Having built up business over the past decade, West Coast contractor Matt Knight has relied on Pottinger grass harvesting equipment.
The Pottinger gear he currently runs includes a loader wagon, triple mower conditioners, rake and tedder.
MJ Knight Contracting is based at Ahaura in the Grey Valley, midway between Greymouth and Reefton. Matt and his team look after a wide variety of customers, including dairy, dry stock and lifestylers. The work is largely in the Grey Valley with the odd client further afield in Hokitika and Murchison.
“We began contracting in 2011. We mainly define chop silage and baling plus some cultivation and deep ripping in the Spring. I gained my experience in my younger years doing grass work for my parents, who are dairy farmers in the area,” Matt says.
About three-quarters of our harvesting work is pit silage and the other quarter is baleage. During the peak season, I have four local guys working for me.
Along with their contracting business, Matt and his wife Anna also have a 250-ha dry stock farm that carries 600 bulls.
Pottinger harvesting equipment has been part of the MJ Knight Contracting and farming story since the beginning. When Matt started out, he replaced the family’s old loader wagon with a 40m3 Pottinger Jumbo 6610.
He also had a Pottinger Novacat front-rear mower combination and Pottinger rake, which have now been upgraded with larger Pottinger equipment, and a Pottinger tedder that is still doing the rounds.
“Our business has slowly grown over the years and to keep up with demand we have upgraded with larger machinery. We bought a new Pottinger Top 842C twin rotor rake in 2023, and this year we bought a new Pottinger 8400 ED triple mower conditioners. We also added a second loader wagon in 2023.”
NOVACAT 8400 ED Triple Mower Conditioners
Matt says the performance of his first Pottinger mowers made it an easy decision to stick with the brand when he wanted to upgrade to a butterfly mowers
“Our first front mower was a Novacat Alpha Motion 301 and our rear was a trailing Novacat 307 with a grouper. Pottinger mowers cut clean, and the Alpha Motion suspension system is really good. With the suspension, they handle uneven ground and the conditioners improve our drying times, giving us the ability to get mowing done in short weather windows.
“I believe our new Pottinger 8400 triple mower is the first one sold in New Zealand. it is a mower conditioner with finger tine conditioners.
“These days, dairy farmers want to cut grass when it is shorter to get better quality. That means crops are lighter so we need to increase the size of our rows. The 8400 has a 9m cut, which lets us cover the ground quickly and it still floats really well. The tine conditioners on the mower on the new mower wilt the grass fast.”
MJ Knight Contracting runs the triple mower with a John Deere 195M, which boosts to 220HP or a John Deere 170R which boosts to 210HP. They use John Deere autosteer to avoid misses and overlaps and to make the whole mowing job more efficient.
TOP 842C Twin Rotor Rake
While the triple mower is new this season, the Pottinger 842C rake has one season under its belt and is performing extremely well. With its 8.4m working width, Matt can use the rake to pull three rows into one, whereas he could only pull two into one with his old rake.
Among the features of the rake that he likes are the MultiTast jockey wheels, which give good ground tracking.
“The 842 rake makes nice square rows that feed into our loader wagon and combi baler really well. It has really good ground following. It floats up hills and avoids hollows,” he says.
“It also has individual rotor lift. Separate hydraulics go to the left and right rotors, so you can lift only one rotor to avoid water troughs and other obstacles. You can work efficiently in triangular-shaped paddocks by lifting one rotor and then the next”.
“It has a very strong main chassis and frame, so it is very sturdy and very well balanced. And with its big wheels on the back, it can work on soft ground.
His Pottinger Jumbo loader wagon gets he thumbs up from Matt. He likes the way the knife bank swings out, which makes it easy to change or sharpen knives.
With a 40m3 capacity, it is a good-sized loader wagon. It has a twin axle with a steering axle, so despite its size, it is easy to maneuver and does not scuff pasture paddocks.
“We can vary the loader wagon’s chop length from no chopping down to 32mm. A shorter chop length is better for filling up the wagon and milking cows, and compacting the stack.”
Matt and his team mostly use their 5.4m Pottinger HIT Tedder during the shoulders of the season. During Spring and autumn, it can be necessary to turn grass over to get it dry if rain is coming or if unexpected rain falls on a mown crop.
“We use the tedder for early baleage, and also in summer to speed up hay drying. We run both the rake and tedder on a John Deere 6330.”
The local dealer for Pottinger equipment is Drummond and Etheridge, Greymouth. Matt says he gets good support from them and from the importer, OriginAg’s South Island sales manager Darryl Chambers.
“Drummond and Etheridge sort out any mechanical issues that we have, and Darryl gives us really good technical support. When we got the new triple mower, he came out and helped us set it up on the tractor. He went through and made adjustments and showed us how to run it in different ways to get the most out of it.”
“We definitely plan to stay with Pottinger. Right now I am sorted with our new mower and rake, but we will have to replace one of our loader wagons soon and I will be looking to them when we do” Matt says.
Special thanks to Matt Knight for his time, and support with both sharing his story and his continuous support with our Pottinger range.
Written by: Paul Titus; Rural Contractor Magazine.
