Topcon Talks Agriculture

Turning the Precision Corner | S05E02

September 03, 2021 Topcon Positioning Systems Season 5 Episode 2
Topcon Talks Agriculture
Turning the Precision Corner | S05E02
Show Notes Transcript

Precision agriculture tools are becoming easier to use, more affordable and built to work on farm, listen in to Jared discuss the latest adoption trends with Bruce Erickson Agronomy Education Distance & Outreach Director for Purdue University

Speaker 1:

Hello everybody. And welcome to another episode of Topcon talks, agriculture. I'm your host today? Jared Oaks. I'm a product manager with Topcon agriculture. And today on the podcast, we're honored to have Dr. Bruce Erickson. Dr. Erickson is the agronomy education, distance and outreach director at Purdue university. Dr. Eon has deep roots in agriculture, raised in Iowa, uh, on the farm, worked as a practicing agronomist, uh, with, with DuPont pioneer. Uh, Dr. Erickson developed the eLearning academy for Purdue university and has served thousands of students across 38 countries. Dr. Erickson has a master's degree in crop production and physiology, and a PhD in agronomy an honor, and a privilege to have you on the podcast today, Bruce, how is your day today?

Speaker 2:

Well, things are going well. It's just, uh, the week before classes start here at, uh, Purdue for the fall semester. And, uh, I appreciate the, uh, boost and my ego there because, uh, when you're, as you sure. Well know when you're down in the trenches here, you're developing teaching materials and, and trying to get the work done. Um, you need all the encouragement you can get

Speaker 1:

<laugh> yeah, yeah, no, it's, it's a grind and it's a busy, busy, busy time. I, uh, you know, there's been some storms kind of all around. We actually had some, some hail pretty good hail go through, uh, kind of on our farm. We've got school starting this week, actually today was the first day of school for both of my kids. And yeah, it's just busy, busy, busy the end of the end of summer. And it

Speaker 2:

It's always exciting, uh, when the students return to, because the they're all the freshmen they're away from home for the first time, it's all that anticipated. Uh, it's the, their whole lives are, you know, held out in front of'em and we take that very seriously. We wanna make sure that they have a good experience here

Speaker 1:

Now that, yeah, that's fantastic. I have some experience with, uh, some of the fine folks up at Purdue and, and other universities, of course, as well. We have a, a, a facility and a relationship with Kansas state, but great grassroots. Um, what's, what's the term, uh, land grant university I think is, is

Speaker 2:

Always

Speaker 1:

What's referred. So that's,

Speaker 2:

That's kinda the arts and the agricultural arts and checkbox. So I, I mentioned, um, you know, all the students coming back, but most of my, you know, I've done a lot of undergraduate teaching in the past, but, uh, you know, in your introduction said, I was the director of the eLearning academy, uh, at Purdue here. And so, so most of my classes are actually for professional people. Mm-hmm<affirmative> and, um, they're, they're online and they're asynchronous and, uh, we've had really good success. We have an introductory agronomy course. Uh, there's a nutrient course, a precision ag course, but, um,

Speaker 1:

And by prof, by professional people, you mean people that do this kind of thing for a living. That that's what you mean when you say professional, of course we're all professionals, right, Bruce, but that you mean practicing agronomists, uh, or even, even farmers and ranchers likely can also attend your, your courses as well, right?

Speaker 2:

Oh, absolutely. I mean, so the students that are on campus here, whether they be, you know, undergraduate grad and, or in some grad program, you know, we're preparing them for the most part for their future careers. And so what I, my focus here lately has been to, uh, you know, to, to make sure that the people that are out there working now, the ag retailers, the agronomists, the crop consultants, um, anyone in agribusiness or related fields, uh, just to make sure that they're up to date with everything, uh, either that, or one of my more popular courses too, is to go back to the basics of soils and nutrient management and pest management and, and crop growth and development and all that kinda stuff. And, uh, you know, we all get a little rusty over time. So, uh, I certainly, you know, I certainly am trying to pedal hard every day to make sure I try to keep up.

