The Blog

A recent editorial by Ohio Director of Agriculture Robert Boggs notes that precision agriculture is helping to fuel the “green energy revolution” in his state and nationwide.

Farmers, the founders of environmental stewardship, not only work hard to make every day “Earth Day,” they also adapt with the times to work smarter, increase efficiencies, and produce superior products that are good for the producer, good for the people, and good for the environment.

Ask any farmer and you will find that conservation farming practices such as no-till, riparian buffers, grassed waterway maintenance, and windbreaks to control erosion are common practices in the industry. In addition, precision farming, using satellite maps and computer models, allows farmers to use fewer fertilizers and pesticides while producing higher quality, higher yielding crops. These advancements sharpen the efficiency of agriculture and help maintain agriculture’s strong, beneficial presence in Ohio.

Do you (or someone you know) work as a Precision Agriculture Specialist/Technician? Or perhaps your work involves supervising or training Precision Agriculture Specialists/Technicians? If either of your answers is “Yes,” then we need your help.

Under a grant from the U.S. Department of Labor/Employment & Training Administration, the National O*NET Center is seeking precision professionals to answer questions about their work for a national occupational database. Selected volunteers receive a $40 honorarium.

A well-known nonprofit research organization, RTI International, working with the National O*NET Center, under a grant from the United States Department of Labor/Employment & Training Administration, is asking for help with an important national project to gather information describing the work that people do in over 800 different occupations.

We are looking for people with expertise in the occupation of Precision Agriculture Specialists/Technicians to answer survey questions about Precision Agriculture work, as part of the O*NET Data Collection program.

By volunteering to assist in these efforts, you will help the O*NET database to accurately reflect the realities of the American workplace, and you will be doing your part to represent the occupation of Precision Agriculture Specialists/Technicians on behalf of the entire profession. Thank you in advance for volunteering!

What is O*NET? The U.S. Department of Labor’s Occupational Information Network (O*NET) is the nation’s primary source of occupational data, allowing millions of employers, workers, educators and students across the country see what it takes to do the work of over 800 occupations (including that of Precision Agriculture Specialists/Technicians).

This information is provided free of charge online to the general public.

The annual Virginia Ag Expo will be held Aug. 8, beginning at 7:30 a.m., at Renwood Farms in Charles City County. The annual event is the largest agricultural field day held in the Commonwealth of Virginia.

Renwood Farms is a large grain and seed processing farm located on the James River, not far upstream from the historic Jamestown settlement, which celebrated its 400 birthday this year.

Growers will have an opportunity to view the 2007 Virginia on-farm corn and soybean test plots. There will be corn and soybean seeding rate plots, corn and soybean weed control plots, seed treatment and fungicide plots.

Participants will be able to go from exhibit to exhibit and visit with the various exhibitors at their own pace.

The theme for this year’s Expo is “400 years of American Agriculture”.

In addition to the many exhibits, and things to see on this operation, field plots will highlight corn and soybean varieties, plant population/density research, corn response to nitrogen, and antique corn varieties.

Secretary of Agriculture Mike Johanns is scheduled to be the keynote speaker for the 2007 Expo. Rick Tolman CEO of the National Corn Growers Association and senior leadership of the American Soybean Association will also be on the program.

A large outdoor exhibit area will give farmers an opportunity to see the latest farm equipment and products and provide an arena for visiting with industry leaders during the Expo.

There is a $10 registration fee which includes a barbecue lunch, snow cones and beverages. For ticket information and directions to Renwood Farms contact John Smith (johnwsmth@aol.com) or Molly Pugh (mollypugh@cox.net).

The 2007 Virginia Ag Expo is a joint project of the Virginia Corn Growers Association, the Virginia Soybean Association and the Virginia Cooperative Extension Service.

Information/story courtesy of Southeast Farm Press.

This site, precision.agwired.com, was recently recognized by its peers by bringing home a second place award from the American Agricultural Editors’ Association (AAEA) 2007 MarComm Awards program in Louisville, Ky. John Deere representatives accepted the award at the Tuesday night “Awards Night.”

Remember to visit the site on a regular basis for the latest information on precision farming.

For more information, you can also visit the John Deere Web site.

Tomorrow, July 31, two satellites in the Wide Area Augmentation System constellation will be shut down by the government. The two satellites that have taken their place have been active and working for some time now, but the shutdown will have an impact on the differential correction accuracy of certain GPS receivers.

The two satellites, numbers 122 and 134, are scheduled to be shut off permanently at around 8:00 am EST. Many GPS receivers currently in service were configured specifically to lock into signals from those specific satellites, and must be reconfigured by the manufacturer. In the field, these units will not be able to achieve differential correction.

Some units manufactured by Midwest Technologies/TeeJet, Raven Industries, Trimble, and Hemisphere GPS are among those affected. For more information, click here.