With harvest just around the corner, it’s important to have one eye on the future planning your success. In an arable farming system, this is a key time of year to maximise capturing every last grain that contributes to yield and annual performance. It’s what you strive all year for, one decision after another – to grow the best crops and maximise your performance and profitability. A crucial component of good planning is capturing your yield data so that you can track and optimise your farm’s performance. As always, there’s plenty going on in farming and with Christmas and New Year tied up with the time most arable farmers start, it’s easy to feel rushed and drop some of the important aspects of harvest setup and success.
Here are three key steps to ensure harvest success and maximise your yield data.
- Before harvest – make sure your combine is serviced, your displays/screens are working (and tested), your wiring looms are installed in your combine (if you’re planning on swapping GPS from one machine to another) and that last season’s yield data on your data card, memory stick or display is downloaded and saved (preferably with a backup) safely for future use. This is also an important time to set up your display with the correct paddock and crop names so that when it comes time to pull that header into the paddock, it’s good to go.
- During harvest – when you pull into the first paddock on day one, try to take your time. Make sure everything is set up and working correctly (GPS, moisture meters, flow meters) and that you perform some yield calibrations to get the data recorded as accurately as possible. There’s no need to get too hung up on this if final paddock weights will be available for post-processing yield data, but it’s important to make sure you will end up with accurate data to give you good insights on your yield performance. After the first paddock, we also suggest downloading and checking that the data is recording and mapping correctly.
- After harvest – Engage with your precision ag consultants to get the data processed as fast as possible. This ensures you maximise your decision-making time and can use your data to guide decisions for the upcoming season – eg variable rate nutrient replacement and/or variable rate seeding. This data is gold and the more years of yield data put together, the more you identify opportunities to tweak your management practices to optimise profitability across all areas of your paddock or farm.
Vantage New Zealand are your local precision ag experts, with reps located throughout New Zealand. To find out more about how we can help you maximise your yield data, call 0800 482 682 or visit https://www.vantage-nz.com/yield-mapping/
Season and multi-season discounts available when you book before 31st December, 2022.