As Thanksgiving approaches, the agriculture-related messages coming into my email seem to have become especially bipolar. I got yet another email forward, a Bloomberg article sent to me from a fellow editor, just crushing the ethanol movement. And I've...

Robotics is, almost by definition, a field awash in cutting-edge technology, so it seems archaic that students at the University of Illinois have built an autonomous crop harvesting system using LEGOs and off-the-shelf software. It's just a...

One of the key benefits that's been driving adoption of GPS steering among growers has been the ability to perform farming operations more efficiently and with fewer people. Rob Lindores, director of marketing for Trimble's Agriculture Division, shared a...

Traditional radar guns can be affected by ground surface variations, potentially compromising the output of the unit. The ACCU-SPEED system receives signals from global positioning satellites resulting in more accurate, more reliable ground speed detection. When put...

Nate Weinkauf, precision agriculture marketing manager, cites several advantages to having the Case IH AFS AccuGuide autoguidance system installed at the factory. "You get the convenience and quality control of having everything set up and tested as your new Case...

Combine years of hard work with having the right product at the right time, and what do you get? An American success story. And in this case, it also happens to be in agriculture. The company, Tru Count, introduced the...

John Pointon works at OmniSTAR, the subscription GPS service provider, and he likes to send me interesting articles on GPS "stuff." This week he sent me a release on something called the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) and...

John Deere Agri Services has added a new Geographic Information Systems (GIS) precision analysis option to its AgroGuide agronomy management system. The new GIS option is designed to help agronomy professionals create and export variable-rate prescriptions and import geo-referenced...

On-the-go sensor equipment, first built by Greenseeker and now also manufactured by CropCircle, is attached to field equipment or carried as a hand-held unit and provides information about the relative vigor of a plant. Unlike aerial imagery, it provides...

The new manual system with GPS receiver features rugged, ergonomically styled housing with simple controls and a bright full-color display screen. It also features the first detachable lightbar with high-visibility LED indicators that allows the user to place the...

Precision agriculture had been sort of marginal on the cost/benefit decision process. But that has changed with current prices of fertilizer and grain, and given that yields have gone up considerably in last 2 to 3 years. Every decision...

TeeJet Technologies sells and supports GPS receivers utilizing the Wide Area Augmentation System (WAAS), the United States' free DGPS correction system. WAAS exists primarily to improve the accuracy of GPS for aviation applications, but it is also a convenient...

AGCO Corporation's Application Equipment Division has consolidated its sales and service groups into one single source in support of the Ag-Chem brand. This includes both RoGator high clearance sprayers and TerraGator flotation applicators. AGCO has entered into...

The World Ag Expo recently announced its Top Ten New Products that attendees will be seeing at the 2008 event in February. Selected from a pool of applications submitted by Expo exhibitors, the Top Ten represent the most innovative...

In October, sister publication CropLife magazine completed its sixth E-Survey, a study of agricultural retailers and their use of computers, technology, the Internet, and precision agriculture. What was found was a significant uptick in the adoption and use of...

In the last edition of e-News, I asked you to respond to what I think is a key factor for operators of tractors and application equipment today -- is the level of difficulty for repairing today's more intricate machinery...

The system combines the Spectrum FieldScout TDR 300 soil moisture meter and SpecMaps web-based software with an end-user's existing global positioning system unit. The result is that users can get on the spot, root zone moisture information that is...

One of the most common questions I get asked in grower presentations or at ag shows is: "How do I get started in precision ag?" Perhaps a better question is: "What do I need to do to be successful...

Equipment manufacturers pack a whole lot of punch into new equipment these days. But after sitting through a think tank meeting I was running this week, I was left wondering if it comes at the expense of serviceability. It's already...

China Agriculture University (CAU) in Beijing has a Precision Agriculture Laboratory that employs numerous professors and about 90 doctorate-level graduates, not just to learn from everything they can import from the "West", but to leapfrog wherever they think useful...