Tick of approval for seed control unit

Goomalling farmer Luke Siegert has given Canadian manufacturer Redekop’s new Seed Control Unit the tick of approval, after using it for the first time last harvest.

The purpose-built cage mill, distributed by AFGRI, attaches to combine choppers and destroys weed seeds during harvest. It is now one of three options commercially available on the Australian market — adding to the Australian-built iHSD and Seed Terminator.

Mr Siegert said his family farm went out of livestock six years ago and since then they had been looking at other options to combat weeds.

“At first we were sceptical on using a SCU, but a few units have been successful in this area,” he said. “We installed the unit in our John Deere header S680 and didn’t have to touch it through our recent harvest program.”

The unit bolts directly under the chopper with a set of mills, running at speeds of 2800-2900rpm. Mr Siegert said there was minimal dust and the power draw didn’t interfere with the normal operation of the header.

“It was easy to shut down as we didn’t require its operation when harvesting the canola,” he said.

“Knowing the Redekop unit gets three times the wear from lupin harvesting, this wasn’t tested at our farm as we don’t grow it.”

Mr Siegert said while he was pleased to discontinue burning for weeds, he didn’t expect they would reduce their chemical weed control, but this would be reviewed in five years.

Crop residue management has been Redekop’s core business and now it has added harvest weed seed control, which incorporates its signature MAV straw chopper. It released the seed control unit after a three-year research and development association with AFGRI Equipment and John Deere Australia, and first tested it in WA in 2017.

Redekop Manufacturing president Trevor Thiessen, who was in WA last week, said the SCU had been in development for five years as an answer to herbicide resistance. Mr Thiessen and partner-owner Dean Mayerle and business development manager Marney Strachan visited with Mr Siegert to follow up on the SCU’s release in WA.

Redekop had 20 SCUs operating in WA during the recent harvest, with a team of support and research personnel on hand to further assess the units’ performance in Australian conditions and address any mechanical issues.