Mark your calendars for the nation’s largest outdoor farm show. The 2008 Farm Progress Show will be held at a new location in Boone, Iowa August 26 through 28. Show coordinators have announced that construction at the site will be completed in time for this year’s event. John Deere highlighted its latest innovations in precision technology at last year’s show. Look for new cutting edge software and machinery at this year’s event.
“Everything is on pace,” says Matt Jungmann, Farm Progress national shows manager, after his weekly meeting with the site developing engineers and construction managers Thursday afternoon. “All construction scheduled for this year will be completed in time for this year’s show.”
All the major earth-moving will be finished this week. Then it’s on to the final phase of the grass seeding and perimeter fence installation which starts next week. Some of the upgraded show features that are nearly finished include permanent restrooms and hard surfaced roads - two features that really enhance the comfort factors for show visitors. Field crops and plots are planted and growing, as well. Electricity and telephone systems are 60% completed.
Long-term facilities for the show known as the “Super Bowl of Agriculture” have been established to avoid weather-related interruptions and to provide visitors and exhibitors with even better show experiences. Visitors at the 2005 and 2007 shows held at its first permanent biennial location near Decatur, Ill., have been very impressed with the show’s upgraded facilities. The show now rotates between the Boone and Decatur sites. The Boone site is developed on nearly 600 acres at the intersection of U.S. Highway 30 and Iowa Highway 17.
Return to the top of this page
A “bad cup of coffee and good conversation” are the two things a group of farmers look forward to nearly every morning in Granger, TX. Jason Schaefer’s article in the Taylor Daily Express reports that as technology continually changes and prices shoot up in a rapidly advancing ag industry, farmers find familiarity and advice through each other at the local Precision Ag Repair.
“You’ve got to have some fun sometime,” Mike Hajda, corn and milo farmer, said in the Precision Ag office Wednesday morning.
Expenses have skyrocketed, evident in the price per ton of fertilizer — up to as much as $460 this year from $150 two years ago, according to Melvin Marek, corn and cotton farmer….
The farmers agree the best prices, the most honest workers and the best repair advice come from Precision Ag, the only place Repa, along with the others, brings his equipment.
“The owners get a lot of business from all over the county,” he said. “They’re good and honest, and they always have decent prices.”
According to Repa, big-business farm equipment dealers charge more for equipment and repair due to increasing overhead costs.
Vrabel said he sees customers from not only all over the county, but also from over Central Texas.
“Word of mouth has been good to us,” said co-owner Tommy Filla…
The group began meeting in the Precision Ag office instead of at the Blackland Co-op Gin down the street about three years ago, Fill said.
“I don’t remember if the gin shut down for a year or something,” Filla said. “It’s still open to them, and a few guys still go over there, but for some reason, they just started coming here.”
A Precision Ag staff member opens the doors at 5:30 a.m. every morning to make the coffee that keeps the farmers going, and the owners give advice and answer repair questions as well as trade their own fair share of jokes and stories…
Click here to read the entire article.
Return to the top of this page
Farmers who use precision agriculture seem to possess a command over cutting edge technology. What other modern technology do farmers and growers take advantage of? Precision Ag conducted a poll to find out if farmers are hip with texting and wireless internet…
Q. Do you text message for personal or professional communication?
A. A lot of you do, which to some degree surprised me. More than half of you said that you use text messages to communicate. Maybe some of you would be willing to send comments to this blog to let me know why and how you use texting. It seems like a pretty inefficient and clunky way to keep in touch, but perhaps some of you can straighten me out.
Q. Do you use primarily wireless or hard-wired Internet?
A. I was much less surprised to see that just a bit more than half of respondents are using wireless Internet. The technology is so much better and simpler to use than it was just a year or two ago.
Return to the top of this page
PrecisionAg.com is offering Tech Tips to farmers. The new season means farmers are looking to get back to their field routines as smoothly as possible. PrecisionAg.com had some ideas to help make the transition as smooth as possible:
- Updates Check. Before you head to the field, go to the manufacturer’s web site and make sure that your field computer has the latest software in it.
- Freshen Your Knowledge. Go through your notes from last year to remind yourself of problems. And give yourself a refresher course on the equipment.
- Neat Workspace. Keep the cab clean to avoid any contamination to the electronic connections.
- Test Run. Calibrate the application rig, do a flow test to ensure that your nozzles are working properly and are not worn out. Run in lot or open area and make sure system is functioning before crunch time.
- Check Battery and Connections. Are they clean? Does everything have good batteries?
