Precision Ag at Farm Progress Show

Kurt LawtonDisplays, Education, Equipment, Events, Farm Progress Show

Make the trek to central Iowa near Boone for the nation’s greatest summer agricultural showcase, the annual Farm Progress Show, held August 31 through September 2.

Precision agriculture demonstrations return to the Farm Progress Show and will share space with the standard field demonstrations. Strip till is gaining popularity across the Midwest. These demonstrations will be located east of the exhibit site in field demonstration number. For further information, check with the information booths or the video monitors throughout the grounds when you arrive. Demonstrations will be open from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. daily.

Some precision companies will share space with the strip-till equipment makers. Other stand-alone precision and strip-till companies will also be demonstrating equipment and will be available to talk with you.

“There are no formal presentations there,” explains Matt Jungmann, Farm Progress national shows manager. “Visit with the companies you want to talk with at your convenience.”

Precision and strip-till technology demonstration area is designed to be educational. The one-on-one time you spend learning about the technology will be very helpful as you make decisions about implementing it into your operation.

Plan to attend
The 2010 Farm Progress Show takes place east of Boone, Iowa, Aug.31 to Sept. 2. The exhibit field is open to visitors 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday and Wednesday and from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. Thursday. The public is welcome. For a full schedule of events and more detailed information, visit www.FarmProgressShow.com.

Precision Ag at Central Ohio Field Day

Kurt LawtonDisplays, Education, Equipment, Events, GPS

Precision agriculture and the economics of technology will be the focus of the Ohio State University Extension Central Ohio Agronomy Field Day on Aug. 25.

The event will be held from 9 a.m. until 2:30 p.m. at David Miller Farm, 10750 Millersport Road, Millersport, Ohio. Registration is $10, payable by noon the day of the event.

Precision farming topics include:

  • “Yield monitor benefits–Using Yield Map Data to go VRT; Using Remote Sensing for Enhancing Profit Potential.”
  • “GPS Options and Accuracy, Autosteer Benefits and Limitations, and Automatic Section Control.”
  • “Use of RTK, CORS, Nitrogen Sensors, Grid Sampling, Infrared Sensing, and More.”

Other topics being covered throughout the day include corn and soybean disease and plant health reports, assessing fertility programs, identifying nutrient issues, anaerobic digestion economic opportunities, and watershed management.

Certified crop advisor credits will be available.

The field day is sponsored by OSU Extension offices of Fairfield, Licking, Perry, and Pickaway counties. Additional sponsors include Farm Credit Services, Laurelville Grain, ADM Grain, Southwest Ohio Corn Growers, New Era Liquids, Agro-Chem East, Coschocton Grain, Wilmington Case IH Super Store, and Ohio Soybean Council.

For more information, check out this link.

PrecisionAg Awards of Excellence at ICPA

John DavisICPA, Industry News

Nothing like moving across country to put you a bit behind. Just a couple of things left over from last month’s 10th International Conference on Precision Agriculture that I wanted to share with you. First and foremost is the awards handed out at the ICPA gathering. The awards were presented by Paul Schrimpf, Group Editor the CropLife Media Group at Meister Media Worldwide, which includes PrecisionAg.com, the award sponsors.

Paul presented the Farmer Award to Ken Dalenberg (above) of Marshfield, Illinois – who was recognized for the role he has played in helping to develop and promote new agricultural technology for crop management. Ken has worked with a number of research projects on his farm to evaluate precision farming technology, along with other innovative products and practices through the University of Illinois, the Potash & Phosphate Institute, the United Soybean Board, and others.

Dr. Jess Lowenberg-DeBoer of Purdue University (left) and Dr. Harold Reetz (right, below) of Reetz Agronomics were honored with Legacy Awards during the conference. Dr. Lowenberg-DeBoer’s work in precision agriculture economics included groundbreaking research into the profitability of every aspect of it, including tracking the adoption of technology at the farm and service provider level, which played an important role in the growth of precision.