Speaker 1:

Yeah. I, I think getting back to the basics is so important. Sometimes we can't see the forest for the trees. It's nice to kind of reset and, you know, get back to, um, get back to the soil, uh, and the fertility and just, just the basics. It's kind of easy to honestly get lost in some of these things sometimes, cuz it changed so fast and, and there's so many, I, I don't wanna say marketing things, but there's, you know, there's so many things that draw your eye kind of away from those basics, but uh, you know, no, no topic is really off limits today, uh, on our, on our call today, Bruce, as, as okay. Uh, as you know, uh, we'll, we'll probably, and for sure touch on some of the recent surveys and some things that have come out, you know, from some of the folks in industry, I think our listeners will really, uh, enjoy hearing some of, some of those insights about where, you know, where portions of the industry is kind of going from an adoption, you know, point of view. Right. But, uh, yeah, we'll, we'll keep things pretty casual.

Speaker 2:

Well, you say no topic is off limit, but I'll try to avoid sex, sex, politics, and religion. I've known for many years, I'm gonna avoid those. Okay.

Speaker 1:

Per deal deal. I'm I'm with beyond that. So, okay. So the, uh, this, the survey that, that I wanted to touch on with you, I know, I know you're familiar with, uh, with the survey, but in case our listeners aren't, uh, the survey Bruce and I will be touching on today is a survey, uh, from crop life. Now, this survey has been around for long, long time, uh, 20, 20, 21 years. I think that 97 is when they started that. Now it is sent out to, uh, dealers and distributors and uh, ag retailers. And the, the point of this survey is to sort of gauge, uh, the adoption or maybe what services, uh, they're offering, how their business models and things are evolving. And, uh, I just want to kind of disclaim to our listeners. These numbers are coming from ag retailers and agronomists. When we say some of these percentages, that doesn't mean that say 35% of farmers do this. It means 35% of a retailers and agronomists maybe are offering that service. So how did I do on that? Disclaimer, Bruce. Okay. You did,

Speaker 2:

You did pretty well. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Well, we'll give you, you know, I'm, I'm meant Purdue here. We'll give you a, uh, B minus a

Speaker 1:

I'll take, I'll take a B minus all day. Yeah.

Speaker 2:

<laugh> So no, you did well. And uh, OK, good. No, I'll just add to that a little bit. Uh, I mean this, uh, past year was our 21st survey. We skipped a few years in there. We never skipped more than one year mm-hmm<affirmative>. And, uh, those that are familiar with Purdue was started by our provost, Jay RI. And I know he worked with Dave Downey and those are familiar names to a lot of people in, in ag retail. But, um, we started working, you know, on paper, if you go back, um, you know, two decades ago because, uh, crop life has a, a very robust ag retailer list. I mean, they have a very comprehensive list and, um, you know, part of the reason for doing the survey is because, um, if something is new as precision ag was, or today's form of precision ag back two decades ago, you're kind of wondering what other people are doing. Sure. And, uh, you know, so, uh, you know, I'm thinking about, uh, doing verbal rate or I'm thinking about getting satellite imagery or offering that, what are other people doing and why are they doing that? And, and of course we do that today. I mean, everyone, if they're buying a car or, or buying a tractor, whatever they're going on the website, and they're looking to see what other people are, you know, if you're staying in a hotel, you, you, uh, evaluate that. And so same kind of thinking I guess, is that, uh, and technology is especially interesting that way, because, uh, it, it's often really hard to, um, you know, with, with things like that, it's hard to really understand, um, you know, what the benefit would be. It's not quite, uh, you know, it's not like buying a, uh, tangible piece of thing. If you're buying technology, it's often you're buying a concept as much as anything. So, um, people are really interested in what other people are doing, but of course now our survey is all online, electronic and people click through and if anyone's listening, that's filled out, um, the, the survey, I really appreciate, um, you know, your contribution to that. And so for the most part, like you said, Jared, you know, we're, we're asking retailers what they're doing, but we're also asking them what their customers are doing also. And I'll try to clarify some of that. And pretty much everything I'm gonna be talking about today is related to field crops of like corn soybeans, fors, cotton, rice, et cetera. We, we also, um, you know, send the survey to, especially dealers that, you know, are, uh, tree crops, vegetables, fruits, all that kind of stuff. But, uh, that's a separate analysis and that's for another day.

