Anyone in the tractor mowing/food plotting business?

[scott123456789]

I’m trying to determine if it would be feasible to jump into the mowing and then potentially food plot business. I teach and am looking for summer work options/nights and weekends to supplement my income. I had an older tractor with a 5’ mower and did a few jobs for neighbors but didn’t have a trailer and the old Ferguson couldn’t handle the abuse of jobs I accepted.

What sort of demand is there to so provide heavier mowing?
Would people pay enough to make it worth to haul a tractor out and put in food plots?
Is $50 an hour a reasonable number to make business analysis from?

How big of a mower would I need, the 5’ mower was find but would be brutal for any jobs that were very big.


Is there a more reasonable way to supplement my income that doesn’t require a $20k initial investment?

[shark79]

You'd be better off mowing yards. Even the illegals got that figured out.

[Dushon]

I wouldn’t pay anyone $50/hr with a 5’ shredder. That’s about 10’ prices and 15’ is about ~85 I believe


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[clay4626]

I would think it would be hard to make a good return on your investment to start off
a small tractor and 5 ft cutter would be ok for small city lots. If you get any larger places to mow you will get really tried of the small cutter and cant cover much ground
the guys that mows big pastures with 15ft batwings get around 50 60 dollars a hr
or charge about 15 to 18 dollars per acre. There is really no end to what you will need to make a go of it. Bigger tractor, bigger cutter, trailer to haul the equipment on
to do food plots you will need a disk and something to plant seeds with.
I would think that you could do better mowing the small lots and mowing some yards
and make the same amount of money. I think there's pretty good money in construction
clean up around the new homes being built.

[RCDuck]

Food plots are not generally a summertime activity.... at least not for me.... March-April and September-October.

[AntlerCollector]

With a 5' mower you better charge by the job not the hour. That being said be prepared to not make much money doing it.

[ranchdog]

Food plots are not generally a summertime activity.... at least not for me.... March-April and September-October.

THIS !!!

And March - April plots have to be pretty big if you have high deer density as they will wipe out small plots of Cow Peas or Lab Lab or Soybeans.

Fall Oat patches due well and generally cannot be wiped out. They may be eaten to the ground but they keep growing unlike the spring plots that die if over grazed.

RD

[jaspermac]

I have a cousin that is a teacher. He leaves for Alaska the first week of June every year. Makes more up there for the summer than he does teaching. Works on a day cruise boat entertaining rich folks. He is now married and she goes too. They met a buisness guy last year that owns a resort in New Zealand and he took the year off of teaching to go work for him.

My point is, there are tons of ways to supplement your income if your are flexible. I wouldn't personally do it on a tractor, but that's just me

[Anythinghunter8]

you would be better off finding someone that bales hay for people and help him out lots of the people are always looking for a raker to help them out however pay is not that much.
If I where u I would buy a trailer and choose your jobs wisely so that you and the tractor could handle it. I have cleaned fence lines for people and I charge $20 a hour, but generally most of that work is chain saw and machete and then use the shredder to finish up and make it look good

[scott123456789]

I know the food plot is a later in the year issue but just trying to figure out how to keep money coming in once grass stops growing.

Thought people would jump all over the chance to have food plots for ~$200 an acre.

Then mowing trying to get $50 an hour which can be two more more acres an hour if clean would keep work coming in.

Competeing with the 100’s of lawn care businesses in a semi rural area didn’t seem like a good approach.

Also was looking at firewood cutting but even with access to free wood I couldn’t make the money make sense.