Land Improvements thread

ford 5600 · 23-03-2015 12:05pm

Limestone Cowboy wrote: »

Sorry to dig up an old thread but hand to keep the same topic together. Have an out farm in the bottom of a valley with a stream starting just outside our boundary. There's 10 acres of a flat field just outside the wall from it and there are 4 or 5 springs wetting a lot of it. As it stands there are no drains what so ever in it. The ground would be a bit sticky but dries out very fast apart from the springs and their surrounding areas. I have no experience of doing drainage work really and I'm wondering what is the best approach to try and dry it out. It has a sufficent fall to get the water to the start of the stream but I don't know how you would tap into the springs. Would you need to put shores in all the area that is currently waterlogged by them or could you dig up the source and try and pipe that directly to a main drain?

In my experience here of draining land, if you can get someone who is able to divine water to find the true springs source. It can save a lot of hassle and money. Sure you can start putting in shores every 10 yards, but it won't be long running into €2000 an acre to do that 'full monty' job.
You will buy a mole plough for somewhere between €14-1700 euro. If done in the right conditions, it will help hugely and not costing a lot besides the diesel to do it. If done every 3 or 4 years It will keep it usable. €20 to the acre every 2nd year in spraying with mcpa will keep rushes out as well, for small money.
What I would do is, divine the springs, put in a shore or two to the really wet springs. FILL to the top with stone! Put in 2 shores properly, instead of a middling job on 3. Then you could mole plough the field if necessary, crossing the shores. A mole plough works very well in marla ground, it stays open if done when dry enough, but no use in peaty soil. And a couple of bags to the acre of 16 6 12 and lime if needed is way ahead of spending big money reseeding and no follow up lime and npk. It will go back in 2 years if not looked after.

Limestone Cowboy · 23-03-2015 12:25pm

ford 5600 wrote: »

In my experience here of draining land, if you can get someone who is able to divine water to find the true springs source. It can save a lot of hassle and money. Sure you can start putting in shores every 10 yards, but it won't be long running into €2000 an acre to do that 'full monty' job.
You will buy a mole plough for somewhere between €14-1700 euro. If done in the right conditions, it will help hugely and not costing a lot besides the diesel to do it. If done every 3 or 4 years It will keep it usable. €20 to the acre every 2nd year in spraying with mcpa will keep rushes out as well, for small money.
What I would do is, divine the springs, put in a shore or two to the really wet springs. FILL to the top with stone! Put in 2 shores properly, instead of a middling job on 3. Then you could mole plough the field if necessary, crossing the shores. A mole plough works very well in marla ground, it stays open if done when dry enough, but no use in peaty soil. And a couple of bags to the acre of 16 6 12 and lime if needed is way ahead of spending big money reseeding and no follow up lime and npk. It will go back in 2 years if not looked after.

I'm spraying and licking the rushes as it is but that's not the problem, it's more of a traffic ability issue. Half of the field is as dry as a bone and it's at the same level as the wetter parts. When your walking it you can easily distinguish where the springs are. Limestone land, don't think you'd get 10ft with a mole plight before your caught in a boulder.

Figerty · 23-03-2015 9:56pm

Limestone Cowboy wrote: »

Thanks, It should definitely be possible to get enough of a fall alright. I took a picture from bing maps there. The red circles is where the springs are and there is a slight fall from right to left in the pic, the stream starts at the bottom of it and it just comes up from underground about 7 or 8ft below the surface level of my field. Was thinking about putting an open drain along by the boundary on the left and bringing shores off that to the wet spots then.

Here's another suggestion for you. Go to the OSI.ie website and click EXPLORE. Find that field on the maps and overlay it with the old Oridinance survey maps. You might find there were walls that were removed.. sometimes the walls were created to make a drain.

Water divining would be a good idea as suggested as water has a tendancy to turn up anywhere it feels like. The red lines you have marked indicate that there are lines coming from above the areas that might be the source.
Teagasc did a very good handbook on draining. There is a older version available on lines somewhere that is good.