Speaker 1:

Sure. But still likely relevant to, you know, if you're, if you're, uh, you know, walnuts and apricots in California or sugar beets or, or peanuts, um, caring for the crop properly preparing the crop ahead of the season or the soil, fertility, all those things kind of matter to everyone. And like you said, uh, in kinda your opener there, this is a really effective tool to open a window to what others are kind of doing. So that, that might, uh, take, take a bit of the uneasiness off, you know, if someone on the, on the listening to the podcast today is, you know, maybe they're apprehensive about a certain technology, a certain item. And then in our discussion, we uncover that, you know, maybe it's 50% or 60% that might ease, uh, one of those folks', uh, maybe concerns, but let's, let's just dive in. And, you know, in looking in, uh, in, in looking in a lot of the, uh, the survey, you know, it's a, it's a, it's a pretty, uh, comprehensive survey of course. And one of the items that sort of jumped off the page to me, you know, with, with my background in, in agriculture and ag retail, and, and, uh, ag distribution, you know, and OEMs and, and manufacturers was data cleanup and a, and aggregation services. Now that, that's what that is to translate. That is my data is a mess. I need someone helping me fix it and clean it up. And, uh, you know, that offering or that service has really hovered at a pretty low level, you know, around, uh, you know, anywhere from 17, maybe up to 20%, um, for the last decade. And, uh, which essentially tells me as an observer, this is a losing proposition, right? We're not even gonna gonna really try to do this because it's so clunky. It's so time consuming, it's so messy, let's sort of throw away the old and start fresh and, and, and do a better job. And, you know, when I talk to customers, I talk to growers, I, I see a lot of folks and work with a lot of folks. You know, they still tell me how frustrated they are with all the formats and all the, this, and all, you know, like I have a computer science degree to know how to do these things. And this year, those services jumped up to 35%, which tells me there's really a strong demand for those services. And, and since there's the demand more distributors dealers and ag retailers are offering those services, which is phenomenal.

Speaker 2:

Yeah. We've, we've seen a big change in just the last few years here in the use of on-farm data for decision making. And, you know, we all know farmers are busy people and, uh, they may have an addition to their crops. They may have livestock, they may have another enterprise such as trucking. They may sell seed, you know, they, they belong to boards. Um, if, you know, if they're farming crops, they've got farms in multiple locations and they just can't be spending a lot of time sitting behind the computer and managing all this stuff. And so they have heavily dependent upon their ag retailers, uh, to help them out with some of this, you know, there are probably the minority that are really good, uh, at doing this kind of stuff. But like you say, a lot of this has been a lot of this has been very difficult, uh, be because, um, it's, uh, heady type of stuff. And that's one of the big, I guess, take homes of the survey. If you take a look, if you pull yourself out and look at the really big picture here, there are a number of technologies. There's a number of things that, uh, retailers and farmers use on their farms that we would call automated and like auto guidance is one of them. I mean, it, it is certainly co section

Speaker 1:

Control another one. Right?

Speaker 2:

Exactly. And, and, uh, they are complicated of course, uh, in inside that box, it's very complicated, but for the farmer, for the most part, um, you, you, you, uh, install these on your equipment or they come factory ready. And, um, it's not a big learning curve for a lot of people to do this, but data type stuff where you have a sensor and, uh, you have to then, uh, pull that into some kind of a decision program or whatever, and then, uh, analyze it and, and then go back to the field. And some of this can happen in real time. You know, we've got some examples of that, like green seeker or whatever, but a lot of it happens in steps. And, uh, there is compared to the guidance in the section controllers and, um, some of the related technologies, um, sure. You know, the, the, the data type stuff has been much slower, but, and we've been working with data. The ironic thing is, is we've been doing, um, uh, grid or zone soil sampling and variable rate fertilization for more than two decades on many farms. Right. Uh, but still, what's interesting. I think we've finally crossed the threshold, um, is in, in terms of the percentage of farmers, we're starting to tick up there, but it's still a surprisingly low percentage of farmers that are doing this. And so people outside of agriculture, look at that and think, gosh, this has been a available for more than two decades. Uh, you would think that there would be some advantage for putting on, in a field that's variable, less fertilizer here, more there, less seed here, more there, et cetera. But, um, most farmers are still not doing that. Uh, and I, and I think it goes back Jared, to what you were saying is that, uh, it, it's often a frustration and, and complicated mix of things, uh, to, in order to make that happen. But we seem to be turning the corner in the last, uh, two or three years here.

