Farmers aren't alone in waiting for the sunflower harvest to get finally underway

Here at Minot SunPrairie Grain's sunflower seed processing facility the flower harvest means the supply they will need to continue bagging bird seed for the year ahead.

(Curt Currie, Operations Manager SunPrairie Grain - Minot) "Supplies are kind of low, but I think we'll be okay till we the new crop comes off. Hopefully next week if it freezes we'll be able to get out there and get some of those."


Curt Currie is the Operations Manager for the seed processing facility

Currie says they use between 175,000 and 200,000 pounds of cleaned sunflowers a day as they bag the bird food in 50 pound bags to be shipped via railcar to the East Coast to their buyer Tractor Supply Company.

(Curt Currie, Operations Manager SunPrairie Grain - Minot) "Right now we're trying to get a car out a day, but with manual labor it's about a day and a half to get a car out. But they want five to six cars because of the demand."


Surprisingly though in the sluggish national economy bird food sales are strong

And for that reason SunPrairie is going high tech this December and mechanizing part of their operation.

(Curt Currie, Operations Manager SunPrairie Grain - Minot) "Middle of December we're going to be putting in a robotic arm which will enable us to do at least a car load a day then."


That arm will automatically stack these 50 pound bags that right now have to be lifted, and often hoisted 13 tiers high so they fit uniformly in a rail car.

And just to a fill a rail car requires 4,050 bags..

(Curt Currie, Operations Manager SunPrairie Grain - Minot) "That's all they do all day long is just lift these 50 pound bags, three to a row 13 high so it's a lot of work."


Work that will get a bit easier when the facility is upgraded late this year

But first they still need the most important piece of their bagging operation, the seeds

So far farmers haven't had any luck in getting decent enough weather to get the sunflower harvest started.

In Minot With Your Eye On Agriculture, Shaun Sipma KX News. watch the video | save this article / add to your favorites list