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
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
Hello everybody. And welcome to another episode of Topcon talks, agriculture. I'm your host today? Jared Oaks. 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. Ericsson 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 e-learning academy for Purdue university and has served thousands of students across 38 countries. Dr. Ericsson has a master's degree in crop production and physiology, and a PhD in agronomy. Let's talk a about a couple barriers that that might be on some of the grower's minds. You know, you, you, uh, go around and do a lot of workshops, obviously, you know, like we discussed before, and I've, I've seen some of your presentations and, and read some of the, the articles, you know, you've written in, in crop life and other things. And, um, I, I mean, I, I'm gonna kind of quote you, but I really was interested in some of these quotations and I wanted to kind of give you an opportunity to maybe expand on some of the quotes you, you, uh, you were quoted as saying that the three biggest barriers for success or quote, difficult to find employees. Now, this is obviously the ag retailer, difficult to find employees that can deliver the precision ag services was, um, these are all around 49, 50%, but that, that was one, the second one was the equipment needed and I'm thinking specialty equipment, hardware, et cetera, to provide those services changing so fast and there, and therefore, you know, just gotta spend more money to sort of keep up with the Joneses. And then the third barrier was fees being charged for some of these services. Maybe they aren't high enough or, or maybe they can't charge for'em and therefore they they're, they're not profitable. Those three barriers I thought were, were really well, um, thought out. And I think, uh, you know, I know those are barriers to the ag retailer and maybe the, the dealer distributor, but I, I really do think that some of our farm, uh, operations are finding those same barriers. You know, employees, people who know how to run, uh, the technology or can learn or want to learn. I'm not sure what you were to use there. And then, uh, the equipment changing so fast, you know, do you think some of our farmer customers are worried about getting involved, uh, in, in the technology, because then they think, you know, maybe oh, that thing's gonna break in a year and I'll have to buy another one. And, and it's, you know, it's$10,000 or I, I was just curious what some of the deeper thoughts were maybe behind some of those barriers that I've quoted to you now, Bruce.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Well, and this is the why part of this survey, I mean, up to now, we've sort of been talking some of the whys, but more like, what are you offering and what are farmers doing? But, uh, this is really a, one of the more interesting parts. And we've been asking, um, this set, and I think there's 18 of these that we ask the retailers to identify. And some of them are customer related type things. Um, and, and others are more related to their business. And I, I guess the whole predicate to a lot of this is that, um, what's keeping you from offering doing more with precision agriculture. Is it the money? Is it the people? Is it the equipment? Is it, uh, the land in your area? There there's a whole bunch of things that it could be. And so, um, when, when I was analyzing, um, this information and I, I should use the word I loosely because I have a statistician that helps me with this. Um, and, and, uh, she does most of the work with this, but, um, if you go back a decade, there were those three that you mentioned, Jared, that popped out and they were always the three that were on top. And, um, you know, when you do a survey, gosh, if you'd look at the individual survey forms that come back or what people put online, you know, it's all over the board. Uh, and there's a lot of variation, just like an agriculture. There's a lot of variation in the field. Well, responses are quite variable too, but so this I thought was really telling that these three were there, there was one exception to this I that, and we don't need to get into that, but these three were, were, um, you know, the highest and the, the people thing, you know, I'm in the education business. And, and, um, the, the people thing, if you, if you take a look at that, a lot of the stuff like you say is complicated stuff. And, um, you know, I I've talked to farmers and, and they struggle with that. Uh, they've been struggling with that, uh, for many, many years, and retailers struggle with that too. And of course with the pandemic, we're all struggling, you know, go to your local restaurant.<laugh>, you know, mm-hmm,<affirmative>, they're terribly struggling with this, um, uh, the people thing. And, uh, you just can't show up, you know, and, and, uh, drive the tractor or drive the sprayer across the field that you have to have a level of knowledge beyond that. And so I don't know what more to say about that, but it's a frustrating situation right now.
