WE ASK THE CUSTOMER
Spreading the word, not plastic
Read time: 3.5 minutes
I heard about it at the show in Saskatoon and thought we should have had this 15 or twenty years ago because we have to deal with the consequences of traditional plastic net wrap all the time
One farmer from Alberta is already telling his peers about the benefits of Nature’s Net Wrap after trialing it last season
Kevin Mathieu has had cows die on his farm in Ponoka County, Alberta, Canada after eating plastic, which gets stuck in their stomach, causing a blockage. He’s also wasted far too many hours cleaning plastic net wrap from his machinery and had to pay his employees to do likewise. But looking ahead, he can see seasons when those costs are eliminated.
A successful trial
Last autumn, he trialed enough Nature’s Net Wrap to make about two hundred of the straw bales he puts in pens for his calves to lie on — about 10% of the total he needs every year. “I heard about it at the show in Saskatoon and thought we should have had this 15 or twenty years ago because we have to deal with the consequences of traditional plastic net wrap all the time. We’ve really noticed it building up over the last three to four years and causing a nuisance. At the time of the trial, we’d baled all our hay already, so we tried it on straw,” he explains.
He’s been bowled over by the results.
The bales held together well over the harsh Alberta winter when temperatures can get down to minus 40 degrees Celsius. But by the end of the calving season, when manure had built up in the bedding pens, Nature’s Net Wrap had all but disappeared.
“We were testing how strong the wrap was when we were stacking the bales, trying to be as rough as possible, and they held together. Then when my son was clearing out the pens, he said he hadn’t seen any Nature’s Net Wrap in the manure at all. It had totally disappeared already. All he could find was little bits of plastic from the bales we had wrapped in plastic. I didn’t think it would break down over winter, so I’m excited about this,” he says.
Kevin Mathieu and his family in front of New Holland and Case IH machinery on his farm.
I’ve probably still got eight to 12 rolls of the old plastic net wrap that either I’ve got to use up or sell. But I would say that this year, I will use Nature’s Net Wrap for all my straw and half my hay. Then going forward I will use it on all my bales
Cutting costs as well as plastic waste
The advantages of the new net wrap are environmental and economic: it reduces the amount of plastic the farm uses, cuts down maintenance time and protects livestock.
“Cows right now are worth an average of C$5,000 and I’ve lost cows to plastic. It takes an hour to cut plastic off my hired spreaders and clean them, which costs me about C$150 an hour. With four spreaders and a loader, that’s C$500 to C$600,” he points out.
On top of that, he also has to deal with plastic that gets caught up in seeders causing downtime during peak season that can easily amount to C$600 per hour. Not to mention the toll the blockages and the cleaning can take on the machinery itself.
“When the old-style plastic net wrap gets caught behind the seals of the bearings, it can cause them to fail prematurely, so we have to carefully clean them,” he says.
Further improvements
The one thing Mathieu would like to see improved is the current length of the Nature’s Net Wrap rolls. At five thousand feet long, they are shorter than the typical plastic wrap rolls, which are seven to nine thousand feet.
“My son was changing the rolls so frequently, he was running along behind the combine. But that’s growing pains and I’m sure we’ll get there,” he says.
According to Marty Chamberland, Chief Growth Officer for Nature’s Net Wrap, the length of the roll is currently dictated by the manufacturing process. “We’re being careful in the manufacturing process to add more length to rolls as we get comfortable running larger volumes. We hit a ceiling at five thousand feet long — now we’re shooting for six thousand and we’d like to get to seven thousand,” he explains.
Mathieu also mentions that some bales covered in Nature’s Net Wrap broke when pulled out of ice in mid-winter. “It wasn’t as strong as traditional net wrap to pull out of the ice. But that’s just management at our end. This fall, when we stack the bales, we’ll just stack them differently, so the wrap doesn’t make contact with the ground,” he says.
For the coming season, he estimates he’ll order enough to cover about half his baling. But it may be more. “I’ve probably still got eight to 12 rolls of the old plastic net wrap that either I’ve got to use up or sell. But I would say that this year, I will use Nature’s Net Wrap for all my straw and half my hay. Then going forward I will use it on all my bales,” he says.
This is music to Chamberland’s ears. He’s confident that this year, Nature’s Net Wrap will be able to meet demand not only from Mathieu, but also the farmers hearing from Mathieu and others like him about it. So as the word spreads, plastic use will decline, helping to improve our environment and making farming that much safer.
Kevin Mathieu and his family on his farm.
CNH is a world-class equipment, technology and services company that sustainably advances the noble work of agriculture and construction workers.
CNH Industrial N.V.
Corporate Office: Cranes Farm Road, Basildon, Essex, SS14 3AD
United Kingdom