Travis Membrey farms in southwest Victoria, with his brother, his sister-in-law and his parents. They milk 1.000 cows and rear young stock on an 800 hectare property near Naringal. Travis has built up a fleet of PÖTTINGER farm machinery over the last four years and has been impressed with its efficiency and durability. His father has also run an agricultural contracting business, which he established in 1978.

The PÖTTINGER fleet includes two JUMBO 7210 COMBILINE, a TORRO 6510 D COMBILINE silage wagon, a TOP 842 C rake, two sets of PÖTTINGER front and rear mowers, and an IMPRESS 155 baler. He says the silage wagons provide a very consistent chop length and are easy to operate with their automatic fill. They are also simple to service because their cutting blades hydraulically swing out for easy changing and sharpening. After three full seasons using the two JUMBO 7210 COMBILINE without any issues, they added the smaller TORRO wagon this year to replace an older model which was starting to become unreliable. “The season we had this past year was just non-stop. The new TORRO 6510D COMBILINE is small but extremely reliable. It is extremely easy to operate and all the information is there.” “The two sets of front and rear mowers have 3 m of working width at the front and 3.5 m at the back and produce a really good finished product”, Travis says.

The PÖTTINGER rake operates with an 8 m working width and Travis reckons it does a really good job. “Because it's big, you don't have to work it flat-out. You set them up and it is a nice, easy job.” The IMPRESS 155 baler has just completed its second season on the farm. “It pulls the grass in so well and makes a really good, firm bale”. The Membrey family farm produced 4.000 tonnes of bunker silage and around 2.000 silage bales weighing up to 1,1 tonnes this season from about 360 ha. They will use all of it on their farm and they also produced a further 1.000 bales of hay. T

he Membreys still farm the original block, and they have gradually extended the property over the years to the point where it now stretches 8 km from one end to the other. Father Brett manages the dairy farm, while Travis runs the machinery side of the business. They employ four full time staff. Travis is a qualified John Deere mechanic, so he maintains the machinery: “If something breaks down I will have a go. I know that we have got a good dealer where we can get a fair bit of information. The service of our dealer is extremely good, which is one of the reasons we stick with them. The machines are built so they don't break down, but eventually they all do.“