Application Season Prep

The little details can make a big difference in ensuring we can apply products to your fields efficiently and accurately. That’s why we spend time perfecting the details we can control before the season begins.

Calibrating Our Dry Spreaders

Every year, the start of our fall season is marked by a day in September spent setting our dry-spreading equipment and applicators up for success (so we can deliver the most accurate application to you). We gather our dry spreaders from our Hills, Wellman and Fairfax locations all in one field accompanied by our agronomy operations team to ensure products are being applied with the utmost accuracy across our growers’ fields since we apply a variety of dry products with different bulk densities.

First, our dry spreaders go through a catch test to verify rate output accuracy per the controller. Next, the machines are sent to a field set up with a test course made up of collection trays spaced horizontally across the course with a center collection tray added for four-wheeled spreaders.

Spread Pattern Test

Our applicators set their spreaders for the desired material density using the weights from the catch test. Three tests are conducted in the field: single product application, blended product application, and blended product application including cover crops. After a spreader runs the course, the collection trays are carefully emptied into test tubes for evaluation.

Pan testing allows us to look at how the product is distributed across the spread pattern and the distance the various products are being thrown from the machine’s center. If the pattern does not match the desired pattern, we can adjust several settings on the dry spreader. For the blended product tests, we also examine the contents within the test tubes to confirm there is consistency across the swath.

Got Boundaries?

Beyond the annual dry spreader calibration, we added a John Deere Gator equipped with boundary mapping technology to our fleet. This allows us to outline field boundaries for customers receiving custom application services, increasing application speed and application accuracy.

What does this mean for your application?

With the boundary uploaded to our liquid application equipment from the John Deere Gator monitor, each spray nozzle will shut off automatically at waterways and field edges.

With service being our focus, we believe a lot of that comes with attention to the small details and in this case, it’s dialing in boundaries and our dry spreaders.