John Cosgrove reports on a time-honoured harvesting practice still happening in the Selwyn district today
In a paddock full of golden oats at Weedons, swaying gently in the nor’wester, an old binder clatters and rattles along behind an equally ancient 1950s-era Fordson tractor.
Dunsandel farmer Paul McCartin, 73, is at the helm of the binder as it cuts a swathe through a paddock of metre-high oats.
“There is not one machine made today that can do this job properly,” said McCartin.
He was harvesting a crop of oats chaff for the Warren family from Rolleston. The self-binding reaping machines are indispensable for manufacturing chaff, he said.
The work is labour-intensive and the days are long, so it is just as well he had his mate Dave Murphy, 65, alongside him at a the wheel of the tractor towing McCartin on the late 1940s-era Case binder unit.
“It’s a good job when you can work in sync with your mates on the tractor, then enjoy a laugh, a joke and a cold beer at the end of the day,” McCartin said.
“Nothing can cut the oats and tie it neatly into sheaves, which we stook or stack it, and later feed it through the chaff cutter to make food for horses.”
It was a pleasure to work in a traditional way, which he first took up in the late 1950s alongside his father.
“There is nothing nicer to see than the sheaves coming out the side of the binder, all tied up in the right shape and lined up neatly in a paddock.”
“Every farm around here had one when I was a boy. But now we only cut oats into sheaves for the Warrens and their stock feed company, some big mills and public shows,” McCartin said.
Once huge teams of Clydesdales pulled the self-binding reaping machines. They were replaced by horsepower of a different kind after World War 2 as farmers switched to tractors.
Up front, Murphy drives the vintage Fordson tractor, while behind McCartin is perched on a spindly seat alongside the spinning post-WW2, open bladed binding unit, owned by the Warren family.
McCartin’s job on the binder is to line up the cut oat stalks, using the levers to control the speed and direction of the sheaves or bundles.
“I love coming here to help out the Warrens each year, cutting their oats for chaff,” McCartin said.
“It’s something I’ll do until I eventually retire and when that happens, I don’t know what will happen to the binder or who will operate it as my son isn’t interested in doing it.”
Warrens Animal Feeds owner Chris Warren said the future operation of his old binders is always uncertain.
“I started when I was 17 with my grandfather, who was binding oats before the war on fields next to Russley Rd. I’m 64 now and my son Blair is taking over,” Warren said.
“His young son is fascinated by the binders now and may take it on when he grows up, but it’s always hard finding trained operators to drive these old machines.”
He said it’s still the best way to harvest oats and chaff.
From paddocks scattered around the district, the Warrens are expecting to produce more than 7000 sacks of chaff this season. It’s a figure calculated not by volume, but by the number of balls of string they use on the binders.
