On The Cutting Edge

When I interviewed Jack McCaw re- cently about the construction of the new 4MC shop off Highway 124, he spoke about the need for more sophisticated equipment to repair today's combines and other farm vehicles.

"You don't fix it with haywire and sticky tape any- more," he observed.

Then he went off on a tan- gent about the increasing use of technology in wheat farm- ing itself and explained how growers now use the signals from satellites to guide their work in the field. I was im- mediately fascinated. During the past few years of putting out The Times' Harvest Edition, I've written about various topics, once even about Wade Thomas' local invention of the no-till drill. But we've never discussed the use of satellites in bringing in the crops.

Wheat farming has changed a lot in Jack Mc- Caw's lifetime. Now in his 80s, Jack was a youngster in the 1930s when the rubber- tired tractor made its debut. Horse teams were still used on many farms at the time.

In the 1940s, when Jack served in the Pacific theater during World War II, one American farmer served 10.7 persons in the United States and abroad. By 1970, this number was 75.8 per- sons. Today, it's more than 140. In 1955, six to 12 labor hours were needed to produce 100 bushels of wheat with a tractor. Ten years later, that number fell to five and by 1987 technology cut it back to about three hours. Now, it takes a modern com- bine nine seconds to harvest enough wheat to make 70 loaves of bread.

What seemed to impress Jack most about technological changes in recent years is the use of GPS, or Global Positioning Systems, allowing the introduction of what's known in his field as "precision farming."

Together with something known as "geographic infor- mation systems," which al- lows for the capture, storage, manipulation, analysis and management of all types of geographical data, GPS lets growers plan their plantings, map their fields, sample soils, guide their tractors, scout their crops, vary their rate of spray applications, map their yields and work in low-visibility conditions, such as rain, dust, fog and dark.

"Guidance systems now allow farmers to perform field operations with sub- inch accuracy, even at night, maintaining rows and beds in exactly the same place year after year," wrote Hem- bree Brandon of the Farm Press blog. "Yield monitors give them a real-time picture of variations in the field; variable rate equipment can provide prescription ap- plication of fertilizer and chemicals with no overlaps and minimal waste."

Data logging programs allow it all to be recorded for analysis; and field operations can be done with less fatigue and strain for the operator who no longer has to concentrate, hour after hour, on trying to maintain a straight path," Brandon went on.

"It's not that unusual for a farmer to be going across the field in his auto-steer trac- tor while checking markets or looking up insect/weed/ other information on a lap- top, tablet, or smart phone," he wrote.

As Jack summed it up: "the new equipment is quite amazing."

It used to be that a cutting line that varied two to three feet in the field was accept- able, even good, Jack recalls. Now, there's virtually no overlap except that which is visible under a microscope. That boosts efficiencies, cuts the cost of supplies and saves time.

And, according to the fed- eral government, which puts satellites in space, it's going to get even better.

"In addition to the current civilian service provided by GPS, the United states is committed to implementing a second and a third civil signal on GPS satellites," predicts the website GPS. gov. "The new signals will enhance both the quality and efficiency of agricultural op- erations in the future."

So don't tell me your tax dollars never paid for any- thing good.

And don't tell me farmers are set in their ways, skepti- cal of all things new. Seems to me they're on the cutting edge.