Good loser · 25-03-2015 11:15pm

Figerty wrote: »

Here's another suggestion for you. Go to the OSI.ie website and click EXPLORE. Find that field on the maps and overlay it with the old Oridinance survey maps. You might find there were walls that were removed.. sometimes the walls were created to make a drain.

Water divining would be a good idea as suggested as water has a tendancy to turn up anywhere it feels like. The red lines you have marked indicate that there are lines coming from above the areas that might be the source.
Teagasc did a very good handbook on draining. There is a older version available on lines somewhere that is good.

Divining is an absolute and complete waste of time.

The springs/wet areas are clearly visible and there is a fall from them to the field boundaries.

Just pull the drains from one to the other. Would advise Terram on top of the stones. Cut into 13 inch wide strips.

Figerty · 26-03-2015 1:07am

Good loser wrote: »

Divining is an absolute and complete waste of time.

The springs/wet areas are clearly visible and there is a fall from them to the field boundaries.

Just pull the drains from one to the other. Would advise Terram on top of the stones. Cut into 13 inch wide strips.

I wouldn't be a fan of the divining but I've seen it done.. I suppose if you drill deep enough you'll find water.

I agree with you about pulling the drains.

TippNorth · 27-03-2015 11:03am

A quick query for those of you who have done a bit of land drainage.

I've been thinking of ways to make draining land a bit cheaper and one idea I had in order to save on the cost of chippings/stone was to use a geotextile material like Terram to wrap around the filter stone. Terram allows water to pass through but stops clay, fine particles etc. This would protect you stone and pipe from getting clogged. but more importantly would allow you to use cheaper stone. I was thinking if using 3 - 4 inch stone wrapped in terram, anyone ever tried this?

ford 5600 · 27-03-2015 12:04pm

TippNorth wrote: »

A quick query for those of you who have done a bit of land drainage.

I've been thinking of ways to make draining land a bit cheaper and one idea I had in order to save on the cost of chippings/stone was to use a geotextile material like Terram to wrap around the filter stone. Terram allows water to pass through but stops clay, fine particles etc. This would protect you stone and pipe from getting clogged. but more importantly would allow you to use cheaper stone. I was thinking if using 3 - 4 inch stone wrapped in terram, anyone ever tried this?

Would the Terram not run into money a Lot quicker than drainage stone?
If you had your own way of putting the stone into the shore, you could put in maybe 6 in of 2" stone on top of the pipe, (bigger stone will damage the pipe), then come to within 6" of the field level with cheaper bigger stone, as you suggest , and the put a couple of inches of 2" stone on the real top, mainly to act as a filter to stop the soil being washed down into the bigger stone.
But , if you had to pay a contractor , or valued your own time, the using of different size stone mightn't stack up against using all 2"" stone.
Have you priced any of this Terram, Tipp ?
I have filled shores dug with a mounding bucket using the way I described above, but using the field stones picked off the field as the 'filler upper'.
I would be getting the 2" drainage stone from a man in your county, there was a feature in the IFJ about him last year, I think.

tomwaterford · 27-03-2015 12:15pm

Good loser wrote: »

Divining is an absolute and complete waste of time.

I've seen a lot of dividers.....but only once ever have I seen someone I would as being gifted at it

She used to use a necklace over the old land registry maps...and marked on it where it used to spin....in a neighbours field she marked a spot a long way from the wet spots and said that's your spring...without ever seeing the field and he drained that spring out of it and it dried the whole place nearly 10 years ago!!

I dunno If she is even alive anymore....she was wicked old at the time....and seemingly she used help find missing dogs etc the same method

Other than that I'd say it's bollix.....any Moran could walk out the field with a stick/two pieces of wire and find a wetter place/flow but very few could pinpoint the beginning spot/spring

tomwaterford · 27-03-2015 12:22pm

TippNorth wrote: »

A quick query for those of you who have done a bit of land drainage.

