Oh my lord

[Niels]

@warksfarmer I do follow some of the US forums and websites yes. Maybe they tend to post pictures of fancy no till or strip till kit of course that makes you think it is direct drilling all the way.

If you have a VRA/section control fertiliser spreader you can vary the application in sections in small blocks? It is being pioneered over here as well and with high value crops such as potatoes, onions, carrots etc.. there is a lot of money to be made. More so than in a crop of cereals or rape. For instance equal tuber size, skin quality, planting distance (amount of seed) etc.. Precision farming and VRA do help with these.

The approach that most farmers seem to apply is to collect data first for a period of 4-5 years. Most of our cropping plans revolve around a four or five year plan so this makes the most sense. Put all those maps of the crop growth, soil sampling and yield maps together (which you can do quite easily with todays software) and you can start ruling out causes to your problems. I think if you are going down the VRA route then this is the most sensible approach? Soil types can be very patchy as in the UK. By correctly mapping them and understanding their effects (by studying the maps) we can alter the potato planting distance accordingly and get a more even grade and/or higher yield. This is a money earner. With VRA wheat drilling yes you can put less seed on the light patches and more on the heavy patches but the return will be smaller (in terms of money made). Take a look at this blog from Ag Leader: http://www.agleader.com/blog/anyone-for-lettuce/ A Dutch farmer using precision farming and sensor to collect data about his lettuce crop. By doing this and applying fertiliser in the right amount he can produce lettuces with a more even size which make a better price.

I agree VRA and everything that comes with it has a long way to go and not all will be practical but saying it's b*llocks and useless is going a bit far. Maybe for some it is but there is also a lot to gain. Especially with specialist crops! Don't forget in Holland we farm on a post stamp and a VERY expensive one with land prices of €100.000/ha. If you can get 5-10% more yield or more profit per hectare of your land that is certainly worth thinking of! Also, we should be continuing to use this technique and help develop it. Gain knowledge and develop proper software. If no one had bought a Toyota Prius hybrid technology on cars would have never been further developed. It's the same with precision agriculture in a way.

 

[warksfarmer]

@warksfarmer I do follow some of the US forums and websites yes. Maybe they tend to post pictures of fancy no till or strip till kit of course that makes you think it is direct drilling all the way.

If you have a VRA/section control fertiliser spreader you can vary the application in sections in small blocks? It is being pioneered over here as well and with high value crops such as potatoes, onions, carrots etc.. there is a lot of money to be made. More so than in a crop of cereals or rape. For instance equal tuber size, skin quality, planting distance (amount of seed) etc.. Precision farming and VRA do help with these.

The approach that most farmers seem to apply is to collect data first for a period of 4-5 years. Most of our cropping plans revolve around a four or five year plan so this makes the most sense. Put all those maps of the crop growth, soil sampling and yield maps together (which you can do quite easily with todays software) and you can start ruling out causes to your problems. I think if you are going down the VRA route then this is the most sensible approach? Soil types can be very patchy as in the UK. By correctly mapping them and understanding their effects (by studying the maps) we can alter the potato planting distance accordingly and get a more even grade and/or higher yield. This is a money earner. With VRA wheat drilling yes you can put less seed on the light patches and more on the heavy patches but the return will be smaller (in terms of money made). Take a look at this blog from Ag Leader: http://www.agleader.com/blog/anyone-for-lettuce/ A Dutch farmer using precision farming and sensor to collect data about his lettuce crop. By doing this and applying fertiliser in the right amount he can produce lettuces with a more even size which make a better price.

I agree VRA and everything that comes with it has a long way to go and not all will be practical but saying it's b*llocks and useless is going a bit far. Maybe for some it is but there is also a lot to gain. Especially with specialist crops! Don't forget in Holland we farm on a post stamp and a VERY expensive one with land prices of €100.000/ha. If you can get 5-10% more yield or more profit per hectare of your land that is certainly worth thinking of! Also, we should be continuing to use this technique and help develop it. Gain knowledge and develop proper software. If no one had bought a Toyota Prius hybrid technology on cars would have never been further developed. It's the same with precision agriculture in a way.

