North Canterbury Farmers Change Over To Bulk

Press, Volume C, Issue 29436, 11 February 1961, Page 9

North Canterbury Farmers Change Over To Bulk

There have been a number of new converts to bulk handling of grain in North Canterbury this season. It is now estimated that under favourable conditions some 250 tons of wheat can be handled in bulk in the district in a day. Without exception the new bulk handlers are finding the method speedier and certainly effort saving.

Where there is some form of storage growers have been able to get their wheat away in bulk when harvesting has been held up through weather. Last Monday afternoon bulk wheat was being carted ter'rail from a 20-ton plywood silo at the Admore property of Milne Bros, near Culverden, when local crops were still not fit enough to harvest and last week-end the Earl family at Hawarden had round about 50 tons of bulk wheat on the concrete floor of an implement shed ready to shift to rail as soon as trucks were available regardless of whether it was possible to go on harvesting. This means that transport lorries have something to carry on with when sacks are still too damp to lift out of paddocks and helps to even out the flow of grain to mills. The Earl family have some 436 acres of wheat at Waikari and Hawarden. When the weather interrupted operations last week-end, 130-odd acres had been harvested with their new dual purpose header in an estimated 45 hours’ working time—an output of 170 to 180 bushels an hour. For a stretch of 41 hours before the weather broke the two three-men harvesting teams worked through without a break in 12-hour shifts. The Earls have been carting direct from paddock to railway where possible. Two tip trucks are being used—one (carrying about five tons and the other 3j to 4 tons—and these are being unloaded at a high loading bank at Waikari. Where a crop of Arawa estimated to be yielding 65 to 70 bushels to the acre was being harvested at Hawarden about six miles or more from the bank to keep pace with the header the truck loading in the paddock had to be driven off in the direction of Waikari when it was full, while the other truck was still on its way back from the rail.

By last week-end the Earls had dispatched some 17 railway waggons to Christchurch. One night at about 11 o’clock they ran out of waggons and until about 7 a.m. the following day the wheat was loaded on to the floor of a steel-frame corrugated iron implement shed with concrete floor and just before the rain interrupted harvesting late last week the same course was again being followed. When loading into the shed the Earls tip the wheat on to a canvas sheet outside the shed and then lift it into the shed with a 6in auger. In the shed where they had some 45 tons in bulk last week-end it was in two bays being confined in each bay by sacks of wheat lying on the flat four high along the sides and three high along the back. All was in readiness to start loading out again as soon as there were trucks available at rail. Four or five hundred sacks of wheat were threshed before the grain was fit enough for bulk handling.

On the Earl properties there is space for some 170 or 180 tons of grain to be held in this way. The shed, which was partly filled last week-end, is 45ft long and 21 feet deep. It is open on one side. Another shed just completed is about 60ft long an 24ft deep. It has an extensive section open on one side which will be used for storing the header, hay baler and other implements out of the harvest season, and there is also an enclosed granary section measuring 15ft by 24ft, which can also be used for bulk wheat. A truck can drive into the granary section. Mr J. W. Earl says that harvesting has never been so easy. The Norrie Bros, who farm south of Culverden near the Balmoral forest, have 230 acres in Aotea this year and by last week-end had about half of this handled in bulk. To hold the wheat in their tip truck they have fixed corrugated iron sheets one sheet high around the sides. The truck runs three and a half-ton loads to the nearby Pahau station, and as generally it is not more than a mile from the harvest paddock the trip can be made before tbs' header is again ready to unload. Bin At the station the Norries have constructed a corrugated iron hopper which slopes towards one end where a 6in auger powered by a tractor lifts the grain into the railway waggon. The truck tips its load into the hopper at the railway siding, where one man supervises the operation of* the auger and moves and sheets up the trucks.

Near Culverden, Mr D. W. Earl, of the Estate D. M. Earl, and the Milne Bros, are also handling in bulk for the first time this year. Mr Earl is using a sft cut tractor-drawn header to harvest his 85 acres of wheat. The bagging platform has been enclosed with metal sheet to form a bulk tank holding almost 30 bushels, and a 6in augur draws off a tankful in about li to 2 minutes. The wheat is unloaded from the header into a plywood bin with metal framework, ’ built to Department of Agriculture design, which sits on a twowheel tractor-drawn trailer. The bin, which holds about two tons, is emptied on to the wheat being confined in each woolshed floor by an auger driven off the tractor's power take-off and the wheat is then lifted into a 20-ton plywood bin on the shed floor, which is being used for temporary storage as the space will be needed later for handling sheep. Without any grain being drawn off from the silo by transport lorries, Mr Earl says that there would be storage for about a day’s harvesting. He expects that he can harvest 10 to 12 and possibly up to 15

acres a day with his present facilities.

Harvesting is being done on this property with two men operating the header and the trailer and Mr Earl's sister supervising the operation of the auger at the shed. The Milne Bros, have about 50 acres in wheat. To handle their crop in bulk they have fitted a plywood bin holding the equivalent of seven or eight sacks to their sft cut tractor-drawn harvester. A 4in auger unloads the bin in just over two minutes into one or other of two tractor-drawn bins—one is a lime sower which holds about 2J tons and the other is a home-made bin made out of plywood sheets and 3in by 2in timber on a four-wheeled trailer which takes about two tons. A 4in auger is used to lift the grain from the trailers into a 20-ton plywood silo which has been built on a concrete base under a corrugated iron roof—the start of a more ambitious storage scheme. At Eastcott, the property of the estate E. Gardner at Scargill, Mr Alan Gardner has enclosed the bagging platform of his 9ft cut self-propelled harvester and fitted a trough underneath the platform from which a section has been removed. The 40-odd bushel tank created can be unloaded into a tip truck in about a minute and a half. The wheat has been carried direct from the paddock by two tip-trucks carrying about 200 bushels each to a high-loading bank at Omihi about 17 miles away. While one truck is away to rail the other is standing in the paddock and as it takes about an hour and a quarter to fill it allows enough time for the journey to rail to be completed. In two days last week working from 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. one day and from 8 a.m. till after midnight the following day 65 acres of the 90 acres in wheat were harvested.