Precision Farming : A First Lesson

(The first in a series of articles.)

By Bob Linnell,

SSCA Soil conservationist

Precision farming offers an exciting opportunity to use new technologies to better manage crop production. Being able to apply more intense analysis and the management of field properties and crop response will enable new efficiencies to be available to producers. The technology may seem confusing at first and some think not practical or too expensive for their farm. They may in fact be right, at least on some things. But then again, we learned to program our VCR's, didn't we.

In crop production, the focus is on site-specific crop management by attempting to identify the variability within a field. Once we have done that, we try to manage the crop according to that variability that we have identified. The tools are the thing that we have a hard time understanding and working with in this often demanding school of farming applications.

Some key technologies make precision farming practical and must be considered before site-specific crop management can become an economically viable practice.

Questions to ask when analyzing any data gathered are:

1. can the variable be identified?
2. are the variables large enough to matter/ and
3. are the variable consistent year to year?

Many techniques are just beginning to be used to identify variation within a field,

and they all have advantages and disadvantages. Tools include:

1. Soil Survey
2. Soil sampling.
3. Grain yield sensors.
4. Position sensors.
5. Computerization with both hardware and software to manage data.
6. Variable rate controllers. and last but not least
7. Technology consultants.

Costs are always a factor and with yield monitors and mapping running around C$4-5000 and differentially corrected GPS systems at 3-5000 and then adding in the ground based support for an initial application (soil sampling) at $4-6 per acre, it may seem expensive. But, and there are always buts, when you talk to someone who has been utilizing the technology for two or three years and find out they can save 10-20% on their chemical bills and increase the yields in only one particular field by double, it begins to really tweak your interest. Then you begin to think what this could do for the management of your whole farm and then you really get interested, and so does your banker.

You get to generate a very large quantity of data in this exercise, and if that is your only goal, then you will have not trouble being satisfied. The key element is knowing how to look through all that data and pick out the pertinent stuff that you can use in your management decisions.

In future articles, I will deal with how you get started, what the specific benefits are and deal with the top ten questions you need to ask to avoid the potential pitfalls of precision farming. Meanwhile attend any conferences you can if you are interested in the concept and learn all you can before you invest in any part of it.