Reetz has been a champion of technology and precision agriculture throughout his four decade-long career, founding the InfoAg Conference in the mid-1990s as a way of getting people together to share experiences and build a networked community of vendors, users, and service providers. Now with Reetz Agronomics, Harold continues his champion role, especially as it applies to the conservation aspects of precision technology, and he serves on the board of the Conservation Technology and Information Center.

Picking up the Consultant/Entrepreneur Award was the OptiGro Team at Jimmy Sanders, Inc. of Cleveland, MS. Accepting the award on behalf of the team was Clint Jayroe (left). OptiGro provides agricultural advice, information, and precision agriculture resources to farmer-customers for maximum return on investment, while Jimmy Sanders, Inc. has been an agricultural leader and innovator in the Mid-South since 1953, serving production agriculture with farm inputs and on-farm expertise for the Mississippi River Delta region. They service a diverse crop mix of rice, cotton, corn, soybeans, wheat, grain sorghum and even specialty crops such as sweet potatoes and peanuts.

In addition, there were several student winners recognized at the event, including: Eric Allphin, Xystus Amakor, David Harper, Ming Li, Joe David Luck, Daniel K. Mullenix, Georg Ruß, Ajay Sharda, Yeyin Shi and Luciano S. Shiratsuchi. You can see all the photos in the ICPA Photo Album.

Special thanks to leica for sponsoring our trip to the 10th International Conference on Precision Agriculture.

Time To Prep the Precision Combine for Harvest

Kurt LawtonAg Leader, Displays, Education, Equipment, Harvesting, Insights Weekly

Insights WeeklyAs the dog days of summer heat up and are still delivering too much rain in many areas of the central Corn Belt, it’s a good time to pull out the combine manual and start gearing up for Midwest corn and soybean harvest.

We spoke this week with Nick Ohrtman, technical support supervisor at Ag Leader Technology, who provided a good pre-harvest checklist that works fairly universally no matter what Ag Leader display you operate. And these same philosophies will work with other monitors; just get the specific details from your operator’s manual.

1. If you haven’t already, create a backup of your spring and summer information.
2. Make sure your display firmware, manual and all connected modules are up-to-date. Find them on the Ag Leader website under Customer Support.
3. If you have purchased a new combine or new heads, create new configurations for any setup that is different from last fall. Remove all old configurations.

Inspect the Combine and Components
1. Check to make sure all cables are properly attached and in good condition.
2. Remove flow sensor and inspect for damage.
3. Check the elevator deflector and impact plate for wear. Verify you have the proper clearance at the top of the clean grain elevator. Clearance should be between 3/8- and 5/8-inch.

Sensor Calibrations—Before going to the field
For step-by-step instructions on how to do these calibrations, consult the Grain Harvest section of the display manual.

1. Calibrate stop height. This will set the height when the display stops recording harvested area as the header is raised at the end of the pass. Stop height calibration is required for each grain type.
2. Run a distance calibration. This will calibrate the ground speed sensor connected to the display. Note: If you are using GPS speed as the primary speed sensor, you will still need to calibrate the backup sensor. Measure off 200-400 feet, drive that distance and record any difference in length.
3. Calibrate temperature. This will set the temperature offset to help provide a correct moisture reading.
4. Run a vibration calibration. The vibration calibration is used to compensate for the amount of force that is being measured by the flow sensor with no grain flow.

Sensor Calibrations—In the field
1. Calibrate moisture. This will set the moisture offset to help provide accurate moisture and yield readings. Moisture calibration is required for each grain type. Take 4-8 samples from a wagon/truck load, then plug in the average reading.
2. Calibrate grain weight. This is critical, and you need to run four to six smaller loads (in the 3,000 to 6,000 lb. range) at varying field speeds, so enlist your nearest weigh wagon owner. If done correctly, this will provide accurate yield readings across all flow ranges. Calibration is required each year and for each grain type. If your average harvest speed is 4.5 mph, then make sure you run loads at 3, 3.5, 4, 4.5, 5 and a maximum speed. And with Ag Leader displays, you can do this at any time during harvest, because once calibrated it will back calibrate any harvest data already completed.

