B&D Murray Johnston(sp) do run the Bala farm and the whole community created the festival to draw people in if I recall.
I am on Vancouver Island (the place where the old hippies are from according to B&D ...LOL) Hippies don't last too long here - cost too much to live here and they either come from money or go to work elsewhere.
Mike, the weeds are there...this year my fields are probably dirtier than normal - I went away for a couple weeks in August and it went down hill from there.
You are right, most guys only do Fresh dry pick or Water harvest for process. I had a dyke failure a couple years ago so I decided to get the fruit out with the Darlington Harvestors. Since then I have repaired the dykes and will flood the field after to get the rest of the fruit out. I will also flood my 3 other fields just for process (juice, craisins, sauce).
How do the Darlingtons work - poorly! The machines are probably mid to late 60's vintage. I was born in 71 and I never really remember seaing them on any of the farms around us - other than the Fresh Fruit guys. They were in a shed full of junk that some guy was knocking down. I bought 7 and a bunch of other stuff. We went through and rebuilt 5 into near new sort of good condition..
There are mor moving parts, bearing, bushings, cams wear points than any machine I have used - but they work ok. You can order one new from Mass. for about $8000-$10000.00 each. But most parts are avaliable...
I knew I would get a Yamakoya question. It is a direct Honda knock off - I was told it is a cheaper Honda line to compete with the real cheap Honda clones from China.
I have 2 old Hondas - 70's vintage. 1 new Honda, and 2 Yamakoyas. The only thing wierd with the Yamakoyas is it must be choked every time you start regardless of how long it has been running. Otherwise it was $150 cheaper than the Honda and in stock at my local place last year. Honda parts pretty much interchange with it.
How does the Darlington work - as I said poorly. It combs through the vine and stripps off the berries from the uprights. They are popped off and pulled up the elevator and dumped into a sack. The machine must be mooving forward befor you engage the picking head - or you will jam.
Part of the reason the machine works poorly is my field conditions. I have LOTs of vine. A true dry harvest field is very lean and the combs can get in deep and not rip out the vine. My fields are still dense and my fruit is very large. In fact if you look closely at the first post picture, you will see the fruit is stuck onto the picking bars - this shouldnt happen. I also have them set very high so I am "cherry picking" the high fruit. But I am leaving 40% of the fruit in the field to be floated out later.
I will answe any other questions this evening with a new post. I will add other pictures later too. Grant
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