Invention and farming are never far apart and this was amply demonstrated in the innovation tent at Ploughing 2022 in Co. Laois.
Although agriculture is a multi-faceted industry, it does tend to be advances in machinery which dominate the area.
Making more of lime in farming
The judges have a difficult choice when making the awards and not all those that deserve recognition make the final cut, so here are three which caught the eye as being practical innovations which might otherwise escape further attention.
The first is from Co. Carlow and goes by the name of Limephro. This is a device which fits to the back of lime spreaders and reduces the amount of lime that is wasted by blowing over the hedges or being deposited in dykes.
In effect, it is a set of shallow curtains that form a tunnel behind the lime which is thrown by the spinners.
Shown only in its transport position at Ploughing 2022, it can be seen to fold away neatly for road movements, but when the arms swing down the curtains drop into the vertical position for spreading.
Although no definite figures can presently be given, the developers Stephen and Carol Kelly, estimate that the dust cloud normally surrounding a tractor and spreader is reduced by up to 80%.
Lime is once again being increasingly recognised as a valuable input and with the need to make every unit of fertiliser count, ensuring the full rate of lime is applied evenly across the field is of vital importance.
Beet cleaning on a budget
Taking the stones out of a harvested crop of beet is essential to protect against further damage to feeding machinery; reducing the soil attached is also important if the animals are to make the most of the feed.
Blue Bull machinery of Tullamore is to put into production a machine that does both jobs in two separate operations, and is said to cost a fraction of alternatives on the market.
Throughput is said to be between 40-60t/hr using a water bath arrangement, and the whole machine is likely to cost around €25,000 when it goes into production later this year.
The company has been trading since 2017 and was established by Darragh Egan to provide feed trailers and bale handling equipment to the livestock sector.
Michael Clarke Engineering
Having one machine to both spread and gather a hay crop has been the ambition of many of those in farming, but other than the now dated haybob, there is nothing available which can happily perform the two functions.
Michael Clarke of Co. Mayo believes he has the answer in his Dualstar 600E implement which substitutes hydraulic for mechanical drive, allowing each rotor to be switched between the two functions.
The present prototype has four rotors which can, in theory, be added to at whim, to extend the machine beyond its 20ft reach.
When in tedding mode, the rear support axle is raised, meaning the weight is carried on the bogie wheels positioned at the centre of each rotor. To move over to rowing up, the rear axle is lowered and the tines function to gather, rather than spread the crop.
Michael, an engineer by profession, has spent 18 months developing the idea and he hopes to have production models ready for next season.