While it might not be "rapid", the new pruning method Ashley Johnstone and Harry Offer trialled and demonstrated at a field walk in June last year has reduced their pruning time by about 13 per cent.

By not being so concerned about rolling canes onto the swingarm trellis and relying on the floating wire, the rest of the trellis wires and the vines’ natural growth habit to hold the canes in place, they reduced pruning rates from 7 to 6.14 hours per kilometre of cordon.

Data from our benchmarking program shows there are growers – who are more diligent about rolling on – for whom the benefits would be even greater. For some of them, the reduction would be from 9 to 6.14 hours per kilometre of cordon – a time or cost saving of 32 per cent.

In saying all that, if the crop falls off the trellis during cutting it’s a catastrophe! Check out the summer pruning video shot earlier this week to see what happened.

Now – how will it go through the harvester? If you're interested to see how it goes, keep an eye out for a text message from DFA or post on Facebook. It will be short notice, so we'll video it so you can watch it later.