Hi guys,
I’m doing research into agriculture for software my organization is currently building. Any chance you guys can elaborate a bit on the benefits of, and the decisions that can be made based on crop counts / stand counts when growing corn, soybeans, tomatoes, etc.?
Any help will be highly appreciated!
Crop can keep the person the farmer hired to plant honest (or fired). Example would be planting tomato plants. The planter contracts with the farmer to plant 20,000 tomato plants and has figured in a 3% average loss so he charges the farmer for 19,400 plants that were planted and the 3% loss. But the plant count shows that the tomato planter only planted 17,820 plants a shortage of 1,580. Makes sense? Of course with the plant count you need to do the mapping soon after planting before the plants get too big and grow into (or very near) the next plant. It would the same with corn/soybean.
Hi @jdavisDavionLLC,
Thanks for elaborating! I hope you don’t mind me asking a couple of follow up questions?
Do most farmers work with contractors to do the planting, or is this only done with crops that need to be replanted, such as tomatoes?
I assume each crop has a different value proposition, so are there any other benefits, next to being able to check the number of actual crops planted? Can detecting individual crops over time help create a unified field?
How often do you ideally want to do a crop count when growing tomatoes and corn?
Thanks in advance!
Pietero -
Sorry for the delay. I answered you question a few days ago when I got the e-mail but forgot I had to do it on the forum, sorry.
Good question. We have tried to break into the AG field here in MS and have hit a wall. Even with a farmer we know personally that has thousands of acres. He says the profit margin is so tight that they can’t see spending the money to get the data. We are told they contract it out for things like tomatoes but with corn, cotton, soybean they do it themselves since it is a seed versus a plant.
From what we have learned is different farmers do it different ways. Here is a good article on the costs:
http://agfax.com/2015/08/28/risk-management-contracts-what-to-learn-from-tomato-growers/
I have also attached a USC study that was done several years back as well as another study. (It wont let me upload so if you will e-mail me I’ll upload the USC study to you.
Hope this is helpful. But a good idea is to pitch the count plant and give them a few scenarios of what they could lose.
Sorry I couldn’t be more helpful. What state are you from?
Joe, Too Blessed To Be Depressed
Joseph R. Davis
Davion
davionllc.com
200 Jetport Road, Suite B
Brandon, MS 39047
601-724-5013 (Office)
601-937-4477 (fax)
334-782-1169 (Cell)