- Subscribe To eMail Alerts. No one needs more email, but alerts can help to keep you informed. Software updates are common, but addendums to manuals, or entirely new manuals, may be sent via email, which should be downloaded and printed for reference. To minimize the email, only subscribe to alerts for very specific products.
Click here to view the entire article at PrecisionAg.com.
Return to the top of this page
The Iowa Soybean Association’s On-Farm Network now counts more than 300 Iowa farmers who conduct on-farm studies to evaluate nitrogen management and other corn and soybean production practices and inputs on their own farms.
One of the things they do is a monthly On-Farm Update, which is being inserted in issues of Wallaces Farmer. Here’s a link to a pdf of the April issue.
On-Farm Network held its annual meeting at the end of February. Some audio interviews done by WHO at the conference are posted there for your listening pleasure.
Return to the top of this page
USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service rolled out a new campaign this week called Conservation, Our Purpose – Our Passion.
The campaign kick-off Tuesday at the National Association of Conservation Districts’ annual conference in Reno included a video highlighting eight farming operations for their conservation commitment
One of those was the Gwinn Brothers operation in Suwanee county, Florida. Donell (pictured) and his brother Robert have been farming together for over 25 years, producing watermelons, peanuts, iron clay peas, bahia grass seed, hay, and beef cattle.
According to their information on the NRCS website, “the Gwinn Brothers recently embraced and implemented the new technology of precision agriculture on their farm to take their farm management to a new level.”
The Gwinn brothers installed GPS systems in several of their tractors. The GPS systems are used for precision planting, precision nutrient application, and precision pesticide application. This addition has helped the Gwinn Brothers save thousands of dollars in fertilizer and pesticide costs, while adding tremendous environmental benefits, especially to water quality. The Gwinn Brothers now have peace of mind that they are doing the very best job possible with their nutrient and pest management, here again, all in an effort to improve soil and water quality.
Return to the top of this page
Earlier this year I did a post about research being done by USDA-ARS and University of Missouri extension on precision agriculture.
I had a chance to talk with MU extension ag engineer Kent Shannon about their research work and how they are proving that precision really does pay.
Listen to my interview with Kent here.
Kent Shannon (7:30 min mp3)
Return to the top of this page
The online encyclopedia called Wikipedia defines precision farming this way.
Precision farming or precision agriculture is an agricultural concept relying on the existence of in-field variability. It’s about doing the right thing, in the right place, in the right way, at the right time. It requires the use of new technologies, such as global positioning (GPS), sensors, satellites or aerial images, and information management tools (GIS) to assess and understand variations. Collected information may be used to more precisely evaluate optimum sowing density, estimate fertilizers and other inputs needs, and to more accurately predict crop yields. It seeks to avoid applying inflexible practices to a crop, regardless of local soil/climate conditions, and may help to better assess local situations of disease or lodging.
Wikipedia is an open source kind of information resource which lets you edit entries. See if you have something to add.
Return to the top of this page
USDA’s Cooperative Extension Service has a good summary of a workshop held earlier this year on “Engineering Solutions for Specialty Crop Challenges.”
The workshop provided a forum for special crop industries to engage the science and technology community. Industry representatives voiced their concerns with regard to productivity, production efficiency, post-harvest processing, and environmental quality. In response, the research community offered some engineering science and technology capabilities that could form key components of eventual solutions.
The forum included representatives from citrus, horticulture, tree fruit, almonds and grape producers. There is some pretty interesting information here for specialty crop producers on how new technology might be able help them be more efficient.
The workshop noted that labor costs and availability, product quality, and environmental concerns are some of the primary issues facing these industries. The labor situation was a common issue expressed by nearly all attendees, primarily as it relates to the shortage of labor and the prospects for automation using robotics.
Return to the top of this page
Alan Meadows is a corn and soybean producer from Halls, Tennessee - which is located in the western part of the state near the border with Missouri. As one of this year’s ASA/John Deere Reach for the Stars winners, Meadows was able to use the precision agriculture package in several different applications.
“First I had it on my sprayer and used the AutoTrac on it,” Alan said. “We also bought the Swath Pro and put that on there and that worked very well.” He also used it on the combine in harvesting beans.
Alan says he learned how precision farming helps in cutting down on overlaps and helped him save time and money. “Your efficiency is so much greater with no overlap or driver fatigue.”
Listen to some of my interview with Alan here.
Alan Meadows (3:00 min mp3)
Return to the top of this page
«Past Entries
Subscribe to the RSS Feed