Speaker 1:Yeah. I, I mean, I don't, I don't want to get too, you know, too deep into the people thing. Um, other than I, I, I guess I would say this, I, I think it's our responsibility, my, my responsibility, I I'm speaking for top con of course, um, it's our responsibility to continue to, to improve on making our technology so easy to use you take it out of the box and a away you go. I, I, you know, recently ins of, uh, some product management discussion, some discussions I've had with some customers, et cetera. Um, you know, my, my wife bought one of these, uh, robotic vacuums a a few weeks ago. I think I may have been, I may have actually been at, at some conference or something, did
Speaker 2:The robot replace your vacuuming services,
Speaker 1:Or man, I tell you what it, it did. And, and this thing thing is it's amazing. Um, and my she's so funny about it, you know, we'll be in the car, you know, driving, and she'll say, I need to vacuum and pull her phone out and start to vacuum<laugh>. And, and you know, that, I mean, I, I guess that's a bit of a per a personal, uh, point I I'm making, but I'm, I'm using it as an example to explain. I mean, that's how simple and dare I say kind of fun that cuz that's kind of fun, you know, it's kind of funny, it's, it's obviously an ex uh, a fairly costly item. Um, it isn't cheap to, to get one of those, but man, the amount of time that it has given us back and, and uh, you know, the dog isn't as stressed out anymore with, with the other vacuum we, we had. Right. I mean those, those little things, I mean maybe some listeners might think, you know, what, what is he talking? He's talking about a vacuum, no, I'm talking about products and technology items that are designed and in engineered for, for you, the customer, you open it up, it's simple, it's easy. Oh, I do this, I touch here, I touch there and away we go, um, I mean we really, really strive and push and challenge ourselves to, to produce product like that. Um, otherwise we, you know, we really can't break through some, some of these barriers.
Speaker 2:I think you've identified also, you know, one of the main reasons why we have lagged in terms of, uh, site specific management as compared to some of the more automated stuff is because, um, the, we need more automation, uh, on both ends on the, on the collection side and on the, uh, input side variable rate or whatever variable timing to make sure that that's right. And the classic example I always use when I'm at a meeting, I always have, of course my smartphone with may I hold up my iPhone and like what's inside this little box here is extremely complicated, but I don't have to know all of the complication that's inside there to make that work. And we need way much more of that. Yeah. The other thing that we need, uh, very much, and, and we're working on that at Purdue and I know other land grants and other universities are also working on this too. So I'm not saying we're special here, but, uh, we, we realize that, um, there's a lot of complication in agricultural fields in that with soils and the amount of rainfall and the genetics, the fertil fertilizers that are put on the pesticides, you can go on and on and on. And what I say, the production function here with the outcome that you end up with in the field is a fairly complicated, uh, equation. You know, when you drive by, uh, driving down the interstate and you look at that cornfield off to your left and right, and it's a cornfield, you know, but, uh, there there's a lot going on in that, in terms of managing that. And, um, we, I, I think when we first started this, what I call the current era of precision farming 20 years ago, we certainly underestimated the complication in fields and we thought, wow, we're just gonna put a little more fertilizer here a little bit less, and wow, the crop's gonna respond. Uh, but we quickly found out, uh, that boy there's a lot more to it than just doing that. And so we we're, we're trying to work on, you know, we have crop modelers, we've hired, uh, at the university here. We have people that are, you know, experts in spatial analysis and data science. And, uh, I even teach a class, uh, or supervise supervisor the class, uh, where we use our software and others like Python and all that type of stuff are becoming more commonplace
Speaker 1:For, for our listeners. You're talking about languages that are designed for massive data sets to get in there and figure out, you know, what's big data. I suppose our, our listeners might know it as go, sorry to interrupt you, Bruce. Go ahead.
Speaker 2:No, I, you didn't interrupt. Um, and, and one of the things, um, you know, for this data driven future that we're talking about here is that, um, you know, when you first started this, this conversation, it was more about, um, you know, simplifying things. And, and so software that we're talking about here can take humongous data sets and, and, uh, you know, if I have an Excel spreadsheet of 10 columns and 20 rows or whatever, I can work with that, I can see the whole thing on one screen, you know? Yeah. But let's go just to like a yield map for a field. Uh, the data file on that, you know, is what, what, I can't remember how many columns it is for some of the common formats, but it's maybe 15 or 20 columns. Yeah. But it's like 20,000 for a, a 20 acre field. It's like maybe 20,000, uh, rows on that thing. And so the typical human can't work with that, we need special software to do that. And, uh, that again is one of the tools that, you know, where you first started this conversation that can help us simplify some of this really complicated stuff.
