Weighing in on new equipment (Edition 24)

WEIGHING IN ON ALL THINGS NEW

Edition 24 catches you up with the new season, along with Kevin Langmaid reflecting on the new weighbridge and how weighing of seed potatoes has changed over the years, a new update on our 2-tonne bin ventilation system, and new face in Admin, Iris.

Read on for these stories and more. The team at Cherry Hill Coolstores.

IN THIS ISSUE


New Equipment	2-tonne Bins are here	Seed Inspection Tours	New face in Admin

Read on for these great articles and much more…

Pictured: Conor and Andrew ready to work

SEASON REPORT

As the leaves on trees start to colour and fall, heavily laden trucks have been rolling in for a couple of months now. We’ve so far received around 1300 tonnes of seed, and we’re pleased to say it’s all looking exceptionally good.

With Innovator seed on site to-date, we’ve noted that the size is smaller than expected – which is actually a good thing.

As your newsletter arrives into your inbox, we’re due to begin the pre-cutting seed, with almost all seed on site scheduled for this.

So if you haven’t already booked yours in, let Conor know and he’ll schedule it for you.

Wishing everyone a wonderful start to Autumn,
Andrew, Pam, Conor, and the team at Cherry Hill Coolstores.

2-TONNE BINS ARE STACKING UP

It’s an incredible sight building undercover of our newest coolstore, with 1500 of our new two-tonne bins being assembled and filled with seed potatoes.

We’re waiting on a further 500 ventilation systems to be delivered and then locally assembled.

By the end of this process, please take a moment to think of poor Tina – who will have added silicon to the ends of 36,000 screws, protecting hands if placed into the inner ventilation system.

Also pictured is our new automatic bulk unloading system, which will work alongside our existing bulk unloader to more than double our capacity to unload trucks. Instead of weighing each bin after we’ve filled it, we pre-determine the weight we’d like to be filled … and the bulk unloader does the rest. How good is that!

Watch our video to see the new bulk unloader in action:

KEVIN WEIGHS IN ON NEW EQUIPMENT

Seed potato storage and handling has changed and improved considerably over the last three decades. We once harvested by hand into 67kg bags. We then emptied them onto an old farm shed floor, with wide enough gaps to allow airflow through to get them ready for hand cutting in the early Spring.

We planted the seed behind a three-furrow plough, with soil tillage done after planting. The weighing of the seed took place at a public weighbridge or at the processing factories.

The industry then moved on to using half tonne bins which were harvested by hand and then later with a small Port harvester. The harvester boxed the seed in the field, which was then weighed on the journey to the coolstores. The trucks had to tare off at the weigh station. It was difficult in some cases to get a dirt free, well-sized sample to the coolstore. It was also difficult to apply the storage fungicide evenly in the field. Eventually, coolstores installed seed weighing facilities for the half tonne bins.

Dirt removal was done over an unloading machine. The chemical was applied, the seed was weighed in half tonne bins on small two and half tonne scales. This process was slow and used a lot of fork lift movements.

An innovation was then made to move to one tonne bins, which improved the receival and handling procedures immensely. One tonne, box fillers were installed but we still had to weigh each bin on a small weighbridge.

Today, we see a new two tonne bin filler being installed at Cherry Hill Coolstores. This will fill and weigh the seed. The two tonne bin filler receives the seed directly from the unloading machine as it eliminates excess soil, sizes and also applies the fungicide.

The new filler is available at a second location on site. Cherry Hill Coolstores now has two unloading machines, which will make for a much faster turnaround for the off-loading trucks. The additional filler machine is destined to help make our seed handling procedures even more efficient, as it reduces fork lift movements and sends all receival information directly to office.

CHERRY HILL COOLSTORES SEED GUARANTEE

Our Seed Management Services. Cherry Hill Coolstores will guarantee our services on Seed Growers seed. If you buy someone else’s certified seed, which is presented to Cherry Hill in good condition, and it breaks down, we will replace our cutting and services at no charge.

This guarantee specifically refers to seed piece breakdown (i.e. rot), and refers to seed which is delivered directly to Cherry Hill Coolstores from the seed paddock for chemical application, coolstoring and cutting. In order for this guarantee to be valid, the Buyer must make claims within 24-hours of the seed leaving Cherry Hill Coolstores and before planting.

