Tag Archives: Facilities

Preparing for the 2013 harvest

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The 2013 harvest is less than a month away, and our team has been working hard to get ready. While our goal is always to have all facilities and equipment ready when needed, it becomes even more essential as harvest time gets closer. Facilities and Equipment Manager Louis Cantafio and his team have been going nonstop all summer to prepare the harvest equipment.

“Right now we’re going over all of the trucks,” Louis says. “A lot of minor repairs, a few major repairs. Most of it, though is preventative. We’re doing a lot of welding on the tailgates and the dump bodies. They come off for harvest, but when they go back on after the season it’s better to have them in good shape. During the season we’re always running hard, and those trucks are in use all year.”

The team also finished work on the harvesters earlier this summer. “Those all got oil changes, new plugs, and anything else they needed for a standard tune-up. We already did a lot of work last year in terms of replacing parts, though we’re ordering parts in because things are going to break and we need to have them back up and running right away.”

The equipment team helps with all the various harvest machinery, making modifications such as additional hooks for storage or an expanded hopper on the elevators. The boom is sent out for repair, and once it is all back, Kelvin Colon will be installing them on the boom reels.

In addition, all the equipment that we rent is on its way. Mike Guest, our Facilities Supervisor, is also in charge of the packing house. His main task this week has been ordering the trailers we use for hauling to the Ocean Spray receiving station. “I modify those myself,” Mike says. “So I need to make sure that what we get works with my modifications. If I make sure what they have for us is compatible with what we need, it saves everyone time and effort.” Once the trailers are in, he’ll get them ready.

The biggest part of Mike’s job, and the one he takes the most pride in, is prepping the processing equipment. “The main thing is getting the blowers ready,” he says. “The belts come off after harvest in order to prevent wear. It makes them easier to clean, for one thing, and that way the sun doesn’t damage them. The black ones can take it, the white ones can’t, so it’s just easier to take them off.” As far as the permanent machinery, is concerned, he says, he checks every single screw. “That’s not an exaggeration: every single screw. All the nuts and bolts: no exceptions. If you want a comparison, this place is a big funnel, and the packing house is the hole in the bottom. If it gets plugged, everything else shuts down. If something holds up a crew, we still have two more running until the first gets back up again. But if something happens at the packing house, the whole thing gets backed up. I always say it, but it’s easier to maintain things than it is to fix them.” Along those lines, he also makes sure he has parts so if something does break, he has what he needs to get back online.

Mike also welcomes any ideas from his crew to improve the process. “They’re the ones who are on it every day; if they come to me and ask if we can try something like adding an extra walkway, I’ll always see if it’s doable.” He is also very pleased with the assistance of Emmanuel Colon. “If I have to go anywhere, I know the place is in good hands.”

Last but not least, our PIICM program is also getting ready for harvest, calculating our crop estimate! Every year around the last week of August or first week of September, our team takes a random sampling of each variety that we have on the bogs. In each bed, they pick twenty square feet. The samples are brought to the Rutgers Marucci experiment station, where the staff generously allow our team space to sort the berries into categories: healthy, scald, rot, and other. Once it’s weighed and recorded, our team uses that info in conjunction with how many acres we have of each variety to calculate our estimated harvest for the year!

Facilities – Big Camp

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One of the principles of Pine Island Cranberry’s facilities management program is care: making sure all facilities are safe, clean, and attractive. To date, one of our proudest achievements is how well we maintain our seasonal workers’ camp. Built in 2008, our seasonal camp (known as the big camp) is one of the best in the state of New Jersey. Particular care is taken every year to maintain the camp to our own high standards in order to attract and retain seasonal team members.

Facilities Manager Louis Cantafio says he thinks it’s nicer than the housing he had when he was at college. “It’s a great campus-type set-up,” he says. “The state inspectors always say it’s the nicest one they’ve ever seen. Best seasonal camp in the state. Maybe even the world.” He has a detailed process that is meticulously followed every year for set-up. Once the start date for the seasonal employees is determined, he schedules the state inspection and makes sure everything is completed. The water is tested quarterly. The facilities team then changes the smoke alarm batteries, arranges for range hood cleaning and inspection of the fire suppression system, and schedules heater and dryer vent cleanings.

