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2014 Seed Selection Tips - Part 1: Which data should you look at?

As the harvest gets underway, many of you will be sitting in your combines watching the yield monitor as you move through your fields. It's an exciting moment, especially when yields end up higher than expected. It makes all those hours behind the wheel seem so worthwhile. But probably the most important question in the back of your mind is: 

Should I plant this product again next year? 

It turns out that, like the stock market, a hybrid or variety's past performance does not always indicate future returns. Selecting which genetics to plant next year is probably one of the hardest but also the most important decisions you can make.

To help you think it through, we've written a three part guide to seed selection. This week we're publishing Part One: which data should you look at?

Ford vs Chevy vs Dodge

Many farmers ask us: is there really any difference between the brands? Surely it's just like Ford, Chevy and Dodge - the badge is different but what's under the hood is essentially the same. Our short answer is: not all all. There are quite a lot of differences between brands, but there are actually even more differences within a company's product line.

The truth is that every seed company has a few dogs, a few All Stars, and a few average Joes. The question is: can you figure out which is which and then select the best hybrids and varieties for each field? 

Data, data, data

You alone can decide which data to listen to. Our suggestion is to start out by looking at your combine data - what did you plant? in what soil types? which varieties performed and why?

It's important to have a good view of the genetic packages you will be planting - e.g. the relative maturities you are targeting, technology preferences, plant characteristics, and different soil types. For each of these fields you can create a short list of your preferred products. 

You can then take this short list of products and their on-farm performance and compare it against other field trials. 

Independent, reliable, third-party data

There is a lot of third party trial data out there. But it's hard to know who's data to trust. Let's safely assume that if the company is selling the seed, then they are quite likely to tell you their product is better than everyone else's. And your local retailer / coop is likely to be pushing his favoured product.

We'd suggest that you look to independent third party seed testers like the universities (e.g University of Illinois, Purdue, Iowa State) or FIRST Seed Tests (for full disclosure: Yield Pop works with FIRST and universities to present trial data in an easy to use digital format). 

Admittedly these organisations are also paid by seed companies to run trials, but at least there is no incentive for them to cherry pick the results - once they've planted the trial, they have earned their fee. They let the product speak for itself. 

The important thing here is to make sure they run their trials in a rigorous way with the right number of replications. Also, do they make information available about the planting date, the population density, the fertility program, the amount of local rainfall? All these factors influence the final yield - you need to filter out the noise and focus on the data which is relevant to your farm.

Once you've selected your trusted data sources, the next step is to figure out which numbers to listen to.

Coming soon -- Part Two: metrics to help you with your seed selection decision

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If only selecting seeds were this easy

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See you at Cereals!

We're going to be a Cereals 2013. To find out more about Yield Pop and how we're making your chemical decisions easier, come and chat with us at stand 4-D-439. 

What is Yield Pop?

There are 919 fungicides, 1669 herbicides, 456 insecticides, and 195 PGRs registered in the UK. Every year new products are launched with a blitz of promotions and baffling statistics. Which ones should you choose? What's the difference between them anyway?

Your chemical choices boil down to three connected questions:

Which product can I use given my crop and problem?

Why should I buy one particular product over another one?

How do I best use the product?

To answer these questions, you can do a lot of research or rely on the information given to you by the manufacturer's sales rep. You can spend extra money on an independent agronomist for unbiased advice. 

At Yield Pop we offer an alternative. We provide free basic product information about every major chemical registered in the UK: the active ingredients it contains, its label, and company promotional materials and more. Most importantly,  we offer a simple search and filter tool to help you identify the products which work for your crop and problem. 

Coming soon...

In the coming month we will launch a recommendation engine to help you compare products and select the one which best fit your needs. At the same time we're going to provide detailed application information in an easy to use format so you can see application rates and tank mix recommendations on the go. It'll look something like this:

To learn more about Yield Pop and how we're making chemical decisions easier, come and visit us at Cereals, 4-D-439. We look forward to seeing you!

Matthew, Alex, Leo

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See you at Cereals 2013, 4-D-439

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Finally, a farm management app we love

A few months ago we reviewed most of the farm management mobile apps out there. At the time, there was one startup we didn't include because they didn't have an iPhone or Android app. Well, now they do and if you haven't already heard about them, then you should take five minutes and read this. They are building a great product and they will quite possibly save you a ton of time and money this season. They are FarmLogs of course. 

FarmLogs

Rating: 5

Link: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/farmlogs/id644043593?mt=8

Purpose: Everything you need to manage your farm business (forecast and measure profits, track expenses, manage risk and get informed) all in one place.

