Tile Lines

[dano_76]

Does anyone have any recommendations on working tile lines down so they don't settle too much? Had a bunch of PP acres tiled and want to work them down this fall. 

[Shaggy98]

Will a box scraper work? How about just a harrow?

[hanktbd]

I usually let them settle for a couple of months and then make a few passes with a disk. Seems to work pretty well except sometimes where the hookups are I have to use a tracter loader to level the piles out.

[idalivered]

they have these things in irrigation country that fills in ruts from a pivot. they go on a 3 point hitch and have the disk blades angled in. I don't have one or even a picture of one, but saw one at a farm sale near hastings ne.  I've always thought that would be a wonderful tool for tile ditches. I guess I always run both sides with the wing on my disk. good luck.

[buckfarmer]

I like to chisel plow. I think it kind breaks the sidewall dirt and mixes it with the backfill dirt. I don't even wait more than a couple weeks after the tile is installed. We have pretty hard clay soil and rarely see much settling this way. I have notice where I live is a clay with more rocks and small gravel. It settles a lot worse. Had a septic tank put in over a year ago, waited till June to level the dirt around it, and it is still settling.

[Jim Meade / Iowa City]

Althought it's really rough, I like to wait a year or even two for them to settle.  As we all know, watering a filled in ditch will settle it and so will the freeze-thaw cycle.  So, I put up with it for a year or even two, then I use a disk or a blade and crop over it as normal.

I saw a neighbor put in tile and level it off right away, then we got a big rain and it got in there and really opened the trench up again.