Farm machinery man

Waimarino Bulletin, Volume 6, Issue 231, 16 February 1988, Page 11

Farm machinery man

It's not the lure of the land but the love of machines that motivates Ohakune farmer Mike Punch. And if his tractors had room for bumper stickers, they'd say "I'd rather be contracting." Fortunately however, Mike's farming business is a partnership with h i s brother Tony. So while Mike takes charge over machine work, Tony is responsible for stock work. The brothers have a 470hectare farm in Ratamaire Rd at Rangataua. Mike says he has always

liked machines and until about 10 years ago he had a small hammer mill for stock food production. He used to mill wheat and barley grown locally and produced up to 150 tons of stock food a season. But when the chance to buy the family farm came up, he had to close down the mill. That hasn't stopped him from pursuing his interest in cropping, however. Crop rotation is very much part and parcel of the Punch Brothers' farming operation. The crops rotate from swedes to choumollier, to wheat to oats or

barley then back to grass. Of course the cropping gives Mike a chance to develop his tractor and equipment handling skills, together with an opportunity to try out new gear or attachments. This year he has his second wheat crop with 20 acres planted in the Orua strain which he hopes will be graded as suitable for milling. When not on the farm, Mike is contracting as a silage maker or pile driver. He has made much of his own equipment including an enormous side-tipping trailer for silage. He runs two Fiat tractors and a wide range of modern attachments. Mike's piledriving venture began as an experiment with the attachment originally used to build crop breaks. His first job was driving in the posts for the foundations of 10 holiday chalets in 1979. Since that time he has helped in the construction of around 80 buildings in Ohakune. The modifications to his post driver - the addition of hydraulic controls and the extended height of the driver enables posts to be sunk as deep as six metres into the ground with the force of the 180kg weight.

The machine sits securely on the rear of his cwn Fiat tractor. Mike is the main silage and piledriving contractor for the immediate Waimarino area, While his rates are worked out on an hourly basis, he maintains that his have not increased

significantly since he first began and remain very cost competitive with other contractors. A pile driving machine drastically reduces the time taken to complete a job. What would normally take workmen two or three days to complete by hand, the

pile driver can easily finish in mere hours, according to Mike. One problem that exists within Ohakune is the vein of hard pan grit that runs 1.5 metres or deeper in some areas, beneath the town. Once posts hit the layer of rock they can be driven no further, he said.