ddf
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Post by ddf on Mar 24, 2021 14:03:27 GMT -6
It's pretty hard to argue against the advancements in mechanization.
But I think my answer would be the same thing that we will need to continue to have the most advancement in through the next 100 years... plant genetics.
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Post by SWMan on Mar 24, 2021 22:18:04 GMT -6
Lots of great responses here, very similar to my thoughts on the topic. The real difference here is who benefits from the advance, the farmer or the general population. Many things discussed here benefit farmers specifically, like autosteer or lighting, but don't really have a large impact on society. One can argue that if we couldn't work at night we would need additional manpower, likewise with all the other advancements that mostly came in our generation. Since the entire cost of our raw product is still a super small percentage of the price of a product on a store shelf, even doubling our cost of production would have minimal effect in the end result. Some crops such a fruit/vegetables are still largely done with manual labor anyways. So I like to think of what would happen if a certain thing was taken away, what would happen? Take away autosteer....probably just seed with markers again. Take away yield mapping and all the variable rate stuff we are told is essential now.....minimal effect IMO. Take away your smartphone....probably just stop by elevator to put in a price target or use landline, probably waste less time texting and hit less power poles... Take away large diesel engines....back to horses? This is a major step backwards for sure. Take away the use of fertilizers/herbicides/fungicides/etc.......BOOM, production cut to less than half instantly! Worldwide starvation! So my answer was the combustion engine and power to run equipment for the 100 year and automation of said equipment for 20 year time frame, with honorable mention to fertilizer and chemical. The more I think about it though, the answer has to be the green revolution as torriem noted. Genetics are part of this as well I agree(how much depends on the crop type), but to a lesser extent than the inputs we apply to the crop. All of this stuff is inter-dependent though, can't apply fungicides without a sprayer. Amazing how complicated farming has become...  |
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Post by torriem on Mar 24, 2021 22:28:54 GMT -6
Take away the use of fertilizers/herbicides/fungicides/etc.......BOOM, production cut to less than half instantly! Worldwide starvation! Yes this is a key point that we always need to emphasize when talking to anyone outside of farming. Most non-farmers have no clue what sustainability is really all about. One revolution I'm hoping for is for science to get us nitrogen-fixing bacteria that can work with other staple crops like wheat, corn, etc. That will be a game changer, and one that I think we can get general support for if it cuts out the need for nitrogen fertilizer, which is made from natural gas and the CO2 implications there. |
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nvw
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Post by nvw on Mar 24, 2021 23:48:09 GMT -6
I've thought about responding several times and deleted my posts.
Have any of us benefited from progress? Or is it the consumer who has? Sure we have it easier physically for the most part. We can work longer hrs. due to better lighting. We can farm more than a 1/4 sec. of land. Once upon a time a 1/4 could raise a a living for a large family.
100 years ago farmers were willing to load a wagon with a scoup shovel with wheat, why? because that was all they had, and it paid the bills for likely longer than several super "B"'s would now.
Back then they had lot's of neighbours, and Saturday night dances. I can't say I would want to go back, but it did have some perks.
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Post by hardrockacres on Mar 25, 2021 7:19:29 GMT -6
I will add bin sweeps...drag augers and hopper bins. Farmers as a whole have benefited from the innovation of products that have removed manual labor from the profession. Non of us do the work manually you fathers or grandfathers did. Grab a shovel and shovel 1 3t load of wheat...most of us would be totally played out. Same with other tech...go a day without auto steer - we forget how much work it is to "steer" the unit all day. Mechanization from horses to tractors - same thing. Tractors don't need food and water every day, nor do they need to be unharnessed and sent to the barn at night, orall the work performed cutting and making hay all summer for winter months....just a big fuel tank lol.
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Post by Beerwiser on Mar 25, 2021 10:36:40 GMT -6
Sort of to add to nvw post. I was looking up when the ICE tractor came about and some of the prices showed up too. Not to mention the quality of the steel used and how long they lasted even for implements. Got me thinking if we are any better now. Anyways all that answered fuel power are technically wrong as it is 2021 and the internal combustion engine in tractors is over 100 years old now. 1890 was the first tractor. www.sodgod.com/tractor-history/I really don't know what has really improved, but I do agree with the seed genetics and pesticides. |
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Post by shmiffy on Mar 25, 2021 11:04:03 GMT -6
I would say fertilizer. Then chemical. In the last twenty years I would say technology for applying fert and chemical. No till farming really changed things. Just over twenty years ago there was lots of summerfallow in the area. Now it’s just alittle bit of chemfallow. When I started farming it was chemfallow then pour the fertilizer to it. When I worked on the service rig I worked for a rich farmers that owned an oil company. He said how important fertilizer was.