Price: $0.05/acre per month or $0.50/acre per year

Our take: Just like their web app, the iPhone app looks great, is really easy to use, and is very fast.

To start you need to set up an account via their web app (http://farmlogs.com/) and it's probably easiest to enter all your information from the comfort of your office.  This makes a ton of sense to us. After all, how many farmers are going to do hard core data entry in the field? As such the FarmLogs app is streamlined to let users add incremental information such as logging spray activities, field scouting etc… finally an app which is all about making the work you do in the field simple.

And although none of the information which the farmer can get through the web app such as markets, weather, news commentary is available on the app, but we would expect this to change at some point. 

But the main reason we're excited about the FarmLogs app, is because these guys are working hard to invent the future of farming. And they've got a track record to match that big ambition. In the last few months we've seen them add weather and crop prices to the dashboard, redesign the user interface and launch their Android and iPhone apps. That's quite a list! 

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Yield Pop: imagining the way internet x ag should be

In January we launched Yield Pop. Our hope is that we can build a virtual version of what farmers have done for thousands of years - exchanging, learning, discussing and sharing problems and solutions with their neighbors and peers. We'd like to thank all the farmers and specialists across the midwest and UK who have graciously given us their time these last few months. We hope you enjoy using it as much as we have building it.   Matthew, Alex, Leo Co-founders Yield Pop Why Yield Pop?  Whenever we tell people from outside the ag industry what we're doing at Yield Pop the conversation usually begins with: but farmers don't use the internet and smart phones do they?  Our first response - just watch this. The better question is not if they use the internet, but rather: how do they use it? Ag x internet: revolution or business as usual? Farmers are not technophobes. If a major new technology delivers significant benefits in yields and profits, they will adopt it rapidly. That is the story of the synthetic fertilisers and GM seeds. However, when it comes to precision ag - the first major trend in IT & ag - adoption has been meager.

Auto-steer, yield maps, and soil sampling might be common place. But as the equipment grows "smarter" and the acronyms longer, few farmers know what to do with the piles of data or whether the investment is worth it. The benefits are not obvious.  The second major IT and ag trend is the mobile revolution. Just a few years ago, no one had ever heard of an iPad. Now it seems that every week we hear of a new farm app: a pest scouting tool, a tank mix calculator, and of course weather & price data.  But when we step back and look at other industries - healthcare, finance, retail - the fact remains that the ag industry's traditional structures and the practices they promote remain largely intact.  Most of these new IT technologies have not delivered significant enough benefits to growers to drive rapid adoption. If we want to sustainably feed (not to mention fuel) 9 billion people by 2050 we need to change more fundamentally. 

The problem with ag as usual  Big Ag has been very good at product innovation and at pushing ever more (expensive) technologies to farmers. New products have undoubtedly helped to boost yields. But many farmers believe that the biggest improvements to their yields, costs, and ultimately profits, will come from a simple improvement in practises: when and at what rate should I apply the PGR? What is the optimum row spacing and planting depth given the variety, my soil and weather conditions? Farmers want to use the internet (and unlock the potential of Big Data) to run their businesses more effectively. But they face four interconnected problems:

Noise: "We are awash with data and information. So how do I find applicable knowledge? And how do I filter out the noise?"

Accessibility: "My systems are not interoperable, the data is scattered and fragmented; I find it very hard to compare products and practises."

Relevance: "Even if I can find the information I'm looking for, how do I interpret it? And is it relevant to my farm?"

Credibility: "How do I know whether I can trust the information? Is this a peer worth listening to? Or a industry specialist trying to sell me something?"

But where to begin? Who is providing such a service?  

Enter Yield Pop The answer is not many. Sure there are neon-green 1990-style bulletin boards and you can browse every ag player's website to find the relevant product information. But we think farmers and all those who help them make decisions deserve better. That's why we're building Yield Pop.  In the last few weeks, we've put a database of more than 35,000 chemicals online so that farmers in the US and UK can easily search, filter and find the right chemical for the right pest. We've also created a space where farmers can connect with their neighbours, peers and industry specialist to discuss and solve problems.

This is just the start, but we're trying to imagine the way in which the internet and ag should be. Please check it out at www.yieldpop.com.

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Getting ready for cereals

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UK chemical decisions are getting easier too

A few weeks ago we launched a giant database of registered US chemicals. Today we're launching the same service for UK farmers and specialists. We've put information about 3,500 chemicals online so you can now find, filter and compare products. For selected products we've also added links to label, safety, tank mix and environmental information. 

