This year's sprout season started two weeks later than other years at FreshGrow in Heerle. "We had a difficult start as a result of the wet spring, as planting took place in a hollow and stagnant manner. The first plants were still harvested reasonably in accordance with planting dates, but of the sprouts planted later, it is still a question mark how big the yield will be. There are growers who planted as much as a month later than in other years," André Tange says. The FreshGrow growing company is a collaboration between growers André Tange and Bernd Verdonk, who jointly grow sprouts on about 110 hectares. The sprouts are supplied to Fresh2You. "In the end, I expect that we will reasonably get our kilos this season. Prices are currently at a prevailing level for the time of year."
Starting this season, FreshGrow and Verdonk are using the latest sprouts harvesting machine from Tumoba of Barendrecht, the Netherlands. This machine has a pre-sorter, which removes the rotten sprouts, leaves, heads and excess sprouts from the lot in the pre-reading unit, so that the good sprouts are less contaminated by rotten sprouts in the remainder of the process. FreshGrow / Verdonk were already working with the optical pre-reading unit of the Butterfly type, but has been using the latest Butterfly 2.0 version with improved cameras since this season. "Actually, I wanted to start using this new version last year, but this season it really took off. I was immediately charmed by this update with numerous technical highlights," Andre says. "For example, the method of ejection has been changed from hammer to flippers. This has made the machine a lot more accurate."
The sprouts to be sorted are illuminated by LED lights and viewed from four sides using cameras, computers and image processing software. "Product feeding is done by means of a flat feed conveyor. The cameras assess the sprouts as they fall and are selected according to the set criteria," explains Tumoba's Christian Molenaar. In the sprouts picker, the Butterfly is equipped with eight cameras. The machine makes the decision in a few hundred milliseconds whether to let the sprouts through or not," Christian says. He sees sprout cultivation becoming more specialised over the years. "It's becoming more and more complicated to grow a good product with the available resources. So many agents have already been dropped, which is surely a concern."
"Because more and more crop protection products are being dropped and because of changes in the package, sprout cultivation is becoming increasingly challenging," agrees sprout grower Tange. "Until a few years ago, trips were the big culprit. We managed to tackle those problems well, but now whitefly has emerged as a new problem. With the intended elimination of Batavia, that challenge will only get bigger. A reason for us to invest in technology to deliver the quality demanded by our customers. Moreover, we expect this to reduce maintenance costs. The machine is equipped with a monitor that allows us to read data remotely by means of a 4G chip. An ideal addition, it allows us to remotely monitor engine data, picking capacity and fuel level. We can also adjust the grader remotely, but my preference is still to do this on site in the field," André says.
For Tumoba, which also designs and manufactures machines for other outdoor vegetables such as babyleaf, lettuce, broccoli and cabbage, Brussels sprouts are still the main crop. "Over the years, therefore, many growers in the Netherlands have dropped out and there is a market with a limited number of players. The sprouts are in the field for a long period, but that also means you have nine months of insect pressure and weather. That means everything has to be right to grow a good crop. Just adding a corner of sprouts is out of the question," Christian says. However, he does see development in other markets. "In Scandinavia, sprout cultivation is on the rise. The acreage there is not as large, but because prices are higher, the growers can afford to mechanise sooner. Furthermore, Brussels sprouts are still of considerable size in Belgium, but much of it is grown there for the frozen market. Due to weather conditions, including floods, cultivation in Belgium has been very challenging in recent years, but this has resulted in factories paying 40% more for industrial sprouts."
A final development Tumoba is working on this harvest season is the robotic picker. "Last season it has already been running successfully. We made some improvements last season and look forward to the results this season!"
For more information:
Christian Molenaar
Tumoba
Broken Meeldijk 77D
PO Box 130
2990 AC Barendrecht
Tel: (+31) (0)180 61 77 55
[email protected]
www.tumoba.nl
André Tange
FreshGrow
Moerstraatseweg 14A
Heerle
[email protected]