# Skeleton Bucket



## Lodgepole (Dec 22, 2019)

Does anyone any experience with a skeleton bucket for rock picking? I am considering purchasing one for cleaning up a very rocky field but don't want to waste my money if they don't work.


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## Hoodoo Valley (Nov 14, 2006)

Never knew such a bucket existed but I'm all focused on this thread now!


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## pogobill (Jan 31, 2012)

Too Bad you couldn't rent one to try it out. Grapple buckets are similar, I think, and would be great for clearing land afterwards with the grapple.
I'm not familiar with the skeleton bucket, but I bet it would work so much better once the land was ripped up with a box blade with the rippers down.


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## bmaverick (Feb 20, 2014)

I've not seen a skeleton bucket for a tractor before. Mainly those are on excavators or skid steers.

I guess these are rare for tractors. Deere has them.









Now, you could do it old school.

Make a soil screen from hardware cloth or welded wire fencing. Then rig it over a drop pit. Use your FEL and dump slowly. Then someone with a rake with the smooth bar down glides back and forth on the soil screen. This would save you about $2,000, but takes 2 people and more time.


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## FredM (Nov 18, 2015)

you could go this way by welding up a grizzly screen, can be picked up by the tractor bucket and moved around as required, worked one of these but much larger screening sand.


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## bmaverick (Feb 20, 2014)

FredM said:


> you could go this way by welding up a grizzly screen, can be picked up by the tractor bucket and moved around as required, worked one of these but much larger screening sand.
> View attachment 60233


If he can't weld, look on the FREE ads in Craigs List for some old black iron fencing or gate. It would work just the same.


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## Dale Brevik (Sep 16, 2019)

Lodgepole said:


> Does anyone any experience with a skeleton bucket for rock picking? I am considering purchasing one for cleaning up a very rocky field but don't want to waste my money if they don't work.


I’m looking at the same problem. My research found people using a landscape rake. (Check YouTube)
You can rent one or used they seem cheap enough. 
My tool rental place has a rock picker that looks like an auger to move them into a row. 
I’ll be watching this thread to see if anyone has any other ideas.


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## Groo (Jan 17, 2020)

I'm going to be hooking up the grapple bucket for big rock picking in the a.m. but I don't think that is what you are looking for.

some run a 3 point spring tine cultivator to pull up moderate sized rocks. That's what Dad resorted to after breaking the roto-tiller's shear pin. Real farmers moved up to bigger iron, so the stuff sized for a modern utility tractor can be had fairly cheap if you are looking in the right spots. 

a very rocky field will likely destroy whatever you stick in the ground though. There are some areas I won't even scratch with the dozer where the glaciers left their bands of rocks. I work with a part time 3 generation farmer who's family farm land is out near my family's farmland (I come form 2 generations of pretend farmers). He also says there are some fields he just completely avoids with machinery (after he didn't take his dad's word for it once he was gone), and he has options for farm tractors larger than the Dresser TD8.


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## ck3510hb (Sep 12, 2016)

I bought one just for digging rocks and hauling from the field with my 763 Bobcat. Had a contractor in for the really big ones with a trackhoe and a JD 410. I use it for light work on my 35 hsp tractor ( Mostly light brush and small items, ). check Virnig website for skeleton or rock bucket. Takes a lot of time to go over 20 acres, consider contracting the job. Good luck.


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## pogobill (Jan 31, 2012)

Now this would be a handy rig, I would think. 








You'd need to have a lot of rocks to pick.,The with the way the frost pushes stone up on my property, I'd use it every year.


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## bmaverick (Feb 20, 2014)

pogobill said:


> Now this would be a handy rig, I would think.
> 
> 
> 
> ...



WOW, that is nifty. What brand is it? I see a tiny logo on the back corner, but can't make it out.


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## bmaverick (Feb 20, 2014)

As for rock finding or in my case roots of 3,000 mature pine trees, I've been using the notched disc harrow. The down side, it will find a rock or two or three in the first field passage. Then with a pry bar, you taken them out like loose teeth.


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## pogobill (Jan 31, 2012)

https://www.agriexpo.online/prod/vila-maquinaria-agricola/product-175906-70565.html
Doesn't look too obtainable in our neck of the woods, but I bet you could build one with a skeleton bucket, a bit of square tube and a couple of cylinders.


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## bmaverick (Feb 20, 2014)

pogobill said:


> https://www.agriexpo.online/prod/vila-maquinaria-agricola/product-175906-70565.html
> Doesn't look too obtainable in our neck of the woods, but I bet you could build one with a skeleton bucket, a bit of square tube and a couple of cylinders.


Dog-gone, it always seems to be, the good and practical equipment needed is over the pond in the EU. What ever happened to that great American know-how and product offering these days. Oh yeah, it went to BIG Ag, and they closed down the little guy with all the regulations. 

The EU has an awesome 3PT folding hay spear setups. They have the 3PT Rear End Loader. They have an great tedder made over there by an Italian company for even the smallest SCUT machines. And Yanmar now has a hay baler for compact tractors over there. 

If there was ever a market with all of these SCUT & CUT tractors sold in the past 3 decades, it would be to mimic those EU pieces of equipment and offer them here. 

One of my sons just bought land. Realized a push mower isn't going to do it. And it will take hours for a rider. A zero-turn is way to pricey and can't do nothing else really, but mow. I told him to look at a Yanmar YM1720 or a John Deere CUT with a belly mower and a 3PT. He has land to place in a very sizable garden now. Why have a mower and a tractor? Get it all in one.


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## bmaverick (Feb 20, 2014)

pogobill said:


> https://www.agriexpo.online/prod/vila-maquinaria-agricola/product-175906-70565.html
> Doesn't look too obtainable in our neck of the woods, but I bet you could build one with a skeleton bucket, a bit of square tube and a couple of cylinders.


Oh boy, you missed another goodie over there .... 

IF you don't want it too close to the tractor, just pull it instead.


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## bmaverick (Feb 20, 2014)

*- = Z-O-I-N-K-S = - 

INSANE ROCK PICKERS FOR TRACTORS *on that same site.

https://www.agriexpo.online/agricultural-manufacturer/unload-to-ground-rock-picker-9827.html 

WOW.


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## Groo (Jan 17, 2020)

Most of those deficated rock pickers, don't look to pick them very deep. The shallower you go, the more often you'll need to do it.

With the cultivator, you can go a couple feet deep, but it'll take several passes to get there.


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