I've been thinking of ways to make draining land a bit cheaper and one idea I had in order to save on the cost of chippings/stone was to use a geotextile material like Terram to wrap around the filter stone. Terram allows water to pass through but stops clay, fine particles etc. This would protect you stone and pipe from getting clogged. but more importantly would allow you to use cheaper stone. I was thinking if using 3 - 4 inch stone wrapped in terram, anyone ever tried this?

Why not use straw instead of the Terran??? I see lads using it around here at times

TippNorth · 27-03-2015 12:38pm

ford 5600 wrote: »

Would the Terram not run into money a Lot quicker than drainage stone?
If you had your own way of putting the stone into the shore, you could put in maybe 6 in of 2" stone on top of the pipe, (bigger stone will damage the pipe), then come to within 6" of the field level with cheaper bigger stone, as you suggest , and the put a couple of inches of 2" stone on the real top, mainly to act as a filter to stop the soil being washed down into the bigger stone.
But , if you had to pay a contractor , or valued your own time, the using of different size stone mightn't stack up against using all 2"" stone.
Have you priced any of this Terram, Tipp ?
I have filled shores dug with a mounding bucket using the way I described above, but using the field stones picked off the field as the 'filler upper'.
I would be getting the 2" drainage stone from a man in your county, there was a feature in the IFJ about him last year, I think.

Terram is around €230 for a 115m roll . they are normally 4m wide, so they could be slit to do 230m of drains. So it would add € 1 per meter to the cost of drainage. How much cheaper is 4" or 6" stone compared to 2"?

TippNorth · 27-03-2015 1:03pm

tomwaterford wrote: »

Why not use straw instead of the Terran??? I see lads using it around here at times

Ya using straw is the same principle, the benefit of terram is it won't rot and degrade and also you can wrap the entire drain in it as opposed to just the top with straw. Terram would provide a more reliable filter also.

mf240 · 27-03-2015 2:38pm

Divining works allright. Have seen it done and seen the results from pulling shores to the springs.

In lcs case its prob fairly obvious where the springs are anyway so just a case of pulling a few shores.

Certain land can be full of springs and finding them and shoring them will help or solve.

Other land just has no soakage and if you can get a fall .shores every 8 yards with stone up to the top or up past the impermeable lair will solve. (Not cheap but what price is an acre of land to buy )

Another thing often overlooked are big high ditches around wet land which stop the land from benifiting from the sun and wind. Remarkable how much just letting in the light at it will help.

Mad4simmental · 27-03-2015 2:46pm

Walking fields today and sum old drainage that was done 20 years ago is horsing out water. A good drainage job is well worth the effort.

onyerbikepat · 27-03-2015 9:03pm

My brother can divine and he's good at it too. He has gone into neighbours gardens and told them where the water mains was running in the lawn...and was spot on too. A guy in here one day on a track machine showed him how to do it. I tried but no good.

tomwaterford · 27-03-2015 9:12pm

onyerbikepat wrote: »

My brother can divine and he's good at it too. He has gone into neighbours gardens and told them where the water mains was running in the lawn...and was spot on too. A guy in here one day on a track machine showed him how to do it. I tried but no good.

Literally most people can do this....same method can be done do finding underground esb lines

It takes a special skill to find the start point though....I tried various efforts at times....but find it hard to pinpoint starting spots

Good loser · 27-03-2015 11:02pm

tomwaterford wrote: »

Literally most people can do this....same method can be done do finding underground esb lines

It takes a special skill to find the start point though....I tried various efforts at times....but find it hard to pinpoint starting spots

No, no, no.

No better than conjuring or magic.

If he can do as you say he should be able to turn base metals into gold. I bet he hasn't done that yet.

Good loser · 27-03-2015 11:11pm

TippNorth wrote: »

A quick query for those of you who have done a bit of land drainage.

