THE Goondiwindi-based Woods family in southern Queensland relies heavily on agricultural management systems (AMS) to achieve best practice farm management.
Early adopters of GPS technology through involvement with the development of the original Beeline GPS system in the late 90s, they have moved from predominantly grazing to broadacre farming in order to maximise the efficiencies and returns from their two large holdings.
“More recently, as John Deere stepped into the AMS market, we’ve gradually moved over to GreenStar 2 because for us it was a logical step as our gear is predominantly ‘green’,” Robert Woods said.
“By going with GreenStar 2 not only did we get the productivity and reduced fatigue benefits of the AutoTrac automatic guidance system but it enabled us to get heavily involved in mapping every aspect of our farming practices through the use of the Harvest Doc and Harvest Monitor software functions,” he added.
The Woods say Harvest Doc has proved to be an “invaluable management aid” for the family because it enables them to fully integrate the data it records during planting, spraying and harvesting.
It enables them to review and archive the data from both properties on John Deere’s Apex farm management software.
“With the information uploaded to Apex we can generate maps and reports that highlight what impact our previous management decisions have had on production, and then use this knowledge to further refine our farming practices,” Robert Wood said.
“We’ve been saving our data for the past four years so we are now able to compare trends over multiple years, identify and control field problem areas, control pests and accurately plan our input purchases.
“By having our guys map everything from planting through to harvesting we’ve been able to create an online diary of everything that happens on the properties.”
As a result the Woods family can benchmark and compare gross margins, thereby taking the guesswork out of the management equation.
When it comes to harvesting they say operators need to be “really focussed” on what they are doing which is another area where GreenStar 2 comes into its own since its takes the pressure off drivers, thereby enabling them to do a better job by eliminating overlapping.
“The other upside of the GreenStar 2’s accuracy is that we collect truly accurate yield data so our trend data is also highly accurate,” Robert Woods said.
“We’ve also been able to increase yields substantially through the use of minimal till tools and the accuracy of GPS to sow between last year’s crop rows - which has substantially reduced the effect of stubble disease and more importantly has given us the ability to sow through larger amounts of crop residue.”
Robert Woods says when it comes to farm management one of the biggest impacts has been the addition of John Deere’s Rate Controller and Swath Control Pro systems that integrate with the GreenStar 2’s touch screen to manage spraying.
“By using Swath Control Pro on our spray rigs we are able to get more done in less time while using less chemicals in the process, as the spray boom sections are turned on and off automatically by GPS so overlapping is minimised, crop yields are improved and input costs and driver fatigue are reduced,” he said.
“Based on our extensive mapping we know exactly how much money John Deere’s Swath system has saved us, and in the case of chemicals the savings are currently running at 4.3 per cent which means the systems have paid for themselves in less than a year.”
Another area where GreenStar 2 assists the Woods family’s farming practices lies in reducing driver fatigue since the technology is able to match spraying with mapping leaving its operators with no doubt as to where they have or haven’t sprayed.
Interestingly, their GreenStar 2 system is easily interchangeable, which is put to good use on its 9670 header, 8520 tractor and on two Case tractors used for spraying.
Farming in the district for more than 30 years, the Woods family enjoys a mix of good alluvial flood plain land at Tulloona and brigalow country at Toobeah.
Growing both summer and winter crops on both properties on a year-in, year-out rotation basis of one-third legumes, one third wheat, one-third barley in winter, and predominantly sorghum in summer.
The properties are said to be well suited to new GPS based farming practices, receiving “excellent” dealer support from Chesterfields at Goondiwindi.
Robert Woods said: “Accuracy is addictive – it really is, especially when you see the impact it has on the way you farm.”
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