Ben Tait has a backround as a tillage and seeding contractor in Mid Canterbury operating as Taits Riverlea, Ben and his family business have drilled more than 20,000 hectares in the past six years.

 The Taits home farm is pretty kind to equipment, however the surrounding Westerfield and Ruapuna districts are not. He tried many drills, starting with a 3.0m Great Plains CP1000 box drill then a 4.0m KRM Great Plains, 4.0m Allen Custom Drill then a 6m JD 750 A.

Bens business is now running a custom built SuperSeeder direct drill with great success. They made the decision to build their own machine based on the need to improve upon what was available on the market. Previously running a JD 750 A, which is a seed only drill that are difficult to load, clean out, calibrate and especially service, meant a lot of down time. The nature of the stony local pastoral farming, primarily irrigated dairy land made the American style spring orientated openers prohibitively expensive to run.

By the time the JD drill had been replaced by the SUPERSEEDER equipped by Bourgault , Ben and the Riverlea group had spent more in the JD parts department than what the 750 A cost to buy new in only three and a half years.

“The Superseeder was developed from our sheer determination not to be stuck in the rut of throwing money at a drill. Replacing the JD with another drill the same would have been like servicing another consecutive life sentence. There had to be a better way!”Ben.

In June 2010 Ben and his wife Stephanie travelled to Canada, where Bourgault Industries had just released the 3710 opener. Ben was so impressed by the Bourgault equipment that in the winter of 2011 he and Stephanie became the New Zealand distributors of the range trading as Canzquip Ltd. Ben & Steph ordered a full set of openers, hydraulics, seed meters, fan and electrics. They then began designing their own drill specific to New Zealand conditions using this new Canadian technology. They designed everything on the SuperSeeder to match and outperform their previous drill. They kept the 6.0m width and 36-opener layout.

”I had seen the openers on the web but up close I was blown away with how robust but simple these openers are. Bourgault doesn’t use any springs that can chatter. They use a hydraulic pressure system on a parallel linkage for down pressure and for raising the openers. The large, rubber press wheel is connected to the depth gauge wheel by a walking beam. This is the only drill that shares the load of its down force between a gauge wheel and a press wheel. These press wheels are under hydraulic pressure, so it absolutely destroys the seed furrow wall as it closes, leaving perfect seed-to-soil contact.” Ben

Bens wife Stephanie grew up on a large arable farm in Saskatchewan,Canada. Steph and her family have long known the reliability and durability of the Bourgault equipment. Stephanie’s farm formally ‘Meier Brothers Farms’ were located within an hour of the Bourgault factory. Steph’s Father and Uncle played a key role in the development of the mid row banding(MRB) application of nitrogen fertiliser working with Bourgault in the early ninety’s. Since then they have been involved with on going research and development with this progressive company. Stephanie’s Uncle now works with Bourgault as their international agronomist.

Learn more about Bourgault’s history by clicking this link.