Minnesota farmer gets harvest assist on green stem soybeans

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Minnesota farmer gets harvest assist on green stem soybeans

A southeast Minnesota farmer called in reinforcements when his soybeans became too difficult to harvest.

Ed McNamara of Goodhue tells Brownfield his earlier maturity beans combined great, “(then) I got into some 1.6 beans that just did not…my combine did not like those at all. Fought them, combining at 2 miles per hour, and I was getting very frustrated.”

McNamara says harvesting the green stems was also hard on his combine, so he contacted an area farmer with a rotatory harvester.

“He basically came in with a 45-foot Draper head and took 80 acres of beans out in six hours. So he was cruising right along, and they were 60-bushel soybeans.”

McNamara says despite the success of the rotary combine, he’s a one-man crew and will stick with his conventional machine. 

Rotary combines use centrifugal force to drive the grain through the straw.  The faster the cylinder spins, the higher the force, which makes it easier to increase capacity.

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