The following post is by Brandon Hunnicutt @cornfedfarmer — it was updated May 1 to include the transcript
Agriculture is changing at a rapid pace. The technology we are using today is vastly different then 5 years ago. The technology we will be using in 5 years will be different then what we are using today. It doesn’t matter if you are a farmer growing only corn using the latest and greatest seed or if you are a small-scale organic farmer planting heirloom varieties.
Farming is becoming more about precision. The ability to precisely place fertilizer to get the greatest return on investment. The ability to precisely drive a tractor/sprayer/combine to minimize compaction. The ability to precisely determine where an outbreak of pests are to be able to only take care of that problem and not over apply chemicals.
It is changing so fast at times it is hard to keep up whether one is a producer or consumer. With that in mind those of us involved in farming, technology, and ag tech associations have decided to start #agtech. #agtech will be a once a month twitter conversation to discuss and address what is going on in ag technology at specific times of the year. From planting to water to harvest, we are looking forward to addressing all things ag and technology.
The first one will be this Friday April 30th from 12-1 PM CDT. If you have questions please contact, via twitter, @cornfedfarmer or @kansfarmer.
This post brought to you via a smartphone in a tractor that drives itself and a planter that turns itself on and off at the end of the field.
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Posted later…. Thanks to John Blue at Truffle Media for getting a transcript together.
Nice overview Brandon, looking forward to the discussion
But committing to a MONTHLY chat? I guess we’ll see how the first one goes 🙂
The number of vendors for precision ag at last year’s Farm Progress show was huge in my opinion. There are many unforeseen benfits to guidance systems and once you start, you can build on it. My brother has a “new” planter monitor that saved him him 2 big mistakes that would have been hard to catch without that too. It all amazes me. I have been consulting for 6 years since retiring from NRCS. We have gone from hand drawn maps to GPS?GIS drawn maps. We did not foresee being able to sample faster because of GPS.
Dave, Thanks for personalizing the importance of this topic! I hope we see you at the #agtech chat on twitter. For some who aren’t on twitter, I’ll try to get a transcript & post it so folks can see what all gets put on the table.