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PROFIT MAPPING: DOES ZONE MANAGEMENT PAY?
Yield may be King but it’s profit that pays the bills.
“We must stop thinking about bushels per acre
and start thinking about dollars per acre,” says
agronomist Mike Wilson. After working with
zone management with Thompson’s Limited
for 12 years he suggests that zone mapping can
help the bottom line, encouraging farmers to
combine their crop marketing skills with zone
mapping-based decisions.
Wilson told farmers at a recent Innovative Farm-
ers of Ontario marketing workshop in Guelph
that first, they need a plan. What are we trying to
achieve?
Economically, farmers need to figure out their
cost of production, their marketing strategy, and
they need to figure out a target selling price.
Wilson can then make agronomic recommenda-
tions based on the economic goals of the farm.
Agronomically, can we cut our input investment
in nutrients, seed or crop protection without
sacrificing yield? Or maybe we can increase
yield by increasing inputs? Maybe we should be
investing in the soil? Do we want stewardship
options to get the farm performing better in
different ways? “To do it truly right, we have to
do them all, at the same time, in every field,” said
Wilson.
Basically, if we continue to farm based on our
farm average we’ll continue to get average
results.
With straight rate applications, there are parts of
the field where we’re matching removal to yields
but we also have areas where we’re over apply-
ing, potentially affecting the environment. “We
need to stop that,” saidWilson, “and keep that
money in our pocket.”On the flip side, where the
yield is very high, we’re mining the soil. We’re not
adequately fertilizing for sustainability. Can we
push harder there?
Zone mapping is more than just printing off
yield numbers from the combine. Yield is king
– we have to use it. But the actual data from the
corn combine may swing from zero to 300 bush-
els. Realistically the average is 149, but now we
start looking at zones differently. “Profitability
doesn’t come from higher yield alone. That’s just
one piece of the puzzle.”
The zone map begins with basic topography,
with three to six years of normalized yield on top
of it. Typically the tops of the knolls are poor and
the low ground is in really good shape. When
you start looking at the data there’s always a
story in the background. You may see where a
fence line and a tree line have been removed, or
areas that have been treated differently showing
different fertility.
You’ll see zone maps where yellow shows av-
erage yield, red areas perform poorly, and light
green and dark green are the highest yielding
areas. For white mold fungicide application,
for example, he will suggest to only spray the
green areas. That’s it. He can also match fertilizer
recommendations to yields in each zone.
There are some areas of the farm that swing
drastically from year to year, maybe a wet
spot that needs some tile, maybe a knoll that
performs well in a wet year but burns up on a
dry year where irrigation may be the best bet.
Can we do those things? “Sometimes yes,” said
Wilson, “but not always realistically. So we begin
to manage them differently, stop wasting our
money if the yield potential is not there.”
Once you have that variability measured you
need to figure out what’s causing it, starting
with soil sampling. Where can we make a differ-
ence? Where we can save and where do we need
to spend?
Sometimes it’s just about investing in the future.
From nearly 9,000 soil samples that Wilson sees
go through Thompson’s every year, he has noted
that the trend of phosphorous and potassium
levels dropping. We’re not putting enough on to
match removal rates. “We’re not doing it right;
we need to do a better job. We just came off five
years of really good prices but the soil tests are
showing that we’ve screwed up.”When times are
good we should have invested in the soil, not let
it go backwards, so if we do get into two or three
or four years of bad we can use that soil bank
account to ride through.
We can increase our yield but we also have
to maximize our input dollars where we can’t
increase yield. If it’s a sand knoll, or a ridge, or
an area that just can’t produce more because
of another limiting factor on the farm, then we
need to manage that to the best of our ability
and stop wasting our money there.
The bottom line is, does zone management pay?
From his calculations, yes. When he compared
variable rate treatment versus straight rate
application he found a $23 per acre savings in
nitrogen, inputs and seed costs. Focusing on the
fertilizer, matching it to the soil test levels, can
gain $8 per acre alone.
Where can we go with this? “Stop farming bush-
els per acre. We can’t do that anymore,” says Wil-
son. If nothing else, start collecting data today
that you may need tomorrow. You will need at
least three to five years of data to see trends and
get full potential from new equipment.
“Profitability doesn’t come from higher yields
alone. We don’t just make more bushels…we
have to farm profit per acre and get as much out
of every acre we can. A lot of technology is there;
we’re just not using it to our advantage.”
Submitted by Karen Dallimore for Thompson’s Limited