' welded horse panels. I used three 3" drill stem pipes welded to the I Beams 1" off the bottom cut to width to hold the I Beams together. The serve as land levelers and manure spreaders, if you leave it set too long and the SOW turns the ground over. The roof is 11/2" pipe trusses with re purposed sheet metal screwed down to it using self tapping screws. Start by squaring up the sled runners, and welding in the drag braces. Build gussets for the front, helping keep it Square and in good shape. Add the uprights on each corner, and at the halfway point. Then install the horizontal braces. I put one support in 6" above the I beam top to account for the nature of hogs to scratch and rub on things. Then weld the horse panels to the I beam and other supports. I welded every other hole on the panel. The more welded down it is the less damage they can do. On the back end I built a support shelf to hold a 275g water tank. I use a hose to pipe the water to a drinking nipple. They have clean drinking water at all times. This pen is very noble with a tractor, but in muddy conditions it can be tough to move. I plan to add repurposed tractor trailer Dolly's to the back corners and weld spindaly to the foot so I can put wheels that Jack down on the back...This will improve mobility in tough conditions.

Community Compost Exchange

Incentivized Community Compost System

small tractor cart trailer

small tractor cart trailer I bought this cultivator from an auction and paid R$1000 (US$350). Normally it goes for Us$1000 in brazil which is very expansive if you think about it. I started to look for a trailer and the prices were ridiculous high. U$1200. I decided to make my own trailer with bed tilt and brakes!

Sinking shellfish bags for polyculture of Oysters and Clams

A sinking clam bag/longline system designed to sit in the sediments below a floating subtidal oyster farm- allowing for increased use of vertical water-column .

Packing Table

This is a rolling table with under and over shelves designed for packing vegetables or other crops. It has an adjustable work height to accommodate users of different heights and different tasks. It was designed and built for the Small Farms program at the North Willamette Research and Extension Center in Aurora, Oregon with a Clackamas Extension Innovation Grant.