Farmers and those in the agricultural industry went to AGRITECHNICA expecting to see farm machinery, but if they took a good look, they realized they were seeing farm toy models, as well. For many of the pieces of large agricultural machinery, there was a smaller model version a collector could take home and put on the shelf.

The November show in Hanover, Germany, offered brands commonly heard about Stateside and many not well known. Jan Boomgaarden of Eilbote-online.de had an entire storefront filled with farm model toys available in its online catalog.

This online company began about 20 years ago with a small booklet selling farm toys and collectibles, and today it has expanded to a catalog with 38,000 subscribers. “We have 2,850 different products, signs, plates, models, DVDs and about 2,000 to 2,100 farm toys. We have about 460 new products,” Jan said.

At AGRITECHNICA several models had been created just for the show. Jan shared that Eilbote offered an International Harvester 3588 2+2 “Snoopy” toy. It had 1,000 limited edition 3588s available.

Another model Eilbote offered in a limited edition at the show was an 1800 Turbo Betriebesstuden model made by Neuheit. The model intentionally looks well-used.

Eilbote was not the only company to offer a limited edition farm toy. “There are about 18 new models and totally about 10 limited editions throughout the show,” Jan explained.

Tractors were not the only types of models. Eilbote displayed two new Grimme harvesters; one was a sugar beet harvester, a Grimme Rexor 620 Self-Propelled, and another Grimme GT 170 model that was new for harvesting potatoes. Lemke plows, fertilizer applicators and many other attachments also made their way into model displays.

The John Deere booth was popular during the show; in fact, it offered limited edition JD 8360R and the JD 8360RT during the show. But each morning before the show officially opened, the highly coveted Gold JD 8360 dealer awards 1/32nd-scale tractor made by Ertl was sold only between 7:30-8:30.

Stories abounded of collectors vying to buy places in line or trying to buy several models. One story overheard was that after the first day the Gold JD model was for sale, one appeared that evening on eBay for a much-inflated price.

Toys came is all shapes and sizes; models were available from JD, New Holland, Horsch, Fendt, Massey Ferguson, Krone, Renault, Valtra and more.

Readers with questions or comments for Cindy Ladage may write to her in care of this publication.