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Yield

Your Field Has Been “Bugged”

March 25, 2012 by Summer

Crop monitoring has always been an important part of raising top yields. That’s why keeping day to day tabs on what’s happening in growers’ fields not only protects yields, but supplies reams of information for future use. As farmers get larger and demand for their time increases, it becomes even more difficult, yet imperative, to have someone (or in this case, something else) other than the farmer himself gather the information for them. It’s both difficult and expensive to find someone you can totally trust who is qualified to do the job of crop scouting as accurately and as efficiently as today demands. So news of getting help in that area will be welcomed by most 21st century growers.

Due to the marvels of modern technology, a whole new army of truly professional crop scouts may be on their way to your farm. And who better to inspect your fields than the real professionals who know more about a specific crop than anyone who learned it in a classroom.

Every year, fields are alive with many different species of insects; many of them aeronautical wonders of nature. In fact, with the body shapes and styles that most of them possess, they have no business flying. Take the typical housefly for example. Its wings oscillate at more than 200 times per second making them difficult to hit with a fly swatter and nearly impossible to capture with your bare hand. They don’t look like they’re built to move that fast, but neurological designs inside the fly, which we know little about, allow them to pull it off. As far as flying field beetles are concerned, whoever thought that any of these hard shelled carcasses could get off the ground, let alone stay within any one zip code during a windstorm? But they can fly very well and that’s where our opportunity lies.

According an article written by Michel Maharbiz and Hirotaka Sato in the December 2010 issue of Scientific American magazine, researchers working in the field of micro and nanotechnologies have discovered that by placing tiny cameras on the backs of beetles and other flying insects, they can record everything in the presence of the bug at any time. In fact, according to the article, military and law enforcement departments are particularly interested in this kind of innovation since all they would need to do is release some of these flying television cameras into a room to see what’s going on. For example, they could see immediately how many people are inside, what they look like and if they’re armed. But the best part of all is that with some minor manipulations of the insect’s navigation system, they can also control where the insect goes. This idea will put a whole new meaning to the phrase “Your room has been bugged.”

So just imagine the future where you not only purchase the seed you need, but at the same time you also place an order for hi-tech camera carrying bugs to be released into your fields at periodic intervals throughout the season. They could do a much better job of covering the entire field while accurately reporting exactly what they see every second. Picture yourself releasing a batch of stealthy ladybugs early in the season when the crop is small. Farmers love ladybugs for their voracious appetite because they consume other dangerous plant damaging insects such as aphids, and in doing so, protect the crop. These portable television screens can tell you, for example, when aphids are present. Honeybees could be released into a crop that is getting ready to flower. Who better to take you right to the plants that are most advanced in the field to tell you what stage that crop is in and how many flowers are on the average plant. All of that information would be transmitted to a receiver in your office or to your handheld device, giving you up to the minute status of every field. Sound far fetched? It’s not. The camera bugs are already being tested.

“Camera bugs” are just one of hundreds of new and exciting breakthroughs you can look forward to in the future. And many of those innovations are going to dramatically change the way you farm. That’s why one of our most important jobs at AgVenture is to keep our customers abreast of the latest information that they may not have access to. Our job is to make sure you stay ahead of the game and in the lead, because when you’re in the lead, everyone else gets to follow.

Categories: Farm Profitability, General | Tags: , , , ,

ROI The Biggest Factor in Farming Success!

March 20, 2012 by Summer

 Why do you farm? Some of you may say it’s because of the life style, the freedom, the independence and the opportunity to work outdoors. Others will say they farm because it’s a good place to raise a family and teach children about nature. But along with those important reasons most of our 21st century AgVenture customers will add that they farm to make money. It’s a business for them and they want it to be as successful as possible.

Farming is one of the only industries that has made a sudden, about face in the past few years when it comes to the potential to make money. Growers finally have the opportunity to get paid for their hard work and make more money than they ever thought possible. A paradigm shift has occurred in all of agriculture, at least for those who are serious about the farming business. Production agriculture has changed from hoping for good yields as the only source of income, to integrating a system for creating yields with grain marketing strategies, crop insurance programs and financial goals. The result is a whole new way of “on farm” thinking called Return On Investment, ROI, not bushels per acre. Profits from this new way of managing a farm will greatly enhance farm life as we know it.

