Project Objectives:
Establish a national timothy hay grading system and develop equipment that would enable processors to grade in-coming hay using the new standards.
Project Description:
Activities were set out as follows:
- Consensus gathering
- Technological verification
- Systems testing
- System orientation
- Implementation and follow-up
Observations & Conclusions:
Consensus gathering:
It was determined that timothy hay in the Japanese and North American market is sold on appearance. Further investigation showed that the technology is available to measure the percentage of brown leaf and the colour hue in core samples of hay. The Canadian Hay Association (CHA) contracted with Heinz Automation and the Canadian Grain Commission to develop a scanner and related software to objectively measure colour and brown leaf content in core samples.
Technology verification:
Experts were recruited to grade cored timothy samples and identify individual grade demarcations for the 5 grades established by the committee. Industry fieldmen ranked the samples and assigned grades to establish the high and low boundaries for the grades. Samples were scanned into the database at the Canadian Grain Commission to be consistent with the industry-graded samples.
Work on designing the HayScan software began in July 2001.
Nutritional components of timothy hay were also incorporated into the final grading system. Sugar testing on hay samples from all regions of Canada and the USA were conducted to look for relationships between quality and overall sugar composition and content levels.
Systems testing:
Field testing of the HayScan was implemented in 2002. The feedback from the early field trials has provided suggestions for modifications to the HayScan, including placing the sample in the scanner so that the dust would not settle to the bottom of the scanner, thus skewing the colour readings.
The CHA chose names for the grades applicable to export hay (in descending order): Supreme, Premium, Choice, Standard, and Utility.
Decisions were made by the Grading and Standards Committee:
The grades for 2002 were a colour grade only.
Cut off points are: Supreme >5100; Premium 4300 5100; Choice 3300- 4300; Standard 1900 to 3300; Utility <1900.
Same standards apply to second cut timothy hay.
CGC programmer identified info about brown leaf hue relating to rain damage and adjusted the calculation accordingly.
The term brown leaf percentage will be replaced with the term Percentage green in the Colour Score calculation.
The following additional descriptive factors will be made available as options in the software> The grader will have the option to select only those items wanted to print out with the colour grade readings: texture, stem size, head size, harvest stage, moisture %, rain damage, % crude protein, % unstructured carbohydrates, relative feed value, % potassium, bleaching, impurities, variety, small.
Core samples are to be standardized using a 1-inch pipe with a ¾ cutting end.
Outcomes:
- The grades developed and the HayScan are currently being used by two processors who use it for the Advance Payment for Crops program offered by AAFC.
- Additional software development was identified.
Commercialization and adoption seems limited.