I didn't say it was b******s though did I. I said it was a waste of time because the equipment is no where near developed enough to actually vary accurately.

I fail to see how section control on a spinning disc spreader can vary in small blocks. In simplistic terms there are two spinning discs that cover 24m width using overlaps etc. If your applying 200kg/ha of fert and on the left hand side of spreader only need 50kg/ha of fert both discs will have to drop to 50kg/ha to hit the desired amount due to the overlap pattern, but by doing that the plant on the right hand side of the machine that needs 200kg/ha is only going to get 50kg/ha.

So you stick at 200kg/ha meaning your wasting 150kg/ha on the left hand side of the machine.

Same with liquid fert unless you have individual lines to each nozzle - I believe this technology does exist in its infancy at the moment but I dread to think of cost.

An easier way to farm would be add OM to the soils and then feed the crop with average rates of all required products. Getting your soils better will return more yield than messing around with technology that isn't good enough.

 

[Clive]

I didn't say it was b******s though did I. I said it was a waste of time because the equipment is no where near developed enough to actually vary accurately.

I fail to see how section control on a spinning disc spreader can vary in small blocks. In simplistic terms there are two spinning discs that cover 24m width using overlaps etc. If your applying 200kg/ha of fert and on the left hand side of spreader only need 50kg/ha of fert both discs will have to drop to 50kg/ha to hit the desired amount due to the overlap pattern, but by doing that the plant on the right hand side of the machine that needs 200kg/ha is only going to get 50kg/ha.

So you stick at 200kg/ha meaning your wasting 150kg/ha on the left hand side of the machine.

Same with liquid fert unless you have individual lines to each nozzle - I believe this technology does exist in its infancy at the moment but I dread to think of cost.

An easier way to farm would be add OM to the soils and then feed the crop with average rates of all required products. Getting your soils better will return more yield than messing around with technology that isn't good enough.

I think the equipment is ok, its could be better but it's just a question of resolution - 24m resolution is certainly more accurate than field scale or whole farm resolution thats for sure

What lets it down far more than the equipment is the agronomy

 

[Beef farmer]

Talk about going off topic, congratulations on your new purchase.

 

[beardface]

Yeh sorry about that @Banana Bar think I fuelled a fire. On the VRA note though I didn't necesarrily mean using stuff out of a bag could use it to vary the amount or type of cover crop across a field or manure across a field to increase OM and use nature to correct deficiencies. Also I don't know any of your farms, so some may be privileged with a generally similar soil type, but considering at our spot it can change 3 times in 200 yards then VRA seed rate can be the difference between an area failing or working under certain conditions and VRA Pand K help to level out inconsistencies of blanket spread pig muck across the farm.

 

[beardface]

Also what people's opinion on VRA chemicals. Been thinking how drones could be used to produce foliage and pest pressure maps through the use of infrared and digital photography. Could combine this with weather reports and crop walking to create a VRA chemical map with areas extended to create buffer zones. Understand would take a bit of management but would we all need something to do on a night . Might not be worth it on 10 acres but maybe 50+ also could be worth a lot more on high value crops to trim the costs, I.e. Blight in potatoes. Just a thought.

 

[York]

I only remember that the VRT Spreader which I sold in '93 was able, as it was a 18 m air spreader, to apply & meter 5+ differant product at the same time in speeds of 10+ml/h
The problem was, the challenge, that nobody was able to feed this unit with the data, what was needed. And so far I see it's till today a challenge.
Yield maps:
just some thoughts about their accuracy. Now with GPS & Parallel tracking we will have over most of the time the same filling of the header but how long does it take that the now cut grain on the outside of the header is entering the feeder house chain? how many meters did the combine drive between the cutting and the entering of the feeder house? so you have basically this outside cut grain mixed with just cut grain, in reality you drive with a "V" over the field of gathered influences.

