Large fields and gentle terrain are the norm in forage-producing areas of North America, but some European companies aim to have their forage equipment – developed with the typical European farmer in mind – adapted for widespread use on this side of the Atlantic.
Two companies in particular hope to promote the time savings their equipment might provide.
Aric Wilson of Woodstock-based Leading Edge Equipment was at the recent Ontario Forage Expo displaying products from a number of European-based companies. One that particularly caught the eye of passersby was an innovative rake/tedder manufactured by Finland-based Agronic.
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Its time-saving potential comes from the fact it can allow hay producers to rake using a front-mounted unit and follow that in the same tractor pass with a baler or self-loading wagon attached to the rear.
Why it matters: Forage harvest, from cutting to baling or ensiling, often must be completed within a short weather window so any innovation that decreases time spent on any part of the process is worth a look.
At the Expo, the six-metre Agronic (the company also has a seven-metre prototype) was attached by a front-mounted three-point hitch to a tractor that also had a round baler at the rear.
On July 5, Wilson captured a video of the unit quickly raking and baling a couple of rows of hay at the Expo site but the next day – the day of the event – was rainy so no demo was held.
“We got up to eight miles per hour and we could have gone faster but the baler couldn’t take any more (hay) in,” he reported.
Other options for attaching the rake are front-mounted as a loader attachment or rear-mounted on the three-point hitch. When mounted on the rear, however, you can’t tow an operating baler behind.
“We had one customer who told me he would only need the rear-mounted three-point hitch but once he tried it on the front, he never went back,” Wilson told Farmtario. “People really like the convenience and time-saving and fuel-saving of being able to bale and rake at the same time.”
Wilson has sold 18 Agronic rakes in the past 18 months in Ontario and Quebec, with Connect Equipment serving as the dealer in much of Ontario. It draws less than 10 gallons per minute from the hydraulic system in either the three-point hitch or loader attachment mode, so when mounted as a loader attachment it can be connected as a third function if that’s available on the tractor.
Hay movement is achieved by nylon rods attached to rotating shafts. Replacement rods are inexpensive and Wilson said they wear well, noting one of his earlier customers has so far raked about 8,000 acres and not replaced any.
Developed in a hilly region of Finland, it’s self-floating so it adjusts to uneven terrain, making it ideal for many of the fields in the vicinity of this year’s Forage Expo hosted by Barry Ribey and family near Paisley.
With its genesis in hilly hay country, the Agronic rake shares a bit of its origin story with the Ra rake, from Italian manufacturer Repossi. Not yet established in North America to the same degree as Agronic, Repossi is working with Toronto-based ITACA to secure distribution partners in Canada.
Company owner and president Gabriele Repossi, the fourth generation of the family in an ownership role since the company was founded in 1898, told Farmtario how he conceived of the innovative machine following a visit and a meal with a customer in the hills of central Italy.
“I need to be faster in my field,” Repossi recalled the forage producer telling him. “And I need to provide my customer with the best quality possible. If I’m not able to give them good quality, I will lose this customer.”
Wheel-rake technology, in use for decades and popular because it works best a high speed, has fallen out of favour among some hay producers because it kicks up more dirt – or “ash” as it’s known in the business – than other technologies. Repossi and his customer talked about this drawback.
“The dessert was finished, the wine was finished,” Repossi smiled during a recent video-link interview organized by ITACA. “So I said, ‘Giovanni, I will try to come up with an idea’.”
And he did just that. An aeronautical engineer by training, during his three-hour drive back to northern Italy, he conceived of a double-wheeled system with only the exterior rake contacting the ground and driving the machine, while the interior rake is the only one contacting the hay.
He pulled off the highway, called the patent office and immediately scheduled a meeting.
“It is so simple that I think it can be disruptive,” Repossi remembers thinking. And in the months since the Ra rake was prototyped and developed, “I’ve had a lot of people say, ‘Oh, I’ve never seen something like this before’.”
There are Ra rakes in use in Wisconsin and Quebec but not yet in Ontario.
