Drones for Agriculture and other surveys.

[BananaRepublic]

This may be slightly off topic but does anybody here run drones for agriculture using NIR cameras, near infra red, and so on. Ive recently being investigating the topic with a view to starting something. Id like to hear about the starting costs, pitfalls, the clients, for example are they old, young, were the already educated about precision farming.

I Know most of you are in the US and Canada but were Im from Ireland, farmers are nowhere near as professional as the could be and they will pay for nothing even though I would save them overall.

Id also like to hear from anyone who does surveys be it for archaeology, pollution monitoring etc to get a feel for what equipment should I be looking at, lidar for example r even the peoples experiences with drones.

 

[Original katomi]

Way out of my wheel house but good luck. My only ideas is to find out about restrictions on flying drones in the area you are planning to target
You don’t want to offer a service then find that you can’t because of laws, by laws and even public opinion
Here in our estate most are a touch anti drones, but we have had a few flying around bedroom window height at what most people think of as bed time
My thoughts after that is some leg work go ask your target market what they want.
Maybe you could take a shot of a field from the air that shows where the crops grows the best and where it does not do so well.
Well just thoughts, but as said not my area of photography

 

[smoke665]

Here in our world, drones are becoming a part of our overall field management. Tractors, planters, sprayers, irrigation pivots, and combines are all tied to GPS now, so there's a lot of information going back and forth to make decisions in real time. Tractors are guided by GPS so the rows are straighter then anything I could ever do by hand. The Combines upload real time yield information at harvest by location, which allows us to alter the amount of seed going down in any area (planter), the amount of fertilizer applied to any given area of the field or alter any spray applied by area.

Drones now are tying into the whole thing by monitoring how well those decisions are working. They can map a field giving us information on how well our plan is working, and provide real time information on areas with additional need for fertilizer, water, trace minerals, etc. and insects. We use a service that comes in on a regular basis that can map a field in mins, vs hours it would take to walk that field, and gives us the big picture vs the limited ground view.

I haven't seen a price on the new JD X9 series combine, but I would guess by the time you get all the add on's it's gonna be pushing $750k, a recent used model self propelled sprayer can easily push $400k, tractors can run from $150k to $500k. Technology doesn't come cheap, but the saving it can produce make it worth while.

 

[AlanKlein]

Where's your world?

 

[smoke665]

Where's your world

Farms in Missouri Bootheel, Southern Ill, and Alabama. Why?

 

[AlanKlein]

I was just curious where you lived and farmed. I now live in central NJ farm and horse country after living in crowded NYC all my life. I'm retired here and love it Unfortunately, the home builders keep buying up farms and building. I hate it. Here's one close by. Not big like the ones where you live.
New Jersey Farm by Alan Klein, on Flickr

 

[smoke665]

@AlanKlein been many years since I've been to NJ, but I was amazed at how much agriculture the state had. I'm sure it's probably suffered the same fate as other areas swallowed up by urban expansion.

 

[BananaRepublic]

Here in our world, drones are becoming a part of our overall field management. Tractors, planters, sprayers, irrigation pivots, and combines are all tied to GPS now, so there's a lot of information going back and forth to make decisions in real time. Tractors are guided by GPS so the rows are straighter then anything I could ever do by hand. The Combines upload real time yield information at harvest by location, which allows us to alter the amount of seed going down in any area (planter), the amount of fertilizer applied to any given area of the field or alter any spray applied by area.

Drones now are tying into the whole thing by monitoring how well those decisions are working. They can map a field giving us information on how well our plan is working, and provide real time information on areas with additional need for fertilizer, water, trace minerals, etc. and insects. We use a service that comes in on a regular basis that can map a field in mins, vs hours it would take to walk that field, and gives us the big picture vs the limited ground view.

I haven't seen a price on the new JD X9 series combine, but I would guess by the time you get all the add on's it's gonna be pushing $750k, a recent used model self propelled sprayer can easily push $400k, tractors can run from $150k to $500k. Technology doesn't come cheap, but the saving it can produce make it worth while.

I studied Ag Engineering so I’m familiar with the technology but to give you an understanding of Irish farming it would be uncommon for a tractor to be fitted with ISO BUS unless it comes as standard and as far as custom guys go they farmers wouldn't except the extra bucks on an invoice for yield monitoring be it grain or forage mainly because they're ignorant about it.

Yes Ireland is smaller then many US states but there so fare behind its unbelievable. Now there is gear here a typical tractor for a custom guy or contractor which is the term here, is a JD6155R and there are more 1000hp SPFHs here then you could shake a stick at but farm incomes are typically low partly because landowners are in the farming business not the money making business as far as the mentality goes.

Now there is one group here, not far from me, Coolmore stud, the racehorse people, who farm 5000 acres and they use tech and in my mind that in itself proves that does have a place in Ireland but from what I hear from those in the know there may be a market in 10 years when the current batch of farmers are retired or dead.

