No, perennial hay ground doesn't remain smooth indefinately with the pests I've outlined. Not even remotely smooth. Wheel traffic, pests, pivots that get stuck, etc all take their toll.

If you were local, I'd sit your buttocks in a tractor, or better yet a balewagon, then set you off across a five-year old field at the 14 MPH you seem to think possible. And I'd be sending you across a field that has had the shallow tillage you seem to think clears this up -- a danish harrow, aka "S-tine" harrow, or "springtooth", followed by a pasture/blanket harrow, where only the top 1 to 2" of ground has been disturbed, this past April.

You'd bounce off the inside of the cab so hard, you'd be black-n-blue after one pass. I've tried to do it; I'd do 14 MPH over the patches where I thought I could do it, then I'd be down around 4 MPH where I know there are problems, then back up to 8 MPH, etc. Then I'd find a brand-new gopher/squirrel/badger mound and I'd bounce off the inside of the cab, leaf springs get broken on a balewagon, rake frames get busted, etc.

The reason for wanting it "pool-table smooth" is that you don't/won't/can't get a field any smoother than what you start with. It is all downhill from where you start.

Oh, and you guys in the midwest don't have pocket gophers and squirrels like we have here. Not even remotely close. I've trapped out 7,000+ pocket gophers from one 160-acre fallow field in one season. I've seen neighbors trap/poison/shoot over 1,000 squirrels from a 125-acre pivot in one month. I've personally been on neighbors' fields in "squirrel invasion" seasons where I've shot over 200 squirrels in three hours without moving my butt from the position I was in and all I was using was a .22 long rifle -- figure I was shooting no more than 125 yards in any direction -- about 10 acres of area. The previous fall, the field had been nearly clean of all squirrels.

That's how fast our pests can invade. The reason why you don't have these kinds of invasions is that all your ground looks like pretty good habitat for your pests. Sure, your crop fields are excellent habitat, but the surrounding areas aren't hard going for your pests.

Here, the difference between BLM sagebrush and irrigated alfalfa fields is like the difference between hell and heaven for pests. Once they figure out that shangri-la exists "right over there", they all move to the 125-acre patch where the eatin' is oh-so-fine...