I've been thinking of ways to make draining land a bit cheaper and one idea I had in order to save on the cost of chippings/stone was to use a geotextile material like Terram to wrap around the filter stone. Terram allows water to pass through but stops clay, fine particles etc. This would protect you stone and pipe from getting clogged. but more importantly would allow you to use cheaper stone. I was thinking if using 3 - 4 inch stone wrapped in terram, anyone ever tried this?

Am 40 years draining.

What you suggest would be expensive and impossible to operate in practice.

Teagasc suggest 1/2" to 1" stone is best. I now use drainage stone (1" to 1 1/2") over pipe especially where flow is strong. Say 12" to 15" of stone over pipe, then Terram cut approx 13" wide rolled over the stone and backfill. Loader fills stone or digger takes it out of dumper - this is easier. Shovel man evens out the stone in drain. Easier with two men on the ground. For smaller flow drains can skip the pipe.

Figerty · 28-03-2015 12:10am

ford 5600 wrote: »

Would the Terram not run into money a Lot quicker than drainage stone?
If you had your own way of putting the stone into the shore, you could put in maybe 6 in of 2" stone on top of the pipe, (bigger stone will damage the pipe), then come to within 6" of the field level with cheaper bigger stone, as you suggest , and the put a couple of inches of 2" stone on the real top, mainly to act as a filter to stop the soil being washed down into the bigger stone.
But , if you had to pay a contractor , or valued your own time, the using of different size stone mightn't stack up against using all 2"" stone.
Have you priced any of this Terram, Tipp ?
I have filled shores dug with a mounding bucket using the way I described above, but using the field stones picked off the field as the 'filler upper'.
I would be getting the 2" drainage stone from a man in your county, there was a feature in the IFJ about him last year, I think.

Look at the connacht Agri pipe Same idea, no stone needed.
Pea gravel is smooth and doesn't hold particles like limestone. It's dear work if you have to do it twice...

ford 5600 · 28-03-2015 12:43am

Figerty wrote: »

Look at the connacht Agri pipe Same idea, no stone needed.
Pea gravel is smooth and doesn't hold particles like limestone. It's dear work if you have to do it twice...

Horses for courses. Around here you don't spare the stone, bring it to the top. Don't use pipe if you want to do it a bit cheaper. The water will never get to the pipe if you don't use stone, but that's the soil type around here.
I still say divining is very useful at this work. You can often have a wet spot of say 1/4 of an acre. You could be surprised where the actual spring is. Water can seep out wetting a large area,because it cannot get up through the marla subsoil. You may not place the shore in the right place without divining.

just do it · 04-07-2015 10:29pm

I'd a mulcher in today and was very impressed with it. To give you an idea of what it was heading in to there are 4 pigtails in a row in this photo - the 4th is hidden by rushes

Here's the tractor at work

I'll put up a few pics of the result tomorrow

Milked out · 04-07-2015 11:06pm

just do it wrote: »

I'd a mulcher in today and was very impressed with it. To give you an idea of what it was heading in to there are 4 pigtails in a row in this photo - the 4th is hidden by rushes

Here's the tractor at work

I'll put up a few pics of the result tomorrow

Mulcher cost much to bring in jdi? Have 2 or 3 acres of heavy rushes to get rid of

just do it · 04-07-2015 11:16pm

Milked out wrote: »

Mulcher cost much to bring in jdi? Have 2 or 3 acres of heavy rushes to get rid of

I'll have to come back to you on that one. Same contactor is doing the cultivation for reseed so it will all be piled in together. It's an hourly rate so depends on how slow he has to travel. Great job though. Even in the heaviest of spots it cut and mulched right down to the butt. I'd have been a few years at it with topper!

just do it · 05-07-2015 8:43am

Before

And after

kevthegaff · 05-07-2015 9:24am

just do it wrote: »

Before

And after

some job!

Figerty · 05-07-2015 9:30am

Mulcher is a greet yoke, but you will still have find the way of stopping them growing back. Drainage and spraying in about 5 or 6 weeks time.

Username John · 05-07-2015 10:26am

just do it wrote: »

Before

And after
[

Savage job all right.
What's the plan with it now JDI?

