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Harvest Day ’22 Rescheduled for Saturday 6th of August

We have rescheduled the Harvest day to take place on Saturday next, 6th Aug. Activities will be starting about mid-day and we will have a fine selection of vintage cars, tractors and commercials on display. We will have tillage with vintage machines, competition ploughing demonstrations and of course combines, trailed, self-propelled and also a range of the most up to date modern machines. Fingers crossed for a fine day! We look forward to seeing you in Ballinspittle.

De Courcey Harvest Working Day 2022

De Courcey Harvest Working Day will take place on the Hayes Farm, Kilkerran, Ballinspittle, Co. Cork on Bank Holiday Monday 1st August 2022.

Old time tillage and harvest working displays. Competition ploughing. Static displays of stationary engines, cars, tractors and commercial vehicles

Update on Fr Kingston’s mission in Mozambique.

Last year the club was delighted to be able to give funds from our Harvest Day to The West Cork Fundraising Community whom since 2018 have been working towards raising enough funds to buy a tractor and other farm machinery for Fr. John Kingston’s mission in Mozambique. Clonakilty native Fr. John Kingston has been working in Mozambique since 1990, focusing primarily on helping the local community to farm.

The mission has been granted a significant plot of land (approximately 100 hectares) in Chimolo, which, if it goes unused will be taken back by the state, this would result in the eviction and loss of livelihood of a number of locals. We were delighted to hear back in May that the mission has now taken possession of a new tractor and implements to enable them to properly farm the land. See pictures of tractor arriving.

Earlier in June, we received some more pictures of the tractor, this time actually at work on the mission farm. We wish Fr Kingston the very best in the work he is doing helping the farming community in Mozambique.

RIP Paddy McCarthy

The De Courcey club was very saddened to hear of the unexpected death of Paddy McCarthy on the 1st of May. Paddy and family generously hosted the 2015 and 2016 Harvest working days on their land in Ballinadee.

Both days were a huge success owing in no small part to the enthusiasm which the McCarthy’s took on the event. A great supporter of the Club Paddy will be sorely missed! We extend our deepest sympathy to his wife, family, friends and neighbours.

May he Rest In Peace. 

Paddy’s family have set up a Go Fund Me account to raise money for Pieta House in his memory.

Follow this link if you wish to donate. https://www.gofundme.com/f/2dkjma-darkness-into-light-sunrise-appeal

De Courcey Harvest Day 5th August 2019

John O’Donovans farm Sandycove, Ballinspittle, was the setting for the 9th annual DeCourcey Harvest Working Day held as usual on the August Bank Holiday Monday. The event was run to raise money for The Fr Kingston Mission in Mozambique, Ballinadee School, Ballinadee Hall and DeCourceys Boxing club.

This year Farmhand Ltd with local distributor Derry O’Donovan Ltd were partners with the Club in running the event. Farmhand brought a fresh modern element to the Harvest Day, the highlight of which was the impressive parade of farm machinery from their catalogue. Full credit must go to Derry and Moira O’Donovan for assembling the array of equipment in one place. On the grandstand was Farmhand sales director David Borland who gave a detailed commentary on the machines as they paraded past.

In amongst the modern gear, there were a few early machines as well, including an Amazone fertilizer spinner originally sold new in Bandon in 1970 and an old Krone muck spreader, both of which were on vintage Massey Fergusons from the same era. Marketing director Stephen Scrivener was also present and was kept busy for the afternoon meeting past and future customers in the Farmhand hospitality tent. The team had a constant stream of visitors looking to chat and to purchase merchandise from the machinery brands on display.  

This year the Harvest day also featured several working horses. They spent the day collecting sheaves from the binders and drawing them to the threshing machines. Well done to local Jack O’Reilly for the fine job in restoring the horse butt which he brought to the show. It was lovely to see the butt in use throughout the day.

Two threshers were in use during the event. Sullivan’s Clayton and Shuttleworth thresher was driven by Lordan’s Marshall traction engine and John O’Neill’s Ransomes was driven by Bart Desmond’s Crossley oil engine. The oil engine was driving several belts to also power a Claas trusser and a grinding mill. Murphys from Kinsale had their 1907 Fowler engine on display.

As usual, the event featured a variety of reaper and binders, trailed combines and vintage combines as well as landowner John O’Donovans 2012 Claas Lexion Montana. Away from the harvesting, the tilling area had a range of different vintage machines ploughing and harrowing. Keith Bryan from Waterfall had his wonderful Titan tractor pulling a trailed plough having earlier in the day had a reaper and binder in tow.

