Aug 07,2017 at 12:14 am By Admin
The Rocks Gone Reefinator has been selected as one of three finalists for the Growth Category of the 2017 WA Innovator of the Year Awards. Mr Tim Pannell, the Innovator and Managing Director of Rocks Gone Pty Ltd, farmed for over 30 years in the Western Australian Northern Wheatbelt. During his time farming, he was faced with the various problems of farming on rocky terrain.
After leaving the family farm, Tim was inspired to research for solutions to rocky soils on the internet. Tim travelled and looked at the existing machines working, and purchased a rotary rock crusher and started a contracting business crushing rocks on farms and for gravel roads for shires. Operating the rotary crusher had its problems, so Tim decided to develop his own concept, which became the ‘Reefinator’.
Australia wide there are approximately 405 million hectares dedicated to agriculture, with 355 million hectares of this land used for grazing. A large percentage of this land is made up of poor, shallow soils, unsuitable for cropping.
The opportunity to renovate these soils and convert the land suitable for cropping is enormous.
Mr Tim Pannell has designed and tested the Reefinator over many years. The Reefinator is an implement that is towed behind a tractor. The machine was developed by building and trialling prototypes on farms.
The Reefinator is a hybrid design between a rock ripper and a rock roller - combining the two functions into a single draw-bar pulled machine. The real secret is in the Reefinator Grate – the part of the Reefinator that acts a bit like a cheese grater.
The Reefinator presents a solution to the rock in the paddock that has had farmers bouncing over, going around, and breaking machinery on for years. Rock can now be crushed and turned into level soil efficiently and cost-effectively, ready for the bar to be driven through safely.
Straightening out the run-lines makes it easier to adopt controlled traffic farming, and greatly reduces input wastage caused by overlap.
The Reefinator can create soil depth where the existing soil is shallow and rocky, improving the potential productivity and yield. Land that was previously only poor quality grazing land can be transformed into good quality productive soil, ready for cropping or improved pastures.
The Reefinator is realising farmers dreams to increase their land area and productivity within their own farm boundaries. “We are seeing amazing results across WA, Victoria and SA. Not only are farmers creating much higher yield and profits, but some are now turning to their neighbours and offering to purchase their rocky land too,” says Mr Pannell.
Crops sown on shallow, rocky soils often struggle in the face of stress; too hot, too cold, too dry or too wet. Crops sown on deeper soils have greater resilience to these stressors, and thus a greater yield potential.
Deepening the soil results in a far greater water holding capacity – so that the rain soaks in where it falls, not running off down the hill at great speed, carrying the precious topsoil with it. Previously this was combatted by putting in contour banks, which only treated the symptom. Treating the cause of the problem by converting the thin rocky soil into deeper productive soils is a far better solution, and can be achieved very cost-effectively, due to the Reefinator.
The Reefinator is manufactured in the South-West town of Manjimup. Over one hundred machines have now been manufactured and sold. The Reefinator was awarded Best Australian Made Machine at Yorke Peninsula Field Days, 2015 and Best New Release at the Newdegate Field Days in 2015.
Rocks Gone Pty Ltd is a family business, with Tim’s wife and three daughters all involved in operating the business.
LINK TO AWARD ANNOUNCEMENT
http://www.jtsi.wa.gov.au/what-we-do/science-and-innovation/innovation-awards-and-initiatives/wa-innovator-of-the-year/2017-finalists