Hello all, I own 67 acres and I'm going to be renting a dozer to clear out some areas for food plots for deer hunting. These areas aren't going to be very big...the bigger of the two plots will probably be about 1-1 1/2 acres and the smaller hunting plot will only be about 1/2 acre when all is said an done. When we first bought the land we had it selectively timbered and we were left with some areas that are really ideal in both shape and size for putting the plots in. There are some trees we'll have to push over but none of them are any bigger than about 6-8" in diameter. All the rest of the "brush" clearing is basically just the tops from the trees that were already cut and removed. There is a local company here who rents dozers to private individuals such as myself and they have many sizes available. Given that the areas I want to doze are essentially already clear of any substantial brush and the largest trees I'll have to push over are 6-8" in diameter, will a 10,000 Komatsu be adequate in size to get the job done? Any help or recommendations would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!
I would suggest maybe getting an estimate from a local excavating contractor. It may be that after figuring your rental cost, fuel, delivery, pickup, and insurance it may be more cost effective to hire it. Now with that being said if your like me and just need the satisfaction of doing it yourself I would opt for about a Deere 450 sized machine.
If you aren't going to be doing any significant dirt work, a dozer isn't what you want. Go find a nice clean 953 with a 4 in 1 bucket.
My son and I bought a used 15,000 lb. Komatsu (D31) for exactly the same thing. Put in 3 food plots, cleared shooting lanes (which the deer now use as highways), dug a tank which the deer use extensively and cut in 2 low water crossing over creeks. Haven't found anything the dozer couldn't handle. You'll be surprised at all the things you can find to do with it. We finished a 3 year plan in one year.
We've got a D31P-20 as well. Great little machine. It's cones Lot of different task over the years on our farm but I use our skid steer w mulcher for making shootin lanes more often than not. But I the only reason I'd ever sell the dozer would be to get a bigger one!
I'd agree with Deey. I'd get some prices first. I'm betting it would be cheaper ( but not as fun) to hire it done. I'd go with a D5 cat or 700 deere size. Something in that 110 to 125 hp range.. Not to big ,but not to small.
With no more area than you're clearing, and fairly small trees, I would think you could rent a larger compact track loader...maybe with tree puller and/or a tree shear.
For what you are talking about a D3 or D4 would be more than enough. I used a D4 on my 25 acre piece of land for plots and use it frequently for 25"+ diameter trees without an issue. Anything bigger and your going to just be burning more fuel and its going to cost more to rent. A d31 would be more than enough as well. Do you have a tractor you are going to use to prep the land? Are you doing to disc the ground? If you don't have a tractor you may be better off just renting a tractor. I'm in upstate, where abouts is your parcel?
If I was going to rent one I would go D5-6 size machine. If you were buying one and doing it at your leisure, a smaller one would be fine. A larger dozer would get what you want done quickly with ease, and save you from having to keep it very long. There may be stumps or other things you may have not seen or thought about that could eat up rental time with a smaller one.