Speaker 1:Yeah. And I I'd like to, I'd like to help all of our customers, um, reach a few milestones, you know, where they, in some cases, some of the growers that I, that I'm working with and also on the agricul or on the, uh, animal feeding feed, lot dairy side, you know, we're also helping, uh, those customers realize some of the value from their feeding data that they, that they have and, and other systems, but you know, that, that first time that a grower, um, sees some of the maps, maybe it's a yield map. Maybe it's a planting map, a simulation map, a satellite imagery map, um, you know, different visualizations about the fields that they right. Intimately know. It's so interesting to me, um, whether it's my father or, you know, uncles, grandfathers, other other folks or whatever, um, you almost always come across a scenario where they say he, he, or she, they say, Hey, I, I know what's going on there. And, and I'm kind of curious, like, yeah, cuz I don't, it's not clear to me. And then they'll say, yeah, you know, 90 years ago there was a barn there and you know, and, and then, and they, I mean they possess, uh, the knowledge that can connect it. It's like a, a, a symbiotic relationship between kind of, uh, grower and, and machine. And when that is connected, you know, the, the insights and the decisions and the power that can be gained really can benefit the farm and, and make things more profitable. Um, otherwise it's sort of just sort of farming by memory, almost just sort of instinct and gut instinct and seeded the pants, which has served many, many, many growers. I'm sure my, you know, some of, some of the folks that I've worked with have forgotten more about agriculture than I may ever know. Uh, there it's, you know, every single field, every, every plant to everything
Speaker 2:I'm, I'm, I'm gonna get a little sentimental on you here, Jared too, because, um, you know, my own father, just the generation prior to me farmed with horses. Yeah. You know, until the 19, I don't know, late thirties or forties, you know, when he first started farming, he farmed with horses<laugh> yeah. And probably two row equipment, you know, and when I was a kid, we had a four row planter and then by gosh, we moved to a six row, um, you know, just in my lifetime. Right. And so, um, what, what, uh, is exciting is to think about our kids and their, our grandkids and how this is all gonna be in the future.
Speaker 1:Yeah. I, I com I completely, uh, agree. I, um, I did, you know, for our, for our cloud, the, the, one of the products that I happen to be the, the product manager for the, the Topcon agriculture platform, we recorded some, um, sort of promotional videos for what the platform does. And I, I wanted, uh, the video not really to get into features, Bruce, but more why are we building this? Who are we building it for? And, and what does it solve? And there's some, some videos out there about tap. I think you go to YouTube and, and search Topcon tap or something. You'll, you'll find them. And granted it's embarrassing that I, that I may be in them, but in the video at the end, that's exactly the goal. My, my that's kind of my closing, uh, point is exactly what you just said is that these technologies are actually bringing sons and daughters back to the farms, right. Empowering, uh, kind of a new generation that quite honestly can kick technologies, but, you know, just hand some of these, uh, young men and women, these, these data files or pieces of technology, it's absolutely amazing what, uh, they're able to do and how fast they're able to do it. And it it's really some exciting time. Now. I know, I know we're, we're, you know, we're at about 45 minutes here and, and they may edit a little here, a little there, but, you know, one thing I really want to talk with you about, cause you've made some comments on it in the past, and I wanna have time to wrap up is what's going on with, with UAVs, for product application, Bruce, I, you know, I've been to J Japan to work with some of our, uh, some of our engineers and also some of our customers and, you know, in Japan UAVs for product application, it's not an emerging technology. It is the technology, right. But by here, it's a totally different conversation. What, uh, you know, I don't wanna spend a ton of minutes on it, but for our listeners who say live in, uh, I don't know, Topeka, Kansas, or, or whatever, they're probably hearing us say drones for fertilizer and pesticide application. That's crazy. But in other parts of the world, it's common technology. Where, where do you think that whole thing's headed
