At The Farm Gate

By Joanie Stiers

May 2010



Farmers progress from horses to hands-free



“Look, kids. No hands!” the father and farmer retold, as he raised his palms in a position to surrender. Fortunately, this was no car-driving lesson. Rather he was showing the novelty of hands-free steering in his tractor. He then shared his satisfaction with the guidance technology, which allows him to work into the dark, especially important for this farmer whose day job is teaching.

The hands-free phenomenon is part of precision agriculture, which has one out of two farmers using satellite global positioning at some level, whether through auto-steer, yield monitors or soil sampling, a university expert says. Each spring more farmers are using satellite global positioning systems to guide their tractors and implements to till, plant, spray and fertilize more precisely and efficiently than human sight or control allows. That includes my family’s farm, where everyone from my brother, the youngest operator, to my grandpa, the eldest labor contributor, can vouch for its impact on the body and bottom line.

Even our 2-year-old son noticed something beyond human control as he repeated, “tractor, drive” and pointed to the hand-less steering wheel as I discouraged his desire to grab and move it like a carnival ride. Satellite global positioning steered the tractor and planter the length of the field with sub-inch accuracy, only to need my brother’s steering to turn. This reduces costly overlap, and the benefit resembles the concept of mowing the yard. The less you overlap where you already have mowed, the faster you finish. You save fuel and time. If you’re farming, you also save seed, pesticide and fertilizer. And auto-steer tractors save a lot of physical ache for farmers, who feel less fatigued after 12 hours in the cab. Something comparable to anyone who can speak the benefits of cruise control on an all-day road trip.

While our son found fascination in the steering wheel, my attention focused on the colorful touch-screen monitor. There I watched the tractor progress through the field, similar to a navigation unit for a car. I witnessed the equipment’s precision, as it shut off individual rows to prevent double-planting, which wastes seed and reduces yield through plant competition. This global positioning technology, teamed with soil sampling and data collection from in-cab monitors, also helps farmers match seed and fertilizer amounts to various soil productivity areas in a single field.

Elsewhere, Dad is among the pesticide applicators using global positioning to reduce spray overlap, a concept that is better for the environment and bottom line. Grandpa tills to prepare the seed bed with auto-steer, and could wave from the tractor with both hands if he so desired. Rather, he likes to focus on the implement he pulls. Even he didn’t think he would progress from horse-drawn equipment to hands-free tractor driving.



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