At the lower end of the field Gearoid Walsh was giving a demonstration with an Amazone Cayros plough and alongside Liam O’Driscoll was putting his Kirovets K-424 articulated tractor through its paces with a reversible plough belonging to Jim O’Regan.

Once again the weather was very kind to us as we had beautiful sunshine for the afternoon. We give a big thank you to the landowner, sponsors and everyone who worked so hard to make the event a success. Looking forward to our 10th Harvest day in 2020.

Agriland: Mix of new and old destined for ‘De Courcey Harvest Day’

This year’s De Courcey Harvest Day will be held on Bank Holiday Monday, August 5. The location will be Sandycove, Ballinspittle, Co. Cork.

Farmhand – the distributor of well-known machinery brands such as Krone, Amazone and Quicke – is the main sponsor of this year’s event, in conjunction with local dealer Derry O’Donovan Machinery.

The De Courcey Harvest Day began back in 2011 as a working demonstration; it’s now described as a “national event”.

Read the article in full at https://www.agriland.ie/farming-news/mix-of-new-and-old-destined-for-de-courcey-harvest-day/

 

 

 

2019 Online Entry Form

Fill in the form below

5th August 2019

A Chara, Thank you for supporting our harvest working day and vintage rally.

Please take time to read our safety Terms and Conditions and register your entry at the secretary’s office.

Event Terms and Conditions

  1. All exhibits must have the necessary insurance to participate in this event.
  2. Entries will only be accepted on official entry forms which must be signed.
  3. No passengers are permitted on vehicles without passenger seats, and absolutely no children allowed on machines
  4. Operators of harvesting machines must be properly seated or safely positioned on work platform while the machine is in operation.
  5. Operators of static working machines must ensure exhibit is not left running unattended.
  6. Threshing crew must be competent and familiar with the machine.
  7. All machinery must be in good repair and properly prepared for operation with all guards and safety features fitted.
  8. All static display vehicles must have parking brake applied and locked when unattended.
  9. Only suitable qualified drivers are allowed to participate in the event.
  10. Stewards must be obeyed at all times.
  11. No Public allowed in the working arena
  12. No Alcohol permitted in the working arenas.
  13. All exhibits to be on site by 11 am the morning of the event.

De Courcey Classic and vintage club 2019

Jim O’Regan, John Quinn, John O’Neill and Martin Nyhan of the DeCourcey Club meet with Stephen Scrivner and Tom O’Connor of Farmhand to discuss Harvest Working Day 2019

Our first meeting of 2019 was held in Corcoran’s Bar Ballinadee on the evening of 25th February. The year ahead was discussed and a few events decided upon. March will see the running of our tillage day.  This event is not a public event but instead a day for members and friends of the club to get together for a bit of vintage tractor work and socialising. A number of St Patrick’s day parades will be taking place locally and the Club will participate in the parades of Bandon, Kinsale and Courtmacsherry.

Following the success of our May tractor and car run in 2018 we will once again be taking to the highways of West Cork on Monday 6th May .Vehicles will gather at the Church car park in Ballinspittle from  Mid-day and depart at 1 P.M. sharp. Cars and tractors will follow different routes.

Our main event in 2019 will be the Harvest Working day on the August Bank Holiday. This year the Holiday is on Monday 5th. A new location has been kindly offered by John O Donovan and family in Sandycove, Ballinspittle. The site is particularly picturesque overlooking the sea at Sandycove and well suited to hosting the working day. Monies raised will be donated to the Fr John Kingston Mozambique project, Ballinadee National School, DeCourcey boxing club and Ballinadee Community Hall.

De Courceys are delighted to have Farmhand Ltd (Ireland’s largest independent machinery distributer) as a partner for this year’s harvest day. Farmhand a family owned business, operating since 1962 are a farm machinery and farm merchandise distributers with a network of over 40 dealers in Ireland.  Farmhand are exclusive importers for many brands including Krone and Amazone. We look forward to working together and putting on a great show in Sandycove in August. 

The year will finish up with our annual threshing in Ballinadee on the first Sunday in November. The threshing at Corcorans Bar in aid of Arc house cancer support will be preceded by a tractor run from Ballinspittle.

As usual up to date information is available on www.decourceyvintage.com and our FB page.