INGHAM MEALS ON WHEELS ROSTER MARCH 2023

Wednesday 1

Kitchen:- B Carne, R Marshall, P Robino

Driver/Delivery: S & P Murdoch, Nqib (Donna & Kate), W Pavetto & S Craperi

Friday 3

Kitchen:- B Carne, R Marshall, P Murdoch, M Cominardi

Driver/Delivery: C Mcleod & S

Cameron, I Cameron & R Radel, M & H Matthews, W Ashley

Monday 6

Kitchen:- B Carne, R Phillips, N Knowsley, S Kemp

Driver/Delivery: J Stokes, V Cutting & P Robino, C Mcleod & R Radel, L Laspina & L Mcgrath

Wednesday 8

Kitchen: B Carne, R Marshall, P Robino, N Knowsley

Driver/Delivery: L Sartor & C Bain, Rotary, C Mcleod & R Radel

Friday 10

Kitchen:- B Carne, R Marshall, P Murdoch

Driver/Delivery: P Robino & J

Schoneveld, F&J Boon, J Armstrong & Y Oakes, W Ashley

Monday 13

Kitchen: B Carne, R Marshall, R Phillips, N Knowsley

Driver/Delivery: J Henderson, E & S Lenti, C Bishop & J Hutcheson, P Robino & J Schoneveld

Wednesday 15

Kitchen:- B Carne, R Marshall, P Robino, N Knowsley

Driver/Delivery: L Mcgrath & S

Cameron, I Cameron & R Radel,J & P Schifilliti

Friday 17

Kitchen:- B Carne, R Marshall, P Murdoch

Driver/Delivery: L Sartor & P Robino, D Girgenti & R Quabba, Hsc, W Ashley

Monday 20

Kitchen:- B Carne, R Marshall, R Phillips, N Knowsley

Driver/Delivery: R & S Van Kerkwyk, P Robino & L Mcgrath, V Cutting & C Mcleod, S Rutherford & J Hardwick

Wednesday 22

Kitchen:- B Carne, R Marshall, P Robino, N Knowsley

Driver/Delivery: Rotary, S & P Murdoch, C Mcleod & R Radel

Friday 24

Kitchen:- B Carne, R Marshall, P Murdoch, M Cominardi

Driver/Delivery: R Robino & J Schoneveld, Keita, J Armstrong & Y Oakes, W Ashley

Monday 27

Kitchen:- B Carne, R Marshall, R Phillips, S Kemp

Driver/Delivery: R & S Van Kerkwyk, P Robino & J Bell, B Molachino & A Kemp, I & S Cameron

Wednesday 29

Kitchen:– B Carne, R Marshall, P Robino, N Knowsley

Driver/Delivery – C Mcleod & R Radel, J Bell & S Craperi, L Mcgrath & L Carey

Friday 31

Kitchen:– B Carne, R Marshall, P Murdoch

Driver/Delivery – C Mcleod & R Radel, C Carey, I & S Cameron, W Ashley

TSL Ag Update March 1

GREG SHANNON

SO now we are into March, and suddenly, the start of the 2023 season harvest doesn’t seem that far away!

That means we will soon be starting to sample crops for early CCS. We sample the crop when the oldest cane is around nine months of age because we want to know two things 1) How the crop is maturing naturally and 2) where the use of crop ripeners will be most effective to help facilitate an early start to the season.

To start before June, we need to use crop ripeners. The type of ripener we use has been around for a few decades. Still, it has become more widespread in use in the Tully region over the past three seasons.

While the weather plays a huge role in starting the harvest early (late May) as hoped, the crop must also have reasonable CCS. The primary way to have reasonable CCS at that time of the year is strategically using crop ripeners.

Season 2022 was favourable for the use of ripeners for the whole season; this is not always the case. Usually, we recommend ripeners be used for the first two harvest rounds only and maybe again at plough out at the end of the season.

We work back eight weeks from when we think we will start harvesting to predict when to start using ripeners.

That means ripeners will start to be applied early to mid-April, so we start sampling the crop from March 20.

Crop ripeners are a good tool but not a silver bullet, and there are some basic principles we stick to to make sure we give them a good chance of working effectively:

• The crop should be healthy and actually growing with little or no RSD or other diseases and no moisture stress.

• The crop should be reasonably tonnage, at least 75 t/ha.

• We mainly use rounds 1 and 2 to help the early start, but they can also be used to suppress suckering later in the season if we get a wet harvest; this happened last year.

The application cost has come down in recent years, and we now need to increase at least 0.2 CCS units to make it worthwhile. Last year we achieved this plus more.

Even if no ripener is used, we still start sampling around the 9-10 month mark because we want to know what the crop is doing regarding CCS. Since December, we haven’t had a lot of good sunny days, so it will be interesting to see how the crop has started to ripen so far.

As in previous years, we will have designated dropoff sites where growers can leave the cane samples for processing using the mobile mill, and these dropoff sites will be communicated to the industry a week before the start of sampling, so basically in a few weeks.