Markcheese · 05-07-2015 10:36am

Would lime make ****e of the ground ?

just do it · 05-07-2015 10:51am

He did a track on the way out of this field. On the left was topped about 2 weeks ago. Big difference!

just do it · 05-07-2015 11:00am

That's the thing lads, this can only be treated as the first step. There's one section in the middle that's particularly wet but the rest of it will make good grazing ground. Need to mind it and develop a good scraw to prevent poaching. Thinking of 0.5t of lime in a few weeks

Milked out · 05-07-2015 11:10am

just do it wrote: »

That's the thing lads, this can only be treated as the first step. There's one section in the middle that's particularly wet but the rest of it will make good grazing ground. Need to mind it and develop a good scraw to prevent poaching. Thinking of 0.5t of lime in a few weeks

The ground I have is neglected and needs a small bit of drainage also but would I be wasting time mulching the rushes ploughing setting the grass seed and be sharp with the spray thereafter

just do it · 05-07-2015 11:29am

Milked out wrote: »

The ground I have is neglected and needs a small bit of drainage also but would I be wasting time mulching the rushes ploughing setting the grass seed and be sharp with the spray thereafter

Whats the soil structure underneath? The soft spots in mine are peat.

Milked out · 05-07-2015 11:44am

just do it wrote: »

Whats the soil structure underneath? The soft spots in mine are peat.

No peat here, has a open drain all around the field but I was going to run a a few piped drains out to it as it's more ground water is the issue id say, it's part of ground we bought this year so ill know more when we go at it. Previous owner planted forestry in surrounding ground

mf240 · 05-07-2015 11:48am

Dung slurry lime and mcpa will all knock back rushes but drainage is the only answer sometimes. May not always be worth it though.

Thats some machine jdi. Youd be some lenght trying to top them and then you have a mess on top of the ground.

Would love a pictute in a few months if you think of it.

mf240 · 05-07-2015 11:50am

Milked out wrote: »

The ground I have is neglected and needs a small bit of drainage also but would I be wasting time mulching the rushes ploughing setting the grass seed and be sharp with the spray thereafter

Id like to sort drainage first .before the expense of reseeding.

Milked out · 05-07-2015 11:58am

mf240 wrote: »

Id like to sort drainage first .before the expense of reseeding.

Hope to have a digger around at some stage in the next while so will do that first alrite. The way milk price is heading tho may hold us back in how much we get done this year. Ideally in our wetter ground we would drain one year and reseed the following year as you dont have the issue of the drain settling leaving you with hollows after reseeding if both done the one year but will be dropping rented ground this year so have to get so much done to carry the heifers and get the ground producing but will be focusing on the drier ground first

Farmer Pudsey · 05-07-2015 12:46pm

just do it wrote: »

Before

And after

This land looks very flat. I presume that there are open drains around it. A few land drains to soft middle spot may improve that part if water table in drains goes low enough. After that it a matter of getting soil fertility right. P&K are very important P more so than K. Slurry will help if you can use it. PH is a double edged sold high amount of lime at any one time will really soften land also you have limited windows to spread on this type of land as often it will have a cover of grass on it before you can spread. I think granlime/g-lime(growmax could be used at the start to really drive up PH) you could also use on this type of lad is the answer using 1-2 bags to the acre.

If you can keep the rushes at bay it will grow grass. Not sure if I would reseed before having it growing grass first.

