Date machines

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My date palm post yesterday reminded me of the AgriTech exhibition in Tel Aviv back in 2012.
 

These "clam shell" platforms are part of big pruning/picking towers.

Enlarge the photo: the posters demonstrate the machines' work.
The biggest model, AF-20,  boasts a working height of about 70 ft (21.5 meters) and a load capacity of 1,500 lb (700 kg)!

Here is how the Israeli manufacturer, Afron, describes it:

The Afron family of pruning / picking towers include models specifically designed for date trees.  Afron date tree models are designed for date trees from 25 feet (7.5 meters) up to 65 feet (20 meters) in height. 
All Afron date tree models include a “clam shell” type operator platform that is designed to encircle the date tree trunk.  This provides full access to the date tree canopy for several workers.  
Not only can Afron date tree models be used for picking and pruning, but also include optional attachments for spraying and mechanical harvesting through the use of a shaker head.
 All functions of the tower can be controlled by a single operator on the operators platform.   

Further technical details are here.

Next time you eat sweet dates, give a thought to the workers who were way up there picking them for you. 

There is also a nice story about Lisa Solomon, the date plantation manager at Kibbutz Ketura in the Arava, in Israel's south.
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(Linking to Our World Tuesday.)
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Plowshares or swords?

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"And He shall judge among the nations, and shall rebuke many people: and they shall beat their swords into plowshares  and their spears into pruning-hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more,"  is what Isaiah prophesied in Isaiah 2:3-4.

The prophet Joel, in contrast, said this:
"Beat your plowshares into swords and your pruning-hooks into spears;  let the weak say: 'I am strong.' "

Chapter 4 of the biblical book of Joel is sounding very modern right now.
It is worth a read.

The Oliver model plow, USA, 1860,  was lovingly restored for the Tractor Museum in Ein Vered.
I saw it in Tel Aviv at the 2012 AgriTech fair.
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Cardboard kids and vegetables

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 It's a balancing act for Israelis to stay afloat.
In the last few weeks the price of food has gone way up.
The grocery bill is said to be 16% higher now. 

And then came the cucumber shortage, pushing the retail price for them up by 150%.
Oi, and we are a nation that eats salad even for breakfast!

Some say a few recent cool nights affected growth and caused the shortage.
Others blame it on not enough foreign workers.

The secretary general of the Vegetable Growers Association said that due to the shortage of a steady supply of farm laborers to harvest the crop, and the reluctance of the government to increase the number of visas granted to foreign agricultural workers, farmers have cut back on their planting of cucumbers, a labor-intensive crop, by 30%.
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(Photos are from last spring's AgriTech exhibition in Tel Aviv.)
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UPDATE:  The day after this post I went to Machane Yehuda shuk (market) and bought a kilo of cucumbers for 4.50 shekels.  That's only $1.20.  The price was a bit above normal but still affordable.  
Supermarkets would charge a lot more, I imagine.
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Good drones and bad drones

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How strange.
Last night I wrote this little post (below) and today we hear that a drone entered Israel airspace at 10 a.m. and was  shot down by our air force.
But  the intercepted drone was one in the shape of an airplane.

Our jets followed it for half an hour  a short while after it turned inland  from the Mediterranean.
At the edge of the Negev desert, on the southern slopes of  the Hebron mountains,  the UAV unmanned aircraft was shot down. 

See the video here  and read  Ynet's latest speculations [updated] about where it came from.
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Here is my innocent post written yesterday:

The dream of every photo blogger, no?

But would you trust your camera to this little flying machine?
Or more precisely, this remotely-operated unmanned miniature helicopter.

Seen and admired at AgriTech exhibition in May.
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A Jeep's underside exposed

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Ever wonder what the underside of a Jeep looks like?
Here's your chance to see it in the mirror.

The guys visiting the AgriTech exhibition in Tel Aviv were drawn to it like to a magnet.
[Hmm . . . maybe I should have put away the camera, feigned interest in the car, and gone over to mingle.]

Israelis seem to use "jeep" as a generic name for any big 4 x 4 vehicle.
Some models of the locally assembled "Storm" Jeeps are the most popular here for off-road fun.   Wikipedia says

 The AIL Storm ( סופה‎, Sufa) is an Israeli  manufactured off-road vehicle and the workhorse of the Israeli Security Forces. The series of Jeep Wrangler based vehicles have been produced by Automotive Industries Ltd. in Upper Nazareth under licence from Chrysler since 1990. The vehicles fill a number of military roles, including that of armoured Infantry Mobility Vehicle, and certain models are available for export as well as for the civilian market.

