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about 9.5% on our fertilizer costs every year – it’s more
environmentally friendly and it’s pretty easy to use,”
explained Monchuk.
For spraying, Monchuk Farms recently purchased a
Case IH with AIM system and Pro 700 display and
moved from 90’ booms to 120’ booms, which reduced
spraying costs by about 2-5% (depending on field).
They are also using Case IH combines with Pro 700
monitors with GPS and mapping.
“We like to keep current with information and
technology, but it has to fit with sustainability on our
farm. At the end of the day, for us to pay for it, it needs
to make sense,” said Monchuk.
Hiebert Farms Ltd.
Hiebert Farms Ltd. is always on the lookout for new
technologies and processes, says Justin Hiebert, a
third-generation farmer.
“This winter we re-built a planter with Precision
Planting gear on it. It’s really impressive technology
and was significantly cheaper than pricing a new
planter... it’s a great way to save money and I think
we are technology ahead too,” said Hiebert.
Technologies used on Hiebert Farms’ planter include:
DeltaForce, FurrowForce, vSet/vDrive, SpeedTube,
FurrowJet and Conceal, vApply HD, SmartFirmer and
CleanSweep.
“Some of the things that we’re doing using precision
ag on the farm includes variable rate corn population,
we’ve been trying some variable rate beans to reduce
white mold pressure, we have done some primitive
variable rate fungicide in beans, we built our own
asparagus planter, we’ve done some variable rate lime
scripts, and use FieldView,” explained Hiebert.
Hiebert also discussed some pitfalls or areas to watch
out for when implementing precision agriculture:
•
Backup all your data
•
Plan ahead
•
Data management
•
Cost
•
Yield monitor differences
Shepherd Creek Farms Ltd.
Mark Brock and his wife Sandi farm 1,700 acres of corn,
soybeans, edible beans and winter wheat on a mostly
strip-till or no-till basis and maintain a 450 head sheep
operation that raises 700-850 lambs per year.
“We’ve gone down the path of precision ag for quite a
while now – we’ve had a yield monitor since 1999, but
have only really gathered good data since 2012,” said
Brock.
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