Have a safe harvest season.

Visit these links for more information.

Product Manuals – http://www.agleader.com/customer-support/product-manuals/

June Insights Newsletter – http://www.agleader.com/media-center/insights-newsletter/

Precision Pesticide Application Website Launched

Kurt LawtonConservation, Education, Equipment, Farmers, Spraying, Standards, sustainability

In an era of continued concern for the environment and tighter regulations, it simply makes sense to ensure we practice precision crop protection application on every acre.

To this end, the Center for Integrated Pest Management (CIPM) announced the launch of a new Pesticide Environmental Stewardship (PES) website. The site (http://pesticidestewardship.org) is designed for anyone who applies, sells, stores, or disposes of pesticides; provides advice or training on pesticide use; or is involved in pesticide stewardship or regulation.

“Our ultimate goal is to cover the basic tenets that apply regardless of who you are, where you live or the pest you’re trying to control,” says Wayne Buhler of North Carolina State University, PES national coordinator and a Pesticide Safety Education Program coordinator for North Carolina. “There are fundamental principles and practices to be aware of whether you are protecting agricultural crops, homegrown vegetables, a lawn or golf course. We hope that whenever the choice is made to use a pesticide, good stewardship practices will be followed.”

The new website complements the work of county extension agents and state-level Pesticide Safety Education programs. It covers a wide variety of stewardship topics, ranging from pesticide storage, handling and disposal…to how to avoid drift, runoff and leaching during and after the application. Homeowners can go straight to a section geared to their needs.

Buhler’s colleagues in the Pesticide Safety Education Program from across the United States were instrumental in the development of PES, including Ron Gardner of Cornell University, Carol Ramsay of Washington State University, Jim Wilson of South Dakota State University and Fred Whitford of Purdue University. Other scientists in academia, extension, government and industry (http://pesticidestewardship.org/Pages/About.aspx) partnered with CIPM on the project, including members of the Weed Science Society of America, the Entomological Society of America and the American Phytopathological Society.

“We know there is a wealth of expertise in the public and private sector regarding pesticide stewardship,” observes Ron Gardner. “We look forward to a growing list of partners who will help us add value to current and future topics on the site.”

A pesticide resistance management topic is currently under development. Future plans include educational quizzes to reinforce important stewardship concepts and self-assessment tools to evaluate personal stewardship practices.

“Search the web for phrases like ‘pesticide stewardship and drift’ and you will get thousands of results,” says Carol Somody, senior stewardship manager for Syngenta Crop Protection and PES industry coordinator. “It can be quite overwhelming to someone who wants to start with the basics, and teaching the basics is the purpose of PES. It provides a much-needed entry point to essential pesticide stewardship information.”

10 Stewardship Tips from the Pesticide Environmental Stewardship (PES) Website

1. Read the label before buying the pesticide.

2. Buy only the amount of pesticide needed for one season.

3. As a general rule of thumb, the temperature inside the storage area should not get below 40 F or over 100 F.

4. Calibrate equipment carefully to assure that the pesticide is applied at labeled rates.

5. Be aware of the current and probable future weather conditions in order to make the best application decisions to prevent drift.

6. Locate the mixing/loading site away from wells, streams and lakes.

7. Never leave a tank while it is being filled and pay constant attention during filling to prevent overfilling and spilling of the pesticide on the ground.

8. When you empty a container, allow it to drain into the spray tank for 10 seconds after it begins to drip.

9. Remember that exceeding the label rate of application is a violation of the law!

10. Follow the label each time you mix and use the pesticide, and follow the label when storing or disposing of the pesticide. Do not trust your memory.