In order for this guarantee to be valid, the buyer must make claims with 24 hours of the seed leaving Cherry Hill and before planting.

View more about our guarantee here.

A SLICE OF LIFE AT CHERRY HILL

Introducing a new, friendly face in admin, Iris Bacosa.

Iris has recently joined the team at Cherry Hill Coolstores, starting last December as an Administration Assistant. In this role she assists Tanya with administration duties, including the processing of invoices and bulk unloading tasks.

Growing up in the Philippines with three brothers and a younger sister, Iris had dreams of becoming an engineer or nurse, but was encouraged by her family to study accounting. After completing her studies, she worked as a picker at Tasmanian Mushrooms before joining the Cherry Hill team.

I’m an avid shopper and could spend the whole day either window shopping around town or shopping online.

In her spare time Iris enjoys photography, and says she would love to be better at it if she had more time.

Iris married last year and, with her husband, enjoys taking part in local traditions like eating lamb on Australia Day.

SEED INSPECTION FIELD TRIP AROUND TASMANIA

In late February, we toured around some beautiful looking paddocks and inspected seed with Simplot and McCain. We covered vast sections of Tasmania from Oatlands to Scottsdale, and right around the north-west to Waratah. Some great days were had by all, with lunch in Boat Harbour a highlight.

For more images of our trip visit our gallery .

BEYOND BLUE

Simplot have recently collaborated with Beyond Blue, to spark conversations about the mental health of farmers in Tasmania. Simplot set aside some time on a recent field trip, to allow Beyond Blue to promote their services and educate farmers on what they actually do.

Did you know that 3 million Australians are living with anxiety or depression? Beyond Blue provides information and support to help everyone in Australia achieve their best possible mental health, whatever their age and wherever they live.

Members of our farming community are encouraged to contact Beyond Blue and reach out for support and advice, at any time.

Please visit beyondblue.org.au or call 1300 224 636 if you or someone you know needs help.

Pictured: Lindsay Morgan

CHINA VISITS CHERRY HILL COOLSTORES

Representatives from Syngenta China and Private Enterprise came to Cherry Hill Coolstores for an educational site tour – they all had a wonderful trip in Australia in mid-February, before returning home to China.

NEW BIN TIPPER IN ACTION

Check out this amazing new bin tipper – an add-on to our already capable forklifts, this tipper system twists and turns in enviable angles.

It can handle one-tonne bins and two-tonne bins.

You truly have to see it, to believe it!

Which you can of course by watching our video, right here:

CONFIDENCE IN TASMANIA GROWING STRONG

We were pleased for our farmers and all Tasmanians for investments into our processing plants: with McCain’s $37 million investment and upgrade to their Smithton potato processing plant; and the recently announced $51 million upgrade of the Simplot processing factory in Ulverstone.

Many new jobs were reported and the ripple effect for our industry is already taking shape. This investment supports jobs and exports for the North-West of Tasmania, particularly in regional communities.

As reported recently in The Advocate newspaper, Rodney McLaren said McCain’s investment is a show of confidence in our industry. We agree, believing it gives our farmers the confidence to upgrade their machinery, and provides security into the future for farmers, their employees and all our families.

Pictured: Aerial view of the McCain Foods french fry plant in Smithton.

TESTIMONIAL … “Benefits of improved services”

Darryl was our first grower to unload seed and witness our new bulk unloader and weighbridge in action. It can take less than 40-seconds for one of our forklift drivers to unload a 1-tonne bin, move it into one of our coolstores and be back in place for the next tonne of seed to drop. In terms of unloading a 30-tonne truck of seed, that’s a huge savings of time for our growers.

“Over the years Cherry Hill continue to have better unloading facilities  and better coolstores. With the new faster unloader, our turnaround time to unload 50-tonnes of seed is about 2-3 hours less per day. That saves  me time and money, and I’m not keeping people waiting in paddocks for  empty trucks to return.”

Darryl Saltmarsh | Partner R & D Saltmarsh, Central Castra.

View more of our testimonials here.