21st century farmers will have more opportunity than almost anyone before them to rent or buy more land, bring a family member into the operation, pay down debt or simply retire early, debt free. That’s because AgVenture customers will have more opportunity than ever to put their ROI system into play. If there was ever a time in crop production to focus on ROI, it is the current growing season. Convincing some growers they needed to re-nitrify their crop or apply fungicides after considerable crop devastation was often not an easy task. But with record high farm prices and the ability to produce a better crop than other growers through the use of MPS, farmers are learning how to better Maximize ROI.

If farmers are actually doing things different in their corn production programs to force record yields, even when the crop seems lost, then top corn yields become synonymous with top ROI for that year.

Make ROI, Return On Investment your focus and the new language you speak for the next few years. When you do, you will notice a huge change in how you manage your business. You will focus less on costs and more on a system for raising higher yields and marketing your grain while protecting your revenue with the right kind of Crop Insurance. But best of all, you WILL be the one retiring early, debt free.

Categories: Farm Profitability | Tags: , , ,

FALL FIELD FURY

March 15, 2012 by Summer

Ever heard of road rage? Sure you have. It’s a term used to describe the emotionally generated aggressive and angry behavior of a driver. This conduct can include rude gestures, verbal insults, deliberately driving in an unsafe manner or making personal threats to others on the road. Road rage can lead to altercations, assaults and collisions, which may result in injuries or even deaths. It can be thought of as an extreme case of antagonistic driving or, more accurately, driving without rational, logical purpose.

Rage simply results in loss of control, which is what happens when emotions and tempers flare on the road. Fury, on the other hand, means destructive rage, verging on madness, which better describes what’s been happening in farm fields all across the country this year. We call this Fall Field Fury.

Fall Field Fury occurs when growers unwittingly take their anger and frustrations out on the very fields they just finished harvesting. As with any level of rage, rational thinking is overtaken by thoughtless, spontaneous actions, which are most often diametrically opposed to achieving the desired goal. In the case of road rage, the original goal is to reach your destination but the actual outcome becomes adverse or destructive and may include ending up in a ditch or even jail. In the case of Fall Field Fury, the real objective is to achieve next year’s yield goal, but the result is likely to be anything but that if you lose sight of your purpose and the intended goal.

Many farmers were frustrated throughout the season as they watched their crops get pummeled by every kind of environmental event possible. That kind of frustration was amplified since memories of above-normal yields from previous years were not very far away. All of those disappointments seem to have converged, placing many farmers into a state of Fall Field Fury. That is, they inadvertently began taking their frustrations out on their own fields—including implementing tillage or fertility practices that made no real sense. They began unknowingly damaging their chances of maximizing yields in 2012.

We see farmers using deep ripping, thinking it will solve compaction issues. However, this year is less about compaction and much more about “baked” soils—soils that are very hard and compressed from excessive heat and dry weather. In years when soils are moist, it may have made sense to deep rip soils to break up hard pans, but with soils this dry and hard, the only thing that relieves this baked condition is added moisture and frost. We see anhydrous ammonia being applied at rapid rates with only one thought in mind— getting the fall fertilizer applied before the weather gets bad. Although, applying anhydrous ammonia in these kinds of soil conditions simply cannot be justified.

We see the moldboard plow ever-present in many areas this year. These growers seem desperate, as they want to solve problems in their fields, although they are going about it in the wrong way. As their fathers and grandfathers did, they continue to believe that moldboard plowing kills insects and helps control diseases, but this cannot be used as a yield-building strategy. In highly drained soils like ours, which are already short on moisture, moldboard plowing only makes matters worse. It simply dries the soil out, rather than conserving moisture needed for microbial activity, residue breakdown and erosion reduction. Farmers need to look at and examine their entire crop production system whenever they decide to execute any specific production element.

Many growers are experiencing Fall Field Fury right now. They’re in their fields doing things that will negatively affect their ability to raise top yields in 2012. Rather than focusing on the tactics geared toward raising a better crop in 2012, they are too busy trying to figure out how to get their farming finished and out of way while the fall weather holds.

This is the time of the year when every farmer needs to do two things. First, summarize and analyze everything he learned on the combine this year. Second, match that knowledge with his future yield goal plans. Nothing can derail your real objectives faster than doing things that get you off track, rather than focusing on what it takes to achieve those goals. Make sure to control your emotions this year and don’t let Fall Field Fury affect your plans to raise the best crop you ever raised, next year.

Categories: Farm Profitability, General | Tags: , ,

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