Speaker 1:

Yeah. And that that's really what, what jumped off that, uh, I think it's a line chart, you know, on that, on those survey results was, I really saw an, an aggressive uptick there and I thought, man, that's great news, because like you said, that tried and true auto steer section control. I, I would even lump, uh, now, uh, in 20 20, 20, 21 eras grid and zone sampling, you know, where those have high 60, 70, 80%. Um, we, we know those things make sense, farmers and ranchers, those technologies pay. I, I will get a return. Um, yeah, extremely interesting. Um, speaking of what, I, I guess what I would categorize as kind of advanced sensor systems or emerging sensor systems, you know, things like the chroy and greenness sensors that you had mentioned, whether that's top cons crop spec sensor, or a, uh, a green seeker or, or some other technologies out there, as well as things like, uh, UAVs and imagery, really from a UAV satellite imagery and, uh, the EC mapping. I think whether that's a sled, uh, that you're pulling around, or maybe it's a virus, or, you know, other technologies, those were still quite quite low, you know, satellite imagery had risen probably, uh, the, the highest out of all of them. Um, and maybe it's just because it's so accessible, maybe it's more convenient and the other systems require some pretty intense setup. Uh, maybe some training, maybe some specialty equipment, additional costs, things like that, maybe a specialist that knows how to run, you know, that piece of equipment. I, uh, I dunno, those are a couple of the items on the survey that I, that I watch closely kind of eagerly it's like every time the survey comes out each year, I'm kind of, I flip right to that page to look at, okay, where are these items at?

Speaker 2:

Well, let me comment on a couple of those. Um, if I may here and what I, what, what I have to say is based on data, but there's a little speculation in it too, so I'm not necessarily always right on these types of things, but, um, I guess, first of all, like to the crop spec, um, you know, the green seeker type of technology that, um, you know, that, that, uh, wasn't first to the game, but, uh, it's exciting technology where you look at the greenness of a crop and you go through, uh, after the crop has come up and, and then, you know, it spits out, uh, it happens in real time. It spits out the correct rate of fertilizer based on, on how green the crop is. But, but one of the things I think, um, you know, that's maybe held at back is that, uh, oftentimes by the time the crop is big enough, uh, to show that yellowing or whatever, or lack of growth, um, that's almost to the point where it's too late to do something. Um, you need to have a little bit more predictive type of thing going on. So, I mean, I think that's part of the reason why it's still somewhat low, um, I guess, uh, electrical conductivity, again, that was a little bit later to the game. Uh, I remember when it first came out really exciting. The, the key thing that it really offers in terms of a field is that's it's high resolution. I mean, compared to like, um, some grid sampling where you've got two and a half acre or one Hector grids, it gets it down much finer than that. And so it identifies these small differences, uh, in small areas of the field. But the thing that is sometimes difficult with EC is that, um, we don't always know what those differences are caused by. Yeah. And so if you don't know what's causing that, how can you correct or modify what you're doing based on that? Uh, so that, that's, uh, really interesting in terms of that. And then, um, the, um, satellite imagery, you mentioned that too, and, and, uh, that, uh, we we've had satellite imagery since the 1960s, I believe, you know, uh, for a long time, I mean, like, uh, 50 years we've had this available and a lot of times it's free, but what's, what's changed. And I think the reason that it's ticking up, I think the most recent things are showing that like three force of dealers are offering, this is a service, but I think only like a quarter of farmers or a quarter of the acres are actually using that, uh, on their farms to help with their management, just looking through my data here. Mm-hmm<affirmative>. Yeah. And, um, I think that is also, uh, somewhat, uh, related, uh, to like, uh, soil electrical conductivity. And in that, um, you know, you can get a satellite image or you can fly over with an airplane or a UAV or whatever, and you see that spot in the field that's different, but, but again, we don't always know why it's different, uh, right. And it could be different different years too. And so, um, there, there's a, there's a big need now for a lot of expertise in, in terms of, uh, the people that are working in agriculture. And we have a lot of smart people I know that are working on that. And, um, but I, cuz I, I mean, I'm probably sounding a little bit pessimistic, but I wanna make sure everyone knows that, uh, I'm the most optimistic person about precision agriculture that ever lived, you know, and

Speaker 1:

No, I, I think I, I don't think you sound pessimistic. I think you sound, you're sounding real. And I think our, our, our farmers and ranchers that listen to Topcon agriculture along with other podcasts and, and you know, it, I think it's important that this is an advertisement for one specific technology. This podcast exists to discuss the things that are on the, in the minds of the folks in our industry, whether that's farmers, ranchers, uh, you know, OEMs, uh, you know, et cetera. And these technologies like the EC and the satellites that we're talking about now, you're you're right. The technology is still evolving, still emerging. There's so much potential from what we can ultimately create from some of those data points, data layers, but at least now without getting real wet in, in the morning or covered in cobwebs or something in the evening, you've got a great way daily, uh, or even weekly say with imagery to, to take a look at your crop and see something that your eyes can't see and you're right. I, I absolutely agree with you. It doesn't indicate to you exactly or definitively what's going on there, but it really does indicate to you that something is going on there and that you should maybe investigate that. So instead of walking randomly, uh, across an 80, right.<laugh> which we've both done, uh, you can target your specific site points based on some of those other layers or at least that's maybe how I like to use that technology.

