Puck Adds New Standard Features to the TTR 20

Jul 13, 2023

Puck is constantly looking to the future to meet the needs of our customers today and tomorrow. It’s this spirit of innovation that has led to new features and solutions of our equipment with each new iteration. Over the last seven years, more than 400 units of our flagship product, the TTR 20, have been produced and provided unmatched ROI to our customers. Puck Enterprises is ready to introduce the latest innovative updates to our TTR 20.

The TPU hose used today gives manure applicators a more reliable hose and more capability to inject at higher gpm rates than before. As the durability of TPU hoses continues to evolve and get thicker, more room is needed to carry these improved hoses. To accommodate for the larger TPU hoses without losing efficiency, the TTR 20 now has room for two additional 8” hoses, or room for two miles of 8” plus two drags. If you have a larger hose, the TTR 20 can manage 1 ½ miles of 10” hose plus drags.

The best didn’t just get bigger — it got better! Alongside the increased capacity, the TTR 20 will now come standard with a hydraulic jack, step pockets in the rear, new sheet metal, and an increased balance when running up and down the road. We’ve maintained the covered slewing bearing swivel to keep mud and the hose from damaging the body of the cart. Additionally, the new modular components, like the widened bolt-on fenders, will help keep debris off the cart. When working in the field and getting equipment dirty, operators don’t have to worry about slipping or falling off the hose reel; Puck has added widened steps and grip tape along the sides. Even covered in liquid manure or rain, you can feel secure in the steps you take with Puck.

We’ve built upon the foundation of our best cart, but we haven’t taken away the features that make it distinctive. The rugged A-frame chassis and 710 radial tires give the turn table reel a robust look while maintaining traction in the field. Our hose reels feature our patented Arch Guard and domed reel ends to allow for safe placement and overlap as you roll and unroll your cart, without worry of hose twisting, kinking, or falling off. To help the operator safely load hose, rear LED lights help illuminate the cart where the tractor lights cannot reach.

With the 2023 additions to the TTR 20 becoming standard, Puck Enterprises continues to push the leading edge of innovation in liquid transfer equipment. The TTR 20 is truly Built to Lead.

The TTR 20 is truly Built to Lead.

Source : puck.com

Video: The 15-Year Bet Behind Every New Variety!

Canada is trying to decide how much agricultural research capacity it can afford to lose. Brian Rossnagel believes the better question is whether the country can afford to rebuild it.

The longtime barley and oat breeder makes the case with a simple fact about his profession: the consequences of today’s decisions may not become visible for 10 or 15 years.

“Pick the right parents. That’s the biggest thing,” Rossnagel says. “If you pick the wrong parents, you’re not going to get anywhere—and you don’t know that until 10 years, 15 years later.”

That warning carries particular weight as Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada moves to reduce spending and streamline parts of its science operations. The department’s 2026–27 plan anticipates the loss of approximately 665 positions by 2028–29 and says some research will be reduced where capacity exists in academia or industry. AAFC says the changes will make its science operations more cost-effective over the long term.

For Canada’s seed industry, Rossnagel’s career illustrates what is at stake.

This fall, the retired University of Saskatchewan breeder will be inducted into the Canadian Agricultural Hall of Fame. During his 35-year career at the Crop Development Centre, he helped develop more than 100 barley and oat varieties, including CDC Austenson—one of Western Canada’s most widely grown feed barleys. His induction recognizes not only those varieties, but the collaboration and research system that made them possible.

Rossnagel is quick to emphasize that none of it was the work of one person.

“The first thing I thought about was all the other people who contributed to whatever success I and my program had over the years,” he says. “We know that it’s not an individual who does this. It’s a group—a team.”

That team extends well beyond the breeder whose name appears beside a variety. It includes technicians, pathologists, quality specialists, statisticians, regional testing sites, seed growers and industry partners. It also includes the breeders who came before and those who will carry the germplasm forward.

CDC Fraser barley, for example, moved through three breeding careers. Its parents came from Brian Harvey’s program. Rossnagel advanced the material after Harvey retired, and Aaron Beattie later guided it through registration and release.

That kind of handoff is normal in plant breeding. The person who makes the original cross may never see the resulting variety reach farmers.

It also explains why lost research capacity cannot simply be switched back on when budgets improve.

“If you shut it off, it’s very, very difficult—and particularly costly—to start it up again,” Rossnagel says. “If you have to start from scratch, it’s going to be at least 10 years before anybody notices whether you’re getting anything done or not.”

The concern is not simply how many experimental lines Canada can process. Modern equipment, statistical tools and genetic technologies allow today’s breeding programs to evaluate tens of thousands of lines—far more than Rossnagel could handle when he entered the field in the early 1970s.

But efficiency and automation do not generate every idea.

“If you pare back down, and instead of having six or seven individual scientists concentrating on wheat breeding, you go down and say three people could handle all this, well, that’s half the ideas gone,” he says. “Particularly if you happen to lose the three people who had the really neat and innovative ideas, boy, that’s a problem.”

It is a timely distinction for Canadian agriculture. Consolidating programs may preserve the volume of material moving through a system, at least initially. It may not preserve the diversity of thinking, regional knowledge or willingness to pursue unconventional crosses.

That regional knowledge matters because Canadian agriculture is not one uniform production environment. A variety suited to southern Alberta may face different disease, moisture and maturity pressures than one grown in Manitoba, Ontario or Atlantic Canada.

“Agriculture is applied biology,” Rossnagel says. “Biology, all around the Earth, moves from the poles to the equator. It does not move from Newfoundland to B.C. like politics do.”