New Hi-Tech Color Sorter at Paulson SeedNew Hi-Tech Color Sorter at Paulson Seed
It used to be that if a bushel of barley got mixed with a bushel of wheat, the result would be cattle feed.
But not anymore. With the advent of technology, the cleaning and sorting of grain has gotten even better.
At Paulson Premium Seed and Conditioning an electronic machine that sorts seeds according to their colors was recently added.
“The idea is to fix a problem (mixed seeds) that can’t be fixed conventionally,” said Les Paulson, who owns the business with his wife Diane.
Earlier this year, Les Paulson, and his brother, Lee, went to Texas where there learned how to operate a color sorter.
At the Paulson facility in North Dakota, a special addition was built to house the Paulsons’ own, new electronic equipment.
Seeds move through the machine through the force of air. Les Paulson said the equipment has a wide variety of uses such as sorting peas, beans, peanuts and soybeans.
In the case of field peas, a truckload can include both green and yellow peas, but the sorter can divide out the crop into uniform colors.
In today’s markets, quality of the seed and its appearance are the selling points. For example, peas that are all green in color are preferred over a bushel of peas with mixed shades.
“It’s all for fixin’ (the seed quality,)” said Les Paulson. “The technology is so much superior than what we had before.”
Paulson Premium Seed and Conditioning has been in operation since 1998.
Les Paulson believed there was a need for a seed and conditioning plant in the area for several years before the facility opened. He has operated a portable grain conditioner since 1982.
The initial plan for the business included conditioning seed for producers and selling spring and fall seed. But the business has since expanded to include the marketing of safflower, peas, lentils and chickpeas year round.