EU Investing in Precision Technology

Kurt LawtonInternational, Research, Weed control

To help growers in the UK adapt to changes in EU pesticide regulations, the British government is funding applied R&D on over 30 innovative projects, including precsion weed mapping.

According to a report in Science Business, one of the projects that has won funding in this first tranche of grants, entitled ‘Automating weed mapping in arable fields for precision farming’ involves four companies, Masstock Arable UK Ltd, Knight Farm Machinery Ltd, Patchwork Technology Ltd, Syngenta Crop Protection UK, working with Reading University.

The aim is to develop a global positioning system-linked computer-controlled digital camera system that can be mounted on farm machinery, such as tractors, sprayers or combine harvesters, to map and geo-reference weeds such as black-grass, which occur in patches in arable crops.  A machine vision system using digital cameras will be linked to image analysis software, to identify the weeds present and estimate their densities.

Benefits of the system include reducing the cost of weed control to the farmer, cutting herbicide use and the early detection of herbicide resistance.

Taking into account contributions from the companies that are taking part, the total value of the R&D is in excess of £25 million.  The thirty two consortia will bring together over 100 companies, research establishments and other organisations.

Technology Strategy Board Chief Executive Iain Gray said the grants are the first made under the Sustainable Agriculture and Food Innovation Platform, which aims to bring government, business and researchers together to stimulate the development of new technologies that will increase food productivity, while decreasing the environmental impact of the food and farming industries.

The Sustainable Agriculture & Food Innovation Platform will invest up to £90 million over the next five years in projects and initiatives across the agri-food sector, focusing on areas such as crop productivity, sustainable livestock production and the reduction of food chain waste and greenhouse gas emissions.

Precision Ag Evangelist

Cindy ZimmermanAudio, Conservation, ICPA, InfoAg

A precision agriculture pioneer was on hand last week for the Conservation Technology and Information Center (CTIC) Conservation in Action tour near Williamsburg, Virginia.

Harold ReetzHarold Reetz, who founded the InfoAg Conference, is one of the board members for the CTIC. He recently retired after 28 years with the International Plant Nutrition Institute and started Reetz Agronomics.

As a champion of technology and precision agriculture throughout his four decade-long career, Reetz was one of the recipients of the Legacy Award in the PrecisionAg Awards of Excellence program for 2010 at the recent International Conference on Precision Agriculture.

In an interview with Chuck Zimmerman at the CTIC board meeting last week, Harold said he has three passions – high yield production systems, precision technology and conservation. [wpaudio url=”http://zimmcomm.biz/ctic/ctic-10-reetz.mp3″ text=”Harold Reetz Interview”]

Conservation In Action Tour 2010 Photo Album

AgWired coverage of the Conservation In Action Tour last week was made
possible by and the

Precision Ag Technologies Save Money

Kurt LawtonEducation, Events, GPS, Guidance, Planting, Satellite, Spraying

Research shows a lightbar can pay for itself in three years on only 300 acres. It can be done with a GPS receiver that receives the free WAAS correction signal that functions within 12-inch accuracy.

This was just one precision farming economic message presented by Matt Darr, Iowa State University ag engineer, during a field day at its Northern Research Farm field day, according to a story in AgriNews.

“This is suitable for non-critical guidance, including tillage, spraying and seeding/drilling,” Darr said. “They are also used for autoswath systems on sprayers, but accuracy will decline in larger fields.”

Investing in a $2,000 light bar for a sprayer can cut chemical costs by 4 to 8 percent per year, Darr said. In areas with rugged terrain, the savings have been as much as 17 percent.

Dual frequency correction offers advances over single frequency correction and provides pass-to-pass accuracy within 4-inches or better, Darr said. This works well for precise auto steering for planting and for planter section control. It requires a yearly subscription that can range from $800 to $1,500.

