CHRIS SHOWS HE IS A MASTER OF THE TRACTOR

Congratulations are in order for one of the people we support at our Raby Gardens and Woodlands site for gaining a qualification in using our tractors. Chris completed his training course to be able to use our two tractors, which he took alongside Raby activity leader Claire Quinlan and Joe Peters from our Estates & Facilities Team.

We spoke to Chris after he was presented with his certificate to find out more about what he learned on his course and what other jobs he likes doing around the Raby grounds.

Chris, you recently completed the tractor training and gained your certification. What are you now able to do with the tractors? The orange one, we use to move chickens or for the midden. The midden is the muck heap. We’ve got three big muck heaps down the bottom [of Raby Gardens]. So if you were going to do it by hand, it takes quite a lot of time. And I can easily move stone for any projects or jobs that need to be done, instead of doing a whole entire job of moving a few tonne of stone by wheelbarrow. Sometimes we use the orange tractor to fill that up and take it down. So it speeds the job up as well as giving other people more tasks. And we also use the tractor, the blue tractor, for the same job.

Some of the other guys do sit on the tractor… just so they can enjoy sitting on a tractor.

What did you have to do on the training? What did they take you through?

Just checking oil, the maintenance of things, if anything is broken, write it down. Yeah, the general maintenance of the tractor and the competency of driving.

When you use the tractor, you have to take into account that if you’re taking a heavy load, you have to keep your counterweight quite low so it has an equal balance, so it’s not going to be tipping over or falling over.

They talked about the health and safety, so if you’re going up a steep slope always go quite slow, or uneven ground you just take it slow, because with speed you could tip it over.

And always be aware of your surroundings, because down here you’ve got other people that could run out in front of the tractor, so you have to be on constant alert to make sure you don’t accidentally run anyone over. So just be constantly alert and when reversing as well, always check behind you.

How long have you been coming to Raby Gardens and Woodlands? I think it was 12 years since I’ve come down to Raby. I’m quite happy working in all areas, from maintenance to animals, horticulture and woodlands as well. I like to broaden my knowledge and horizons and I’m happy to help people and staff in other areas.

What do you think you’re going to tackle next? What’s your next challenge?

We’ve been working on the bird hide, probably other projects that’s going on like another alpaca shed.

Well done to Chris on mastering his tractor skills and for being such an important and helpful member of our Raby group.