Speaker 2:Bruce? Yeah. I've seen those YouTube videos of those, um, little spray drones, uh, in Japan. And they're, they're cool looking. And, um, you know, we talked a little bit ago about, uh, how the UAV technology has really advanced here the, just the last couple years. And, um, I, I would've, you know, know a decade ago, if you would've asked me if UAVs would ever be feasible for putting on crop inputs. I would've said, uh, no, I really doubt that's, uh, you know, gonna happen anytime soon, but I'll tell you I've been wrong a lot before. And I think I'm wrong on that. Um, in, in that, uh, there's, you know, the battery life, uh, the, uh, which enables them to fly more and their ability to, to, uh, carry a payload has increased. And, uh, what, what, I guess it's still probably gonna be a while before we do whole fields with, you know, something that's put on at 20 gallons per acre.<laugh> something like that, you know? Sure. Which is a kinda a standard saying, but, uh, there are, there's a ton of special needs spot spraying. Uh, and we know that some pesticides are put on at very low rates too. Mm-hmm<affirmative>, but, but, uh, you know, individual weeds spot spraying, spraying in areas where it's really difficult to get in there with the ground rig. And if in all over the Midwest, we all know that, uh, there's been lots of spray planes, uh, the last, uh, month, you know, you, you hear'em in the evening, you can see'em as you're driving, et cetera. There's a lot of aerial application going on and there's a big place for that too. Yeah. So again, I, I think, uh, I just think we're gonna see be seeing more and more of this in the future. I mean, I even think, I even think that we're, we might even get some kind of a convergence where we're gonna get, uh, something that's like a small spray plane or whatever that might have a gas engine on it that is unmanned, something like that.
Speaker 1:Or, or maybe, maybe even something that, uh, works with the standard, you know, applicator equipment that that's out there and provides, you know, maybe some kind of assistance on the job where it sprays. Um, cuz a, you know, as a commercial applicator that, you know, there's some really challenging, um, scenarios for, for the other one A's out there. Um, Bruce, where, you know, whether it's really narrow areas or, you know, areas where you can't keep the pressures, you can't keep the things safe and smaller, more targeted application mechanisms. Like these UAVs might be a better technology to again, assist, not replace, but assist that larger machine. That's got hundred and 20 foot booms and is out there doing, uh, like you said, 20, 20 gallon acre, cuz many of these mixes like a 10 or 12 gallon of the acre carrier. Right. They, they like my, my, my father refers to that as watering your crop. But of course, yeah, he<laugh>, he, he only says that cuz we, you know, we have, we use a spray coop, so it's got a nice small tank on it, but uh right. Yeah, no, it's, it's gonna be really, really exciting. I wonder how many of our listeners are thinking, they're talking about the, the Terminator drones, you know, the drone in, uh, Terminator where like finds the, uh, the bad guy identifies it. And of course they're using bullets, but we're talking about using herbicide on a nozzle, but in a way that's, that's kind of similar Bruce, the kind of the sci-fi to make the, the podcast have a bit of a sci-fi turn, but to be able to see and identify and target and then ultimately say, wow, that's this. And I should use this product at this, you know, in, in a, you know, in a millisecond to make that decision. That's, we're closer to that than I think a lot of folks recognize
Speaker 2:And what you, uh, what you comment on too, is something that I always have to caution myself on too, is that the new stuff is always really exciting. There's always this shiny thing over the horizon, I guess I call it. And, uh, you know, we always have to make sure that, uh, you know, it's gonna pay the bills and all that kind of stuff, but I'm as guilty as anyone of getting excited about this stuff, but related to the application and using a UAV, um, our, for the first time we asked this question on our crop life survey and uh, currently it said, and I was surprised how high this number was. But currently 14% of the retailers said that they were offering, uh, crop inputs on UAVs. But in three years, uh, they, they said in three years, 29% of them would be offering. So like, uh, uh, oh, a little over a doubling of that. So they're, so retailers in general are really up on this type of thing.
