By Mel Pickering – GMO and IP Officer – February 2024
In preparation for all the new machinery arriving at the Rosedale GMO field site, Mel Pickering and Christine Trittermann (from Stu’s lab), attended a Tractoring for Women session at Oakbank on the 22nd February. The session matched Mel and Christine up with an equivalent tractor to one we have just acquired for the GMO field site.
The course is designed to provide practical training in tractor use, aimed at women on farms or in industry where tractor knowledge is important.
“I’ve never driven a tractor before, so with the arrival of the tractor and various site prep
implements at our GM field site at Turretfield in January, this course was a perfect opportunity to gain the skills to confidently operate a tractor. It was almost all practical based, covering topics such as safety, attaching implements, transporting loads and maintenance. We also spent a lot of time driving various models of tractors around a track, which I can confirm is a lot of fun! It has given me the confidence to operate our tractor and to get started on site prep for the 2024 field season at Turretfield, as we move towards larger scale plots.”