Peter and Stefano Antonello have harvested their first pumpkin seed crop in the past few weeks.

It was a first for the area too, after the Australian Pumpkin Seed Company approached local farmers to venture into the new industry.

The company’s Sharan West said she suspected the area would be good for growing pumpkin seeds because it was similar to the plant’s native Europe.

The “naked” or “hulless” dark green pumpkin seed comes from a plant unlike those grown in Australia as a vegetable.

Stefano said they look like varieties used for jack-o’-lanterns.

The pumpkins are grown for their seeds and the oil that comes from the seed.

These products have proven so popular that the company is looking to expand.

“We had a meeting with a group of farmers (at Myrtleford) to discuss our idea with them,” Ms West said.

The factory is now at Chinchilla, Queensland, but there are plans to relocate it to Myrtleford.

“The factory at the moment is too isolated,” Ms West said.

“We hope to shift the factory here sometime this year.”

But before the factory arrives, they need to be sure Myrtleford is the best place to grow them.

This is where the Antonellos come into it.

“We wanted to try a new enterprise,” Peter said.

“Nothing has been happening on the land since tobacco went.”

So they decided to trial pumpkin seeds to see if they were economically viable.

Last December they planted 2ha of the special pumpkins on their property.

“It’s the first trial crop for down here,” Peter said.

“It was direct drilled with an airseeder.”

He said there were about 22,000 plants per hectare.

They had to get bees in for pollination to produce the most seeds possible but other than that they didn’t take a lot of care.

“They use a fair bit of water,” Peter said.

This was overcome with permanent sprinklers run from moisture meters in the soil.

The full allocation, from a long-standing irrigation licence from Buffalo River, was available for them to use.

Peter said there were no pest pressures but powdery mildew could be a problem.

Harvest was conducted with a specially designed European machine that picked up pumpkin that had been windrowed.

The machine’s spikes lift the pumpkins onto a conveyor, then into a crushing drum where they are processed to separate them and store the seeds and expel pumpkin pulp.

They opened up the paddock to some of their angus cattle as they harvested.

It was a treat for the cattle.

“They were eating it behind us as we went,” Peter said.

The biggest problem they have faced is underestimating how much labour it would take to clean and dry the seeds with just makeshift equipment.

“We haven’t got the right machinery,” Peter said.

“It’s been a big learning curve this year.”

He said they hadn’t done the figures yet but were likely to try another trial-size crop next season.

However, he was pretty clear that without the proper equipment he wouldn’t take it on on a bigger scale.

It was just too labour intensive.

After the seeds are harvested they are washed twice — in the Antonello brothers’ case, by hand — and then dried for three days.

In Queensland the drying process takes just one day.

At Myrtleford an old hot house has been converted with racks covered in shade cloth.

The black seeds are turned with a rake.

The Antonellos also have 250 angus breeders and a vineyard of pinot gris and pinot noir on their four properties, which cover 405ha.