INTERNATIONAL
Spreading Super in Mangamahu Valley by Mike Feeney
Mangamahu Valley, New Zealand
A 20 | agairupdate.com
(Circa 1960s) Landing just after dawn, I had Pete, my loader, to top up the fuel tanks of ZKBUX, a Cessna C-180 with a 230 BHP engine outfitted for spreading super phosphate fertilizer, known as super. We had a cup of tea while I told him that I wanted to keep flying without refueling to see how long we could work until we had only about half an hour of fuel remaining. The area to be covered was a rectangular field rising up to a western ridgeline. There was a number of small dams and lakes, a very pretty area of about 500 acres in the Mangamahu Valley, New Zealand. The rate of application was to be around 250 pounds per acre. A half ton load should sort of fit one run, perhaps stretched just a little and finished with two runs at 90° to tidy up the job. As usual I divided the block into halves, then quarters. It was a dream job with first runs being a tad lower than the airstrip and last runs being only a few hundred feet higher. The paddock was
close with just a sixty degree left turn to get lined up, another left turn back to the strip and curving right bank to the touchdown point on the right wheel. The time on the ground was about 50 seconds. Pete was very good on the tractor, as he had grown up on the family farm. We completed about 15 loads per hour on the close work, decreasing as I needed to climb and the distance increased to the paddock. After about 55 loads and three and a half hours, I got Pete to dip the tanks. He looked over to me holding up three fingers; three more loads only. I called a halt after three hours and forty-five minutes. It felt great, but I did need a pee for sure. I had to go behind the fertilizer bin, as a bit of a group had gathered, including a nice lady with tea and hot scones. The next job was about ten miles further north up the valley, on the east side quite high. It was a perfect morning with traces of fog still remaining