Speaker 1:Yeah. And that's, that's so interesting to me because I, I would have thought they may have been the biggest, uh, laggard saying you're never gonna replace these nurse trucks and these big machines and these big fertilizer plants and things. But I, I don't know, we'll maybe we'll have to save that for the second round of podcasts with, uh, with, with Bruce. I, I tell you what to, to wrap, to wrap up. That's
Speaker 2:Good to hear. I might get a second chance here,
Speaker 1:Jerry, and you come back anytime. I I've really, really enjoyed our chat. I, uh, I want to thank our listeners so much, uh, for, for tuning in and maybe sliding around back and forth and hunting and, and finding, uh, some of the discussion today that, that you are really interested in, but Dr. Erickson, the way I like to close our podcast is really to give you the opportunity to speak to the listener directly. Maybe if you've got a thought on your heart or mind, or, or wanna, uh, you know, promote a specific thing or give a message to the farmers and rancher community or ag retail that that's out there by all means, please, uh, you know, give, give a few, uh, words of wisdom if you will.
Speaker 2:Yeah. And I don't, I really don't have much to wrap up, but I'll just make a couple of comments. Um, I mean, a, a, a couple of summary things we're seeing data that's used to drive decisions. I mean, we've had data for a long time, but using that data to drive decisions is certainly on the upswing, uh, dramatically here in recent years, you know, like we talked, uh, the, any time that we can automate stuff and take the complication out of it because life is complicated, you know, in its own way. Uh, we need, need to keep doing that. That's, um, you know, I guess another major summary thing that we talked about here, and then, uh, probably, you know, as, as we're moving forward, all the, uh, automation or robotics are certainly going to keep, uh, you know, advancing and have a bigger place on the farms, whether that's an automat automatic grain card or some kind of a robotic weeder, or, you know, a robotic vacuum in your house, Jared, or all that kinda stuff, you know, that, uh, I probably should look at, uh, you know, to make sure that my floors are cleaner. Uh, but the final thing, I guess I'll say is that, um, if, if you look at technology adoption and I've done a little bit of studying of this, and I don't claim to be an expert by any means, but, uh, you know, it's interesting if you take a look at, um, those cell phone adoption or computer adoption, or in agriculture when people were, you know, adopting pesticides and the classic one that a lot of people refer to as that, uh, hybrid corn adoption. And, um, back in, uh, what hybrid corn or hybrids in, in Mays or corn were invented, I think, uh, in the early 19 hundreds, like 19, oh, I, I don't quote me on the year here, but, uh, in that time, time ago. Yeah. But the typical, uh, you know, Midwestern farmer, I'll just say that. And I know I'm sure we have listeners from all over the country, but the typical Midwestern farmer didn't start using hybrids until like, uh, 30 years later. Um, you know, like in the 1930s, uh, and forties, even for some states, depending on where you were. And so the, the whole thing with that is it takes a person in order to change the playing field. You know, the technologies are, are not gonna do it. And with precision farming, that's even more acute because you have even greater complication. I mean, the farmers in the 1930s and forties, uh, say in Iowa and Kentucky and wherever, uh, all they had to do to start using, um, that hybrid was to, uh, you know, stop pouring the open pollinated in their planter and pour in the hybrid seed and really nothing else changed of their farming operation. Right. But with precision farming, you, in many cases have to change several different aspects, uh, of your farming operation in order to make that work. You gotta look at it in a whole different way. And so that's part of the adoption equation too, is that, um, that whole thing is, uh, a lot more complicated, but, um, we're, we're, um, I mean the future is bright and, and, uh, we all want to, uh, you know, grow more and do it more efficiently, and we wanna make sure that we're not turning the water or, you know, otherwise hurting the environment. And I, and I think all these tools are gonna help us keep doing that into the future.
Speaker 1:Well, I, I really, really appreciate, uh, your, your time today, Bruce. I, you know, I, I had so many things from, from carbon to, to other things I, I thought I, I had to pick, you know, we, we, we like to keep these podcasts under an hour, but let's, uh, let's definitely stay in touch and, and see, uh, 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,
Speaker 2:Very much, Jared.