Speaker 2:

No, I mean, uh, you know, for diagnosis, that's often the first thing is to see that there's something different and then you, you know, transfer the field and, and take a look. And the other thing that is really telling here too, in recent years is that, um, boy, the computer technology, I mean, one of my kids, uh, pulled out, uh, my old Nokia flip phone here, you know, that was in one of my desk drawers<laugh> and they had'em too, but they seemed to forget that, you know, they were more interested in poking fun at old dad here, you know? Sure, sure. Um, you know, um, and, and pull out my old laptop computers, I've saved a couple of them. I mean, they're like three inches thick. Yeah. Um, yeah. You know, they would,

Speaker 1:

And the battery last, what? Maybe 30 minutes

Speaker 2:

<laugh> right, exactly. No, I mean, they're so thick. They could survive the apocalypse, I think. Yeah. You know, they're humongous. And so we, and 20 years ago when we started, you know, what were like VRT and yield mapping and all this stuff, um, we didn't have cloud storage. We didn't have, uh, uh, a lot of the stuff that we have, uh, today we didn't have telematics to move the stuff around

Speaker 1:

This. This'll blow some of our listeners minds, but we didn't even have USB. Remember Bruce, we, we were moving files with floppy discs. Now I'm talking about, uh, the, the small, the modern floppy disc, not the old school<laugh> ones, but yeah.

Speaker 2:

And I remember, I remember at top farmer workshop, I don't recall the year, but it was like maybe 2004, we had a, a UAV or a drone demonstration. And man, it was so exciting to fly your own bird and to collect this imagery, but the imagery coming off, that thing was terrible. Terrible. Um, yeah. And you, you couldn't stitch it together. It was right. There's been so much advancement made in that area too. And, uh, wow. What, you know, that, that area is growing very rapidly and lots of promise there.

Speaker 1:

Yeah. So, so much, um, easier to use so much more accessible and, and also much more maybe affordable than it has been. Obviously I think it's commonly known that over time, technological, you know, technology items and not just hardware, but also software related items. They do get more affordable over time, but that's obviously because the larger population adopts those items as well. If you're making five items and selling it for this well, if I'm making, uh, 5 million of them, you know, it's, it's much, much more, uh, we can offer it at a much lower price.

Speaker 2:

And I noticed that Dell and Lenova want to still charge me about the same price for my new laptop, but it's about twice as fast. Every time I get the new one too, you know, so

Speaker 1:

I, you know, I, I come actually from, uh, you know, agriculture, but I was in it for, uh, oh yes. Near nearly a decade. And I, I maybe I shouldn't feel bad saying this, but, um, a few years ago, I, I moved over to a Mac. So everything I have is Mac and apple, and that, that might not be perfect for certain folks, but, uh, I, I haven't looked back. I was really, really apprehensive of moving off of windows and I did lose some things. I will be honest, I lost some programs and some things that I really, you know, kind of enjoyed, but of course there's parallels and, you know, different things that they can use now to kind of run windows on max. I I've really been happy with that, but the, the point is don't be afraid of the technology. If you're a farmer and rancher, and you've got a cell phone in your pocket, take, take a, maybe a step forward, look at the modern computers, look at the, the modern devices. They're much more affordable than you may think, and they're easier to use. Right. And they are, they are built well. I, I, I think, uh, um, although the, in the old days they were three and a half or four inches thick and weighed, you know, eight pounds today. They do feel maybe cheaper and lighter just cuz I think as in ag, sometimes I associate quality with weight sometimes, you know? Oh yeah. Uh, but um, the, they real, the machines are really built well and, and whether it's a, a tablet or a phone or, or whatever, I, I think the barriers are coming down. Um, I really, really appreciate, uh, your, your time today, Bruce. I, you know, I, I had so many things I, I had to pick maybe round two is in order and to all of our listeners. Thanks so much for tuning in to another, uh, top com talks, agriculture podcast. I'm Jared. And thanks again to Bruce hope everyone stays safe and has a great day. Thanks very much, Jared.