Friday, March 29, 2024

Making money with farm maps

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Farmers have used maps since the start of time. Drawn in the dirt with a stick or on Google Earth with a mouse, they show history and differences and record aspirations. Maps support plans for success and help solve challenges. Maps help you understand farm variability, whether you grow pasture, vegetables, trees or arable crops. Unhandled variability is the profit killer when low-yielding areas consume the lion’s share of effort, resources and funds.
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It pays to get interested in the poorer areas of your farm, and the better ones, too. That way you can stop doing what isn’t working, and do more of what works well.

Your steep, wet or rough paddocks are where the ATV gets rolled, the axle cracks, the leg gets broken, the most fertiliser washes away and the crop grows the slowest. More effort, resource and drama for less yield and profit.

Other areas yield well each year and never cause a headache. New technology allows you to quickly and easily see differences. These differences define zones that are a good place to focus your attention.

Farming without duly considering your zones can be a path to waste and ruin, so it is valuable to know where the edges are. If you put these on a map, and use them to improve practices, you have captured this value.

Some zones will reverse from high to low yield from season to season. Others will perform well year to year. Some zones can be improved forever, quickly and easily, with drainage or management changes. Others will never pay and inputs should be reduced – or stopped.

A zone of light soils may leach more nutrients and lose more water faster. Heavier soil zones will perform better in a drought but may be waterlogged in wet periods. Match crops, irrigation and nutrients to the zone’s potential.

While we can still use grandad’s aerial photos from 1943, with new fences, troughs and buildings marked in crayon, we can also get up-to-date satellite views from Google Earth or buy images taken on a chosen date. Some farmers are teaming up with neighbours to share the cost.

Today images can even show things invisible to the naked eye. Images from plane, satellite or tractor sensor, and using infrared, can be used to show plant stress long before we can see it. They can also show differences in biomass across a farm. This can tell you a lot about opportunities to farm better.

Some differences are at or below the soil surface. Today you can capture survey quality slope data with GPS and map below the soil surface with electromagnetic sensors towed behind an ATV. Many New Zealand farmers are using these tools to manage their soil and water better.

Don’t throw grandad’s map away, though. Old maps can be gold, particularly when you compare them with new, and use them to make better decisions or revisit old ones.

Here is an eight-step plan to make guaranteed gains on your farm:

1. Open Google Earth (or use a pen and paper, or a stick on the ground)

2. Determine where you think you may be losing value in your operations

3. Map it

4. Make a plan to learn more about it

5. Gather data, apply your intelligence, engage a specialist if you like.

6. Plan a management change, or two

7. Implement

8. Review and repeat.

Intelligently mapping your farm is money in the bank.

Leading farmers all know their next step with their farm maps – whether this is to get a new image, a satellite image to see yield differences, map yield data off their header, or to capture accurate terrain detail to use for drainage design. You would be wise to join them, otherwise they will have all the fun – and they may own your farm one day.

Maps are an age-old tool for better farming. Today’s mapping tools are better and more cost-effective than ever. What is your next step? 

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