The beautiful Negev and Judean deserts make up about half of our country, and almost none of our open land is privately owned or closed to travel.
Unfortunately for the land maybe, but luckily for the 4 x 4 drivers,  freedom to roam off-road is well established.

The heavy government taxation on fuel and cars makes the cost of maintaining a jeep in Israel many times higher (when normalized by income)  than in the USA.
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(A post for Weekend Reflections meme.)

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Would you like your hay bagged?

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Many favorite blogs here in the northern hemisphere are showing pastoral scenes of freshly-baled hay sitting in golden fields.
Over the years and the miles I've seen quite a few ways of protecting bales--but never saw hay in a zippered bag!
This one, encountered at the Polysack booth at last May's big Agritech exhibition, made me smile for some reason. :)
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Browse their website and be surprised by all the Israeli high-tech agricultural innovations, including amazing agrotextiles.
At a kibbutz in the Negev, 150 people work at Polysack to supply solutions for world agriculture.
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That's a lot of bull

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That's a lot of bull! A real poster boy.

Sion was giving away posters at the big AgriTech exhibit in Tel Aviv.
I might have liked one but carrying it on the buses, train, and tram would have been a problem.

Sion is an Israeli company for bovine artificial insemination and breeding.
More about their hundreds of Holstein sires and the Israeli breeding system--click here.

To see their clever logo, go here.
There is a good play on words there, if you know Hebrew.
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(A post for today's Camera-Critters.)

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Photography from a powered parachute!

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This man has to have the most exciting photography job in the world!
Above the world, actually.
He makes photos of the earth below while flying in a powered parachute.

You can see his flying machine on the cover of his book, Knafayim shel tsipor (Bird's Wings).
Asaf Solomon stood still a minute for this picture with his book and with Or Solomon at the big AgriTech exhibition in Tel Aviv.

Go to the AgriTech website and click on the box "A Bird's Eye View of Agriculture in Israel" to see a short and amazing slideshow of some of his best shots.

Under Asaf's hand you can see his handout: each of the 18 boxes shows one aspect of what his photos are good for.
Artistic aerial photography and postcards of Israel, of course, and coverage of special events like hot air ballooning.
But also to find drainage problems in farm lands, to document the extent of forest fires, to better see roof solar panels and to map acres of greenhouses, to document building violations, to plan water reservoirs . . . and much more.
Asaf is also helping archaeologists see "the big picture" that they can't grasp while standing on the ground.

Channel 10 News made a video of Asaf in action!
You can watch it at the photographer's website, http://asafsolomon.com/en .
Just don't get too jealous.
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A city in a garden

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I had planned to post an altogether different photo for ABC U-Day, but that was before I encountered the useful knife sharpener of yesterday.

Still, I beg to inform you that URBS IN HORTO, meaning "city in a garden," is the motto of the great City of Chicago.
Chicago, that beautiful and friendly city by the Lake, city of my birth, place of my first 22 years of life.

Imagine my surprise when, among the hundreds of exhibiting companies and institutions at the 18th International AgriTech in Tel Aviv, I came upon a booth of the State of Illinois.

I just stood gazing at the photo--had it included just a few more blocks, our apartment would have been visible.
Ah the memories--swimming and fishing in Lake Michigan, climbing the lake's snow mountains when it froze, riding my bike on the cycling path, riding horses on the bridle path . . .
Where else could a kid have such fun in nature in a city of millions?

And now that I know Chicago's motto, I heartily agree that Chicago is an urbs in horto.
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"Made in Europe" tractors

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Get a load of this modern tractor!

It was a big hit at the AgriTech exhibition last week in Tel Aviv.

The guys were drooling over it.

I don't blame them; I wanted to have a turn sitting up there in the plush cabin too!

The sales rep had the powerful (and beautiful) engine running, which added to the excitement.
He was showing off, effortlessly turning the big front wheels with only one hand on the steering wheel.

All the tractors were so new and shiny clean that they were fertile ground for reflections for James' Weekend Reflections meme.
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Benedictus bread wheat

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Benedictus--blessed!

Blessed be the Christians who celebrate Ascension Day today, whether on the Mt. of Olives or around the world.

I never know how to illustrate Jesus' ascension into heaven 40 days after Easter (except for this one post).
But when I saw the wonderful name of this new kind of bread wheat yesterday at the 3-day AgriTech exhibition, I knew it was perfect for the blog!

The improved wheat was one of the many plants the Agricultural Research Organization, Volcani Center, was showing off.
It was developed to be resistant to leaf rust, one of the major diseases of wheat.
The new bread wheat cultivar cv. Benedictus-16 has already been released and is doing very well in the field.

Cv. stands for cultivar which comes from combining the words cultivated variety.