Bobcat Telehandler Saves Time & Money in Manure Handling

It was in 2018, when he added an additional 2000 m² poultry building, that David Derenne considered purchasing a new compact telehandler. On his farm located in Langonnet in Finistère, the handling work had previously been done by contractors.

Another advantage is that with his own telehandler, he is no longer dependent on contractors’ delays and has been able to shorten the duration of the sanitary emptying by several days. "For me, an empty building is a building that loses money," the farmer emphasises.

A Tool That Can Work 24 Hours Straight

David Derenne initially opted for a Bobcat TL30.60 model offering a 5.8 m lifting height. Three years later, convinced by the machine, which works between 500 and 600 hours a year, he decided to replace it with a slightly bigger model (the TL30.70), offering the same 3 tonne lifting capacity but with a higher lifting height of 6.7 m. "The telehandler can run up to 24 hours continuously during peak work periods. I can't afford any breakdowns," he stresses.

A warranty extension, negotiated upwards from three to five years, allowed David to resell his first TL30.60 with two years of warranty remaining.

A Tool Suited to the Farm Buildings

The newer model, with a cab only 2.1 m high, allows the farmer to operate at the lowest point of the buildings where the height is just 2.2 m. "I remove the rotating beacon and I can pass through everywhere for the manure," he confirms. David Derenne is highly satisfied with the performance of his telehandler. "It’s a real bulldozer. When I empty the building, I can lower the bucket and push all the way to the back of the poultry house." 

He also appreciates its manoeuvrability for turning on the spot without slipping, as well as the four-wheel steering that allows him to ‘crab-steer’ out of tight spaces when stuck against a wall. "In such situations, there is a risk of damaging the whole poultry house. I couldn't do without it now," he insists.

The blue LED lighting is also a real plus. "Chickens don’t see blue light. It helps avoid scaring them during night time loading," he explains.

A Machine For Every Task

David Derenne has equipped himself with various tools to optimise tasks on the farm. One bucket is dedicated to manure cleaning. The 6.7 m lifting height has allowed him to increase his productivity by making it easier to fill trailers. 

"It used to take me two and half hours to empty a poultry house with the 5.8 m machine, and now it takes just one and a half hours. You have to adapt to the ever-larger trailers used by farmers." 

David also owns an Emily sweeper for cleaning the poultry houses, a claw bucket for handling wood, a spike for handling straw bales, and a special forks attachment for moving containers when loading the chickens.

More Efficient Bedding and Chick Handling

Two tools, in particular, have saved David Derenne time on the farm. One of them is a set of pallet forks for handling a chick container, also acquired by the farmer. "It’s a 6-tier container that allows me to unload the chicks with the telehandler in 45 minutes. Before, each crate had to be unloaded by hand, which took two hours."

The second tool is an Emily bedding bucket used to spread sawdust on the concrete-floored building and wood chips on the earth-floored ones. "It’s a special bucket with two hydraulic motors and drawers that open on both sides to spread the contents," the farmer describes. 

Since receiving this equipment, he has been able to complete the bedding of the three buildings in a single day. "When I started, I used to spread the straw bales by hand. It was very laborious and took me two days per building. Then a contractor came to shred the straw over an additional day," he recalls. To save time, David Derenne later hired a new contractor to finely shred the straw with a Teagle machine before spreading it. But this solution proved insufficient in combating pododermatitis. The Emily bucket, combined with sawdust and wood chips, has ultimately proved to be a winning solution for both time savings and animal health.

Welcomed Suspensions

In addition to its effective pneumatic seat suspension, the Bobcat telehandler cab is connected to the chassis via a flexible plate that acts as a shock absorber, according to the farmer. "When accelerating and braking, you don’t feel the jolts," he says happily. 

The boom suspension, which he chose as an option, is also an asset. "I’ve already transported a one tonne bag of wood chips between my two sites, four kilometres apart. It was a gamble whether the bag would hold or not, and thanks to the shock absorber, it held."