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Post by northernfarmer on Mar 25, 2021 11:18:24 GMT -6
I agree too that the internal combustion engine in a tractor is over 100 years old but from what I gather up in this part of Alberta anyway that tractors were not a thing until much later and on this farm in about 1941 I believe and imagine a few years before that on some of the more established farms. My dad years ago had mentioned lots of stories of the various neighbours when he himself was young that were just entering the age of engines for anything, be that a tractor or any mode of transportation which was well under 100 years ago. It was the railway coming through the area that sped up the transformation of the whole area as only goat trails through the muskeg/forests existed before that. Quite different here vs southern Alberta for that very reason of solid trees over most of the landscape. That is another conversation as to how the railway is hugely responsible for having created a means of transportation of goods across Canada both into towns and out of as per all the wooden grain elevators that used to dot the landscape that farmers could haul with a wagon and team of horses the grain to market.
Like Torriem mentioning the methods of his grandfather with horses, apparently it was quite the ordeal for some farmers in this area who only knew livestock growing up and tractors and engines were a complete unknown. Like one neighbour who told dad in an animated way how he drove through his own barbed wire fence while working his field as he got to the end of the field and said Whoa !!!! and tractor kept on going and drove through his fence. So used to horses and in a panic moment did that rather then remember to push the clutch pedal in or more then likely a hand clutch. Or another farmer who had bought a truck or vehicle at least of some sort from the local dealer ( vehicle and farm dealers were way more numerous back in that day in small towns so I am to understand ) and the dealer had told him to bring it to him to do the first engine oil change on it for free. Well that time came and so the farmer thinks, that used oil in the engine he won't get if he brings it to the dealer and I want it to put into my squirt can for the thrashing machine so he drains the oil out of the crankcase and drives to town. Well he never made it to town and once again an animated explanation of how the engine blew up and came to a stop on his way to town. That went to show the limited understanding some farmers had of such modern inventions and rightfully so and the mistakes they made with that transformation from animal power to the age of the engine.
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Post by snapper22 on Mar 25, 2021 14:31:38 GMT -6
My ancestors who settled here were teamsters whom worked the railways and canal projects in Ontario. Horses were an important part to them and succeeding generations here. My dads generation he was the only one interested as his brothers were about done with them. So I was in on a lot of buggering around breaking driving horses and saddle horses for a time. What we used for driving horses was purely sport but I couldn’t fathom nor desire sitting behind them on a tiller or hay rake days on end. Even the thoughts of throwing harness and shovelling shit day after day is wearing if you know better lol.
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Post by kevlar on Mar 25, 2021 14:56:34 GMT -6
My grandfather told me one of his best days of farming was when the last work horse left the farm! That's funny because my grandfather was the opposite. He was very hard of hearing so said he preferred farming with horses because he couldn't hear if there was something going wrong on say a combine or tractor. I certainly wouldn't want to go back to farming with horses, but I find the noise of equipment getting to be more annoying each year and often think how nice it would have been out on the land without a piece of equipment blaring away. That and the slower pace of life. Yes everything has advanced a lot, but I'm not convinced it's all for the better for us as farmers.
It's hard to say what has been the biggest advancement in farming, as everything has gone leaps and bounds hand in hand. No single thing could have advanced on it's own with something else advancing before it or along with it. Auto steer for example wouldn't be possible without hydraulic steering. Chemicals wouldn't be what they are without the sprayer technology advancing as well.
Maybe the biggest advancement in farming has simply been the farmer him/herself?
Sorry, I see I just repeated several things others had said earlier.
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nvw
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Post by nvw on Mar 25, 2021 17:32:54 GMT -6
My Dad said they could have had some good years in the 30's, weeds are what got them. Some years the Pigweeds are what fed the livestock, so maybe it was a wash.
I would think that chemicals and zero till are the best advancements. Without a clean crop, and moisture, no amount of Fertilizer will help.
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nvw
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Post by nvw on Mar 25, 2021 17:53:54 GMT -6
I think back when Roundup came out, It was $25 per litre and they recommended 2 litres per acre. Had we known 1/2 litre would work, or even forgone Fert. for the Year, or next, it would have been money well spent. I Summer fallowed a lot of land trying to get rid of Thistle and
Quack. All I did was fertilize it.
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rcyung
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Post by rcyung on Mar 25, 2021 19:12:43 GMT -6
Had a cousin doing my preharvest spraying back when roundup was so pricey. He had a concoction of roundup ,diesel fuel and a product he called acidulate . Cut the roundup rate down a bit and saved a few bucks. He had a buddy that put too much acidulate and said the quack was crunchy when he walked on it after a few days. Good thing nobody was checking residues back then.
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Post by bobofthenorth on Mar 25, 2021 19:59:26 GMT -6
My favourite hobby horse is Haber Bosch - it is responsible for most of life as we know it. Its also slightly older than 100 now so I guess not eligible. Mechanization would have to be next followed closely by the green revolution. In the last 20 years its clearly breeding but I have to echo the comment that I'm not sure the latest developments have improved any lives outside the boardrooms of big pharma.
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Post by SWMan on Mar 25, 2021 20:11:35 GMT -6
The 100 and 20 year guidelines are merely that, not a hard and fast number. When something was technically invented and widely adopted can range a fair bit.
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