Real Time Kenematic, or RTK, correction is the most accurate GPS correction because it uses a privately-owned reference station located close to the GPS receiver. RTK can provide one-inch pass-to-pass accuracy and is the only GPS correction that provides year-to-year position stability. RTK allows controlled traffic, strip tillage/fertilization/planting and extremely precise autosteering. Darr said that although RTK receiver costs have come down, the investment is still high from a cost and complexity standpoint.

RTK networks maintained by groups of implement dealers are available for a subscription fee. The cost is similar to a dual frequency subscription.

Read the story to learn more about more network choices and their value.

Farm Journal Corn College Talks Technology and More

Kurt LawtonAg Leader, Corn, Education, Events, Fertilizer, Insights Weekly, Planting, Remote sensing, Software

Insights WeeklyDespite the heavy rains at times followed by high heat and humidity, around 800 growers, retailers and crop consultants came to Farm Journal test plots near Bloomington, Ill., to gain in-depth knowledge from experts at the recent Farm Journal Corn College.

During this week-long classroom and in-field event, hosted by Farm Journal field agronomists Ken Ferrie and Missy Bauer, participants gained hands-on information about such topics as planter impact on root growth and development, variable-rate population and nitrogen, the significance of water pH on herbicides, lime quality and application methods, and much more.

Ag Leader Technology was one of the sponsors of the event, and the company hosted a luncheon ‘Learning Session.’ “We talked about crop sensor technology from A to Z—from helping growers understand how the technology works to what farmers need to consider when adding the technology to their operation,” says Jessica Reis, Marketing Communications Specialist for Ag Leader.

“It was an excellent dialogue with growers, who helped remind us how cutting-edge this nitrogen sensor technology is from their perspective, which is different from those of us who deal with it daily,” Reis says. “We talked a lot about how growers can add sensors to gauge crop health during a postemergent herbicide application, as well as how the sensors, such as our OptRx Crop Sensor, can be incorporated into a nitrogen application program. It was a great learning session for us as well as the growers.”

Sponsors of the event also participated in a trade show area to answer any and all questions. “We had a lot of questions about planter section control, such as our SureStop Clutch and SureVac Shutoff, to help grower save seed costs,” Reis says. “Data questions, such as how to analyze years of collected data for improved management decisions, were very popular. We helped growers understand the benefits of our SMS Basic and Advanced software, and how it can work with data from many types and colors of equipment.”

For more information from this third annual event, visit www.farmjournalcorncollege.com. And check out RFD-TV on September 1 as Corn College TV will air 30-minute educational programs weekly.
Visit these links for more information.

Farm Journal Corn College http://www.agweb.com/farmjournal/farm_journal_corn_college/

OptRx Crop Sensor http://www.agleader.com/products/directcommand/optrx/

SMS Basic Software http://www.agleader.com/products/sms-basic/

New Video on ParaDyme from AutoFarm

Kurt LawtonCompany Announcement, Displays, Equipment, GPS, Guidance, Satellite

AutoFarm has released a new video featuring its ParaDyme GPS Precision Farming system.

The new five and one half minute video highlights ParaDyme as the world’s first totally integrated precision farming system, with the capability of being installed on any “color” or brand of farm equipment from tractors, combines, sprayers and spreaders to swathers.

AutoFarm ParaDyme is the single system solution to all facets of precision farming: planter control, application control, yield monitoring, data logging and management, plus hands-free GPS steering via WAAS, EGNOS, OmniSTAR HP/XP, and RTK. It is also GLONASS ready. The ParaDyme System offers a choice of three displays: AutoFarm INTEGRA, AutoFarm EDGE and AutoFarm Viper Pro. It is also compatible with the AutoFarm OnTrac2 GPS Assisted Steering System running with ParaDyme/INTEGRA or ParaDyme/EDGE.

With its unique factory-integrated wireless, ParaDyme offers a Remote Real-Time Service connection to the dealer in addition to optional RTK ReadyConnect that provides RTK correction without a base station. A newly enabled WiFi function is another expansion of an already feature-packed solution to virtually everything precision ag.