While a lot of that is done by licensed contractors, our team is busy prepping the rest of the camp, making sure everything is clean and in good condition. They make sure everything is stocked (linens, cleaning supplies, cookware, dishes) and that all the required posters are updated as needed.

Supervisor Gerardo Ortiz is in charge of seasonal recruitment and says that having a good camp makes it easy. “We like when people come back,” he says. “When we have places open, our returning guys always have a friend or a cousin who they can recommend. People who know what the deal is and what they’ll have to do. And they want to come! This place, it’s a five-star place.” What makes it better, he says, are the amenities. “It’s clean, the rooms are bigger, and there’s more privacy. We only have four or five guys in each room, and each room has its own bathroom.”

There are plans for making it even better. “Bill is always looking for ways to improve,” he says. There are plans to add a second screened gazebo as well as a basketball court. Long-time season team member Alberto Torres is also the (spectacular) camp cook. “The kitchen building is also a great place to hang out,” Gerardo says. “The guys come in, watch TV, play cards. It’s nice. And it makes people want to come back.”

Louis agrees: “It makes us more competitive for quality staff. We have the best in the world, and we want to treat them that way.” Gerardo adds, “Bill Sr. always used to say, if you’re a good worker but can’t come back for a while, the door is always open. There’s always a spot here if you’re a good worker. Our guys, they know what they have to do and they do it, so we want to make them happy.”

Early summer

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In addition to the ongoing Boricua renovation, our Pine Island team is hard at work on many of our usual summer tasks.

Facilities and Equipment Manager Louis Cantafio is keeping his team very busy. Two equipment storage buildings have been built after the originals were demolished in the aftermath of the 2011 storm that took down the old shop. Another equipment shed by the packing house has been taken down and is being replaced with a larger, more efficient building. The team is doing ground prep for the new one. “We did the initial ground prep for the sheds by the shop, as well,” Louis says. “We’re very well situated to do that. Just raising the ground that small amount made a tremendous improvement; if we get a downpour, the ground’s high enough that we won’t get any water in the shed itself.”

In addition to the routine maintenance work on bog mowers and the harvesting machines, Louis is also training a new member of the equipment team: Miguel “Coco” Mercado, a recent graduate of BCIT and now, a second-generation full-time employee.

The facilities team, under the supervision of Mike Guest, is building the new pump houses at the Boricua renovation, redoing a staff apartment, and widening the doors to old pump houses in order to make engine repair and replacement more efficient.

While all of this is going on, other members of our team are hard at work on pest control. Team members Casey Koehler and Tory Haines spent the afternoon searching for and removing dodder at Telephone Line.

Dodder is a parasitic plant that is a very serious pest for cranberry production and can be challenging to control. In order to thrive, dodder must form a successful attachment to its host. Once a suitable host is found, it will twine around the stem. After attaching to the host, new shoots will develop and either attach itself many times to the same host or branch off to attack different hosts. Research has shown that sanding might have a helpful effect, but while that may reduce the infestation, it does not halt it. So our team removes dodder by hand. Hand-removal is time consuming, but effective in light infestations. Once the dodder has formed an attachment, it is clipped and removed from the area for burial.

Casey and Tory are also keeping an eye out for spotted fireworm larvae. Egg masses of spotted fireworm can be easily detected on the the upper surfaces of weed leaves, and our IPM teams monitor any changes, as the most effective control occurs when the larvae are in the early stages of development.

Most importantly, spotted fireworm can be controlled without harming the bee population, which is always a concern during the bloom period.

Boricua renovation

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Pine Island’s bog renovation team is moving steadily forward on the next stage of our Oswego project at the Boricua bogs, which we will be planting with Crimson Queen this fall. Like the rest of the bogs at the Oswego renovation, they had previously been planted with Early Blacks and had been productive bogs, but “…they were starting to become what we colloquially call ‘mutts’, which means they weren’t true Early Blacks anymore,” Bill says. “Production started to drop off. They were adequate and not necessarily terrible, but definitely no longer up to our standards.”