Markcheese · 05-07-2015 12:49pm

Is there any real expert/consultant that a farmer can get in to examine his ground, dig a few test pits and trenchs and recomend X -Y or Z .
A digger driver will recomend a hymac being in there for weeks - some one else could advise mole ploughs or deep ripping to break up a pan
- on same ground - I'm sure a quarry rep would be pushing vast amount of stone-
What ever way it's expensive- you want to do it right. once and once only -

Figerty · 05-07-2015 12:56pm

Markcheese wrote: »

Is there any real expert/consultant that a farmer can get in to examine his ground, dig a few test pits and trenchs and recomend X -Y or Z .
A digger driver will recomend a hymac being in there for weeks - some one else could advise mole ploughs or deep ripping to break up a pan
- on same ground - I'm sure a quarry rep would be pushing vast amount of stone-
What ever way it's expensive- you want to do it right. once and once only -

Teagasc have a good land drainage book that you should read yourself. This is a version on line that is older. the new version came out last year and was very good.
It deals with how water moves through the ground etc.

just do it · 05-07-2015 12:58pm

The one I can say about the mulcher is it gives you a great start. I started tackling a similar 7ac field 6 years ago with the topper, spray and paddock grazing and it's only this year you'd confidently go in with a mower.

Agree with comments that the starting point is drainage. No money in this year's budget for it though :rolleyes:. Also it's my first year in this ground so I want to get to know it a bit better before really opening up the cheque book. Paddock grazing is an easy next step that works brilliantly on wet ground.

Buford T. Justice XIX · 05-07-2015 2:36pm

just do it wrote: »

He did a track on the way out of this field. On the left was topped about 2 weeks ago. Big difference!

Looking at that photo reminded me of a field i drained a good few years ago. Topping rushes is only part of the equation, as a neighbour told me. He came in with a silage wagon a few weeks later and picked up the rushes and dropped them at the field edge where we burned them later.

Where the rushes were picked up turned out far better for growing grass than where they were left. The rushes are much stronger in areas where they were left unpicked for some reason?

just do it · 05-07-2015 2:58pm

Buford T. Justice V wrote: »

The rushes are much stronger in areas where they were left unpicked for some reason?

The light can't get down to get the grass going?

Buford T. Justice XIX · 05-07-2015 4:00pm

just do it wrote: »

The light can't get down to get the grass going?

That's probably part of it alright. The rushes seem much stronger/thicker where they weren't removed though.

Figerty · 05-07-2015 8:38pm

Buford T. Justice V wrote: »

That's probably part of it alright. The rushes seem much stronger/thicker where they weren't removed though.

I also saw a report in the Journal a few years ago saying that dead rushes had a decent nitrogen content if let rot down... I think the light getting to the ground is more important

smokey-fitz · 05-07-2015 9:17pm

Figerty wrote: »

I also saw a report in the Journal a few years ago saying that dead rushes had a decent nitrogen content if let rot down... I think the light getting to the ground is more important

Thats why if you mulch them the new growth will come up through. Cut rushes could take 6 months to rot down, mulch them and they will be gone in 4 to 6 weeks. I mulched some last year and the growth after was great.

Limestone Cowboy · 05-07-2015 11:17pm

Great job there jdi, looking forward to seeing the finished product!

just do it · 05-07-2015 11:23pm

smokey-fitz wrote: »

Thats why if you mulch them the new growth will come up through. Cut rushes could take 6 months to rot down, mulch them and they will be gone in 4 to 6 weeks. I mulched some last year and the growth after was great.

What was the mix of grass to rush like in the regrowth? How did you manage it subsequently?

smokey-fitz · 06-07-2015 12:06am

just do it wrote: »

What was the mix of grass to rush like in the regrowth? How did you manage it subsequently?

It thinned out the rushes alot, in spots over 50% id say. if you spray the regrowth with mcpa it should knock them fairly well. Next year it should look like a different field. This year my grass management is not great due to lack of cows. I should of had 30 odd cows to graze 50ac of similar ground but after a bad year im down to 14 cows. I was going to split into paddocks and mulch any that got strong. Over time I would improve drainage, level, reseed ect.

smokey-fitz · 06-07-2015 12:13am

Pic

smokey-fitz · 06-07-2015 12:15am

More

smokey-fitz · 06-07-2015 12:19am

smokey-fitz wrote: »

More

The 2nd picture shows about 2 weeks regrowth. I flailed it in stages at the time, think I was at silage. Great regrowth for old unfertilised ground.

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