 

[smoke665]

@BananaRepublic Dual major Ag & Business for me. I had a rather diverse career (Farming, Publishing, Transportation, Construction), I always intended to actually farm, but only did so for a few years, as my other business interests kept pulling me away. Leased the farms many years ago on a shares basis, and haven't looked back. I've found that with proper management/marketing I can actually make as much or more as I did performing the work. Farmers are an odd lot in that they get tunnel vision when they get busy in the field, forgetting the marketing aspect. Because of my past record, the lessees don't have a problem letting me handle that aspect.

Here in the US labor is a big driving force behind the move to bigger, more advanced technology, the days of finding field hands easily, are gone. Add to that stagnant crop prices, and you either have to improve yields or reduce costs, fortunately we've done both. I've made significant investments in tiling, irrigation, fertility and infrastructure, the lessees stay abreast with the equipment. Because of the high entry cost of both equipment and land, you see a lot of farmers leasing the land they farm. It's just almost impossible to finance both at the same time. By leasing on a shares basis they can spread out the cost of their equipment over a larger number of acres, without the upfront cost of the land. It isn't unusual for them to be farming 3-5000 acres under contract. There are some larger operations of 10k acres or more, but the issue of labor comes into play again. Millions of dollars of equipment is worthless without operators.

 

[BananaRepublic]

@BananaRepublic Dual major Ag & Business for me. I had a rather diverse career (Farming, Publishing, Transportation, Construction), I always intended to actually farm, but only did so for a few years, as my other business interests kept pulling me away. Leased the farms many years ago on a shares basis, and haven't looked back. I've found that with proper management/marketing I can actually make as much or more as I did performing the work. Farmers are an odd lot in that they get tunnel vision when they get busy in the field, forgetting the marketing aspect. Because of my past record, the lessees don't have a problem letting me handle that aspect.

Here in the US labor is a big driving force behind the move to bigger, more advanced technology, the days of finding field hands easily, are gone. Add to that stagnant crop prices, and you either have to improve yields or reduce costs, fortunately we've done both. I've made significant investments in tiling, irrigation, fertility and infrastructure, the lessees stay abreast with the equipment. Because of the high entry cost of both equipment and land, you see a lot of farmers leasing the land they farm. It's just almost impossible to finance both at the same time. By leasing on a shares basis they can spread out the cost of their equipment over a larger number of acres, without the upfront cost of the land. It isn't unusual for them to be farming 3-5000 acres under contract. There are some larger operations of 10k acres or more, but the issue of labor comes into play again. Millions of dollars of equipment is worthless without operators.

Labour is a problem here too it wouldn't be an odd site to see a 17 year old driving a fully laden 7r down the road and there the custom guys, fortunately most guys on these rigs know what their about. As far as the leasing arrangement you describe there is only perhaps one or two people doing it here on Diaries and to be frank I think there will be allot more of it cause the average age of a diary man here is 55+ and an amount of them would not have a successor. Essentially whatever problems you have in the states are in Ireland too but the big diary cooperates like Glanbia and such, who are like Irelands Monsanto, have sway over government policy behind the scenes and are happy enough to stifle progress to keep share holders happy, allot of whom are those same farmers, go figure!.

 

[Soocom1]

Not into the ag side, but I am in the general associated industry. (GIS)

First; Laws, laws laws! I cannot emphasize this harder. UK area laws are well.. a bit weird in my opinion but cest la vie. The real crux is ensuring that you can comply with all local laws for whatever. especially drones.
Ireland Drone Laws: Guide for Beginners

Second; Understand that what you want to do is use a drone to use NIR for various applications. Get to know the industry WELL! there are quite a many competitors in the field who will offer services in some cases for less than a sixpence and do the job.
Best Infrared Drones in 2018 [Thermal Cameras for Night Vision]

Third; get to understand the ancillary industries. This includes GIS, mapping in general, technology, advances, and get in good with the local Ordinance office.
Ordnance Survey Ireland - National Mapping Agency

Forth; subscribe to trade publications. this may seem a bit mundane, but the information the trade publications come up with is gold!
Point of Beginning | Latest in surveying, mapping & geospatial tech

Fifth: get in deep into the Ag business and understand how the Ag language translates to GIS and various application language. This will help you sell your product.
GIS for Agriculture | Integrate High-Resolution Imagery & Real-Time Data in Farm Management

 

[smoke665]

@BananaRepublic getting back on topic. Drones are finding uses everywhere in agriculture. Here's a link on one model that can map up to a 1000 acres in 3D uploaded to the cloud. These aren't toys, some of these babies can fly at speeds bumping 100 mph

https://www.kansascity.com/news/business/technology/article29995221.html

Drones because of size have limitations on what they can carry, but they're finding uses in spot seeding and spraying. Spraying is the hot topic now. Once a crop reaches a certain height, if we have an insect problem, we have no choice but to fly on pesticide. That's a broad sweep approach when you don't really need it, because the whole field is not likely at risk. By mapping the field with a drone you can locate the hot spots, then send in a sprayer drone to target just the areas of infestation. Drones are able to fly slower and lower allowing you to use a stronger mix at a lower rate, with less risk of drift or harm to the environment, and ultimately saving you money. Here's a link to their page with cool video of one that hasn't hit the market yet.

NEW! M6A PRO G200 - LARGE SPRAYING DRONE | SHOP NOW | HSE