THERE'S usually always a solution for problems in agriculture.
Which is why Busselton avocado business Jasper Farms asked tractor and industrial equipment manufacturer supplier JCB if it could "Australianise" its Hydradig model, which is widely used in Europe.
The specific changes required by the Canadian owners was for a cab with a vertical lift and a rotating cutting head.
Both were duly supplied - according to Australian safety standards - by Harvey manufacturers Havcon Engineering and Hydradig operator Scotty Maitland couldn't be happier.
Jasper Farms bought the JCB Hydradig 110W wheeled model from Bunbury Machinery, Bunbury, earlier this year and has been operating it for the past four weeks, pruning avocado trees, following its conversion by Havcon.
It now sports a cab with a scissor-lift with 0.8 metres of lift to allow the operator a better view of what he wants to prune.
And with the rotating head which sports a grab and shear to cut branches, Mr Maitland already has given it the thumbs up, speeding up the pruning process while alleviating neck pain.
In a previous world, Mr Maitland, a former Wyalkatchem farmer, used a 14 tonne steel track excavator with a rotating head to reach up into the taller canopies while lower branches were done manually with pole saws.
"The excavator was unwieldy and a literal pain in the neck operating it and it did raise safety issues," Mr Maitland said.
"So when we looked at the Hydradig and what it offered it seemed the right way to go, particularly when we knew we could get vertical cab lift."
Other appealing features included 30 kilometres an hour road speed, stepless transmission, crab steering and four-wheel drive and a comfortable cab.
The latter is vital when an operator can expect a 12-hour shift with a pruning rate between four and five hectares a day.
"All those features put it way in front of the excavator," Mr Maitland said.
"And we will use it for multiple tasks such as digging and grading for year-round operations, so it won't be a single purpose machine."
Generally avocado trees can grow to a maximum height of eight metres but Mt Maitland said pruning allowed tree heights to gradually be lowered.
"You don't want the fruit too high so about 6.8m is ideal and we're gradually achieving that on the farms."
Once the pruning is done a FAE mulcher is employed to reduce the prunings into mulch which is then pushed under the trees by a hay rake to keep the sun off the surface of tree roots.
Jasper Farms has planted 82,000 trees on their farms which total 510 hectares.
