$100 Ideas

7/25/2009

Hitch at Hand
To keep hitches from rattling around in the pickup bed, I installed a hitch holder. Two pieces of bent steel mounted on the inside wall of the bed secure two hitches upright. When I need to switch a hitch out, I don’t have to climb into the truck bed; I just reach around the side.

Aaron Waldner
Stratford, S.D.

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Dry Dam Solution
Our cows are always knocking over or knocking off the dry dam pipes when we pasture them. I put our round bale feeders to use when otherwise they’d go unused during the summer. First, I drove a fence post on both sides of the dam pipe, then I corralled the pipe with the feeder and tied the feeder to the posts. Even a bull can’t muscle the feeder, and the cattle can still reach in to eat the grass.

Randy James
Leopold, Ind.

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Seed Sign Puller

By adapting a post puller design and using leverage, Seth Wengert made pulling seed signs easier. The best part is that his back doesn’t hurt when he pulls the signs out at the end of the year. Wengert raises corn, soybeans, hay and sheep with his father and uncle near Clemons, Iowa.

Post pullers are handy, but they don’t work for seed signs because there’s nothing to grab onto. So I came up with my own tool to get seed signs up and out of the ground. The tool consists of a handle that pivots on a base. Welded to one end of the handle is a pin that slips into the holes that run the length of the sign post. To use, I insert the pin in the lowest hole on the post, then push down on the far end of the handle to pull the post up.