As we mentioned in January, part of the renovation includes new pump houses. We’ll be installing the larger size double-wall fuel tanks, which have the benefit of better environmental protection (always a concern with water management) and having to be fueled less often, which is more efficient. But first, the bog renovation team had to work closely with the facilities team to get the dog leg and suction line installed.

The installation is fairly straightforward: the team (Facilities supervisor Mike Guest, foreman Wilfredo Pagan, and team member Emmanuel Colon) places an eighteen-inch stone bed at the bottom of the canal. They place the screen (a PVC pipe with slots cut into it) on the stone bed, then add another foot of stones on top. “It’s so much more efficient this way,” says Wilfredo. “We end up using less water with this design, because we don’t need to raise the water as high. And it’s fun to watch!”

While the installation itself is straightforward, it does take some time to make sure it’s done right. The team works with the long arm excavator and a laser level to ensure that the stone bed is properly set, as well as getting into the bed and checking by hand.

Once it’s installed, the stone bed will act to filter out any natural debris that’s in the water, such as leaves, sticks, twigs, and dirt. The stone will stop any debris from entering the system and plugging the sprinklers.

While one team is working on the suction line, another team is installing the main irrigation line as well as laying out a plumb line at Boricua #1 and #2. Plumb line is installed to make sure the layout of the irrigation system is a true grid. Once that’s installed, the team will be able to put in sprinklers.

Bog Renovations manager Joe Colon says all that remains after this is land leveling so that the team can start mapping for the sprinklers and underdrain. “It’s a lot of acreage,” he says. “But we did a lot last time. We can definitely do this.” Wilfredo agrees: “We’re getting better at this all the time.”

Packing House

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Over the past few weeks, we’ve talked about water management, the picking crew, and the gathering crew. The final step before the Ocean Spray receiving station in Chatsworth is our packing house. This process, unlike the previous, really is as simple as it seems. It is, however, a continuous process, and relies on constant communication between the team leaders and the packing house team, as well as between the packing house and the receiving station.

Each team on the bogs has been assigned a color: Orange, Blue, or Green. In order to properly track each team’s production, their bogs are assigned a different section on the packing house platform.

Each bog is run through the blowers separately. When a new bog is started, the first load from the new bog has a post-it note attached to it with our Exhibit A number, or bog identification number. It is the team leader’s responsibility every day to let Mike Guest, our facilities supervisor, know what their plan for the day is and to keep him informed of any problems that might occur during the day.

“We switched to this new system back in 1999,” Mike says. “It’s actually a lot easier and I think works better.”

First, the forklift crew, led by Joan Dominguez, unload the full cranberry boxes from the trucks coming out of the field. If the boxes are coming from the bog that Mike is sending through the blowers, then the forklift crew will dump the cranberries from those boxes into the hoppers. If Mike is not running that particular bog the forklift crew will stack the boxes in the appropriate spot for that crew on the platform.

Once the cranberries are poured into the hoppers, they pass along the belt through the blowers, which are used to partially dry the fruit and remove as many of the leaves as possible.

These leaves are collected throughout the day and sold to local blueberry growers; when Pine Island still had a blueberry operation, we used this to mulch our blueberry fields. Nothing is ever wasted!

Once the leaves are blown out, the fruit drops onto another belt and from there move up the truck elevator into the waiting trailer.

Team member Harry Mick keeps the loading moving; he signals our drivers, Candido Rivera and Josue Rodriguez, to keep the trailer inching forward as each section is filled with fruit. It is then his task to halt the line when the trailer is full or the bog is finished in order to bring the next waiting trailer forward.

While all of this is going on, other team members are busy rinsing off the belts in order to keep the equipment as debris-free as possible. They also take advantage of pauses in loading to sweep up the extras and push them toward the debris pile. In addition, everyone pitches in when necessary to clear out the hoppers, which occasionally can get jammed. The last box out of a bog usually has a lot of leaves, grass, and other bog debris, and can clog the line and cause hold-ups both here and at the receiving station if we do not take care of it immediately. Therefore, the constant washing of the equipment and attention to detail by the packing house crew help keep our harvest running.