Now we could go on with many more "flaws" on the gathering of data. You want one more?
N Sensor:
All are basically measuring the biomass by measuring the Chlorophyll. Please read the fine print in the manual.
What is influencing the Chlorophyll?
The fine print says: that all nutrients must be taken care of, been in adequate amounts, BEFORE the sensor will only be working on the N.

Don't want to go on, as it's not constructive and rely meeting the needs.
this is now constructive: Identify your zones, get the appropriate info what is causing the good & poor yield, fix it, and you have spend much less money to increase your average yield by a 2 digit percentage with limited money on the investment size.
That is basically my daily work now, with small & large farms, even a house gardener will understand this.
York-Th.

 

[Niels]

I didn't say it was b******s though did I. I said it was a waste of time because the equipment is no where near developed enough to actually vary accurately.

I fail to see how section control on a spinning disc spreader can vary in small blocks. In simplistic terms there are two spinning discs that cover 24m width using overlaps etc. If your applying 200kg/ha of fert and on the left hand side of spreader only need 50kg/ha of fert both discs will have to drop to 50kg/ha to hit the desired amount due to the overlap pattern, but by doing that the plant on the right hand side of the machine that needs 200kg/ha is only going to get 50kg/ha.

So you stick at 200kg/ha meaning your wasting 150kg/ha on the left hand side of the machine.

Same with liquid fert unless you have individual lines to each nozzle - I believe this technology does exist in its infancy at the moment but I dread to think of cost.

An easier way to farm would be add OM to the soils and then feed the crop with average rates of all required products. Getting your soils better will return more yield than messing around with technology that isn't good enough.

The equipment might not be developed enough but it has come a long way in twenty years time. Add another twenty and we will be looking at things totally different again but if no one invests there won't be any development.

If you're interested have a look at some literature on modern day fertiliser spreaders with VRA and section control. Both disc's can work independently and can spread 150kg on the left and 50 kg on the right. This only means you have to get out and level the fert as one side of the hopper will be empty soon. The Vicon and Sulky can switch off individual sections if you like. Say spread a strip of 6m, then 3m nothing then spread 6m again.

I know of one Dammann SP running over here that has four spray lines I believe and four separate tanks. However, the price is eye watering. I don't know how 'easy' it is to add OM to your soils? Opinions vary a lot on this topic as well. Most farms that are putting a lot of effort into it here are struggling to keep OM levels the same let alone raise them. Have seen fields spread with a FOOT of compost and incorporated in the soil but the effect it had is barely noticeable. Some people claim it is impossible to raise OM levels in the course of a single farmers life time (about 40 harvests). Don't know how much truth there is to that.

 

[ajd132]

The equipment might not be developed enough but it has come a long way in twenty years time. Add another twenty and we will be looking at things totally different again but if no one invests there won't be any development.

If you're interested have a look at some literature on modern day fertiliser spreaders with VRA and section control. Both disc's can work independently and can spread 150kg on the left and 50 kg on the right. This only means you have to get out and level the fert as one side of the hopper will be empty soon. The Vicon and Sulky can switch off individual sections if you like. Say spread a strip of 6m, then 3m nothing then spread 6m again.

I know of one Dammann SP running over here that has four spray lines I believe and four separate tanks. However, the price is eye watering. I don't know how 'easy' it is to add OM to your soils? Opinions vary a lot on this topic as well. Most farms that are putting a lot of effort into it here are struggling to keep OM levels the same let alone raise them. Have seen fields spread with a FOOT of compost and incorporated in the soil but the effect it had is barely noticeable. Some people claim it is impossible to raise OM levels in the course of a single farmers life time (about 40 harvests). Don't know how much truth there is to that.

I have heard of people increasing OM dramatically. But from what I gather even small increases make a big difference to the soils biological activity

 

[Niels]

I have heard of people increasing OM dramatically. But from what I gather even small increases make a big difference to the soils biological activity

I have HEARD a lot as well but when you ask for soil analysis from ten years ago and today you draw a blank....