In this week’s machinery section I got the chance to put JCB’s latest offering, the 419s, through its paces on a silage pit in Laois and found it to be a worthy replacement for the popular 418s. This machine was the first one to go into use on this island since its launch at SIMA back in February. In the second part of Peter Thomas Keaveney’s Canadian series, he looks at the seeding and spraying equipment and operations on the 9,000-acre operation. Mechanical stone picking is also used on the farm, which would have made a lot of our lives easier over the years if it was a viable solution here. The sheer size of the gear makes for serious output that is unheard of in this country.