While all of this is going on, trucks from the Blue, Green, and Orange teams are coming and going, keeping our forklift operators busy!

“It can get tough when we have a lot of fruit coming in, because we can only get the trailers out so fast,” Mike says. “But everyone hustles, and everyone helps, and we do what we need to get done.”

New beginnings

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One of our strategic drivers at Pine Island Cranberry Company is our equipment and facilities management. Instrumental to the daily efficiency and success of our operation is well-maintained, consistently available equipment and facilities that are fully operational. We have long maintained our own shop on the property, and early in 2011, began making plans to upgrade our facility. The weather had other plans for our projected timeline: an afternoon storm on July 24 destroyed the maintenance shop and several equipment sheds at the farm and also damaged eleven vehicles. In the end, strange as it sounds, the storm actually helped: despite the difficulties with the aftermath, we were able to put the new building in the original location.

Facilities supervisor Mike Guest acted as general contractor for the project, coordinating all aspects during the long process, and did an amazing job. Bill’s daughter Becca Fenstermaker also helped kickstart the project, visiting several area locations to get ideas for what we would need.

Friday’s grand opening was also a chance for many of our neighbors and vendors to meet our new equipment and facilities manager, Louis Cantafio. Louis, a former land manager with the Franklin Parker Preserve, has been here since early July and is greatly enjoying his time here so far. He says, “Every day it’s always something new and something different.” Mechanic Ernie Waskiewicz agrees: “It’s fun because it’s not the same thing every day, and you’re doing something that needs to be done.” With three advanced degrees, Louis enjoys learning for learning’s sake and is having a good time picking up all the ins and outs of the cranberry business. He was initially attracted to the scale of things at Pine Island, and from his time in the area (he and his wife live in Chatsworth in a house they designed and he built himself) he knows many of our team members and how they both work hard and have a good time.

Louis also believes in continuous improvement; in many ways, starting from scratch here has been a help to him in his work. He doesn’t believe in doing things in a particular way just because they’ve always been done that way; he likes finding out why things are done and then finding ways to improve them if need be, whether it’s ordering parts, purchasing equipment, or analyzing standard practices. And he’ll do whatever it takes to help achieve our company goals, pitching in wherever he’s needed.

Addressing the crowd gathered at the official opening, Bill said, “It’s a great day for Pine Island Cranberry; this makes us that much more efficient and that much better. It makes our team that much better. I’m proud of this place and I’m proud of our team: they do a great job every day to make us what we are.” Mike Guest agrees: “It’s great to see our guys able to work more safely and more efficiently.” He’s also proud of the place; he says that in addition to the surface things (layout, equipment, space), there are many things that we don’t see which contribute to making it a fantastic place to work.

Harvest prep 2012

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Well maintained, consistently available equipment and facilities that are fully operational are instrumental to the daily efficiency and success of our operation here at Pine Island Cranberry Company. Our goal is to have all facilities and equipment ready when needed. While this is a top priority throughout the year, it becomes even more essential as harvest time gets closer.

It is important to make sure all of the equipment has been properly maintained well in advance of the harvest: the boom, boom reels, harvesters, et cetera. The boom is taken out and checked for any repairs that need to be made, and so is the reel.

The harvesters are brought in and serviced at our shop. We also look over and repair as needed the blowers, elevators, trucks and tractors for each harvesting crew and ensure we have all the tools and safety supplies necessary to get us through harvest.

At the packing house, we do a test run on our blowers and elevators:

At the same time, we also look beyond the harvest. Getting a head start on bog renovations for 2013, Joan Dominguez and Emmanuel Colon are working on building replacement pipe gates for flooding for our Oswego renovation project.

As we’ve mentioned in a previous entry on bog renovation, we’ve been replacing our wooden floodgates with a newer PVC design for greater longevity. They are also easier to install and repair.

Doing whatever it takes to efficiently prep for our busiest time of year helps us realize our mission and our vision and exceed even our own expectations.