Over the coming weeks we'll be adding even more information and details about each product so you'll truly have everything you need in one place.

http://www.yieldpop.com/chemicals

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Making chemical decisions easier

Ever wondered what active ingredient is in Sonic? Or perhaps, just looking for all corn fungicides which protect against stalk rot or fusarium?  For too long, farmers and specialists have had to struggle to keep up with all the product names and cut through the marketing. Well, we decided it is time to make your chemical decisions easier. We've put a huge database of 30,000 US registered chemicals online. With just a few clicks you can find the right chemical for the right crop and the right pest. And, you can compare them across companies. For selected products we've also included the links to the labels, MSDS, and all the promotional materials. So now you have everything you need in one place. http://www.yieldpop.com/chemicals

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Use Yield Pop tags to quickly find the ag topics you care about

Rather than scrolling through endless forum posts looking for the topics you care about, because all content on Yield Pop is tagged you can easily find what you are looking for.   For example, are you interested in what's been asked about 'planting 2013'?  All you have to do is go here.   Interested in all things 'fertilizer'? Well that's over here.   Precision-ag? You guessed it - it's over here.

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Top 5 on Yield Pop this week

Here's what people were asking (and answering) in the US this week: 

What is considered best-practice for fertilizer placement in a no-till or minimum-till system for corn?

How much of the 11-52-0 fertilizer I spread last fall should be available for my crop this year?

Thinking about planting corn early (in March) - what do I need to consider?

What are the best mobile farm management apps?

Is there a good online resource for understanding when a plant needs micronutrients and which ones?

And in the UK...

I've been offered a wheat price of £180/ton for the 2013 harvest - should I take it or wait? -- Lots of views but still no answer!  Can you help? 

What is the right seed rate for my wheat?

Live rat trap bait?

Trouble planting spring barley - can I still use Stomp Aqua?

What are the rules on farm saved seed? What can and can't I do?

What's your question? Email it to [email protected]! 

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Top 5 on Yield Pop

Want to know what's trending this week on Yield Pop? Read on...

US

What is the current availability of drought tolerant corn hybrids?

What are the best mobile agriculture apps? 

Thinking about planting early in March, what do I need to consider?

How can I make the best use of crop insurance in 2013?

What will happen to corn prices this year?

UK

What is the latest date to plant winter wheat seed?

What will happen to wheat yields and prices in 2013?

My wheat crop looks rubbish, what can I do?

UK smartphone farm apps - which ones are you using?

What are the rules on farm saved seed, what can and can't I do?

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Part 3 of Yield Pop's 2013 farm & ag app review: the final apps and concluding thoughts

A recap of the series thus far.  Part 1, in which Clint asked us about which apps he should install and we reviewed some agronomic apps.  Part 2, in which we reviewed general farm and record management apps and finished with some seriously awesome, yet proprietary, we-are-hoping-for-a-more-open-future precision ag apps. 

In this, Part 3, we'll finish our app review by looking at crop price/news/weather apps (this is the ag app trifecta), crop input/seed recommendation apps,  and the one ag social media app we could find.  At the end we'll offer some concluding thoughts about the state of ag apps and what we as an industry should do in the future. 

Price, News & Weather apps

DTN/Progressive Farmer

Rating: 5

Purpose: Real-time & local information from weather to prices to news. 

Price: Basic app is free (ad supported) and doesn't require a subscription. 

Our take: A Bloomberg terminal for farmers - or - a native app front-end to the DTN website depending on how you want to look at it. For those of you with deeper pockets or who plan on farming in Afghanistan DTN offers a mobile command center package which includes not only a 64gb ipad wrapped in a military grade case, but it comes with the DTN app preloaded! Looks like the price might be $135/month, though exact details are tough to find on their website. 

ag Index (Monsanto)

Rating: 4.5

Purpose: Market, weather, commodity prices and agronomic advice all wrapped in Asgrow/DEKALB/Deltapine branding.

Price: Free

Our take: Brought to you by the Big M. The agronomic information looks pretty good and despite the overall branding seems relatively neutral. Insect forecast is a nice inclusion.

Growers Edge

Rating: 4.5

Purpose: Market news and prices tailored for your location. Pretty much the app version of their popular website.

Price: Free

Our take: The design is definitely lacking, but of all the market price apps we've looked at, this one has by far the easiest to use cash prices.  It quickly lists all of the elevators near us and give historical information for each.  Best feature is the "Best Cash Prices" button which quickly tells you where the best place is to sell your crop taking into account price, basis, delivery & storage costs.

Brownfield

Rating: 4

Purpose: Gives you access to Brownfield's new reports and especially audio

Price: Free

Our take: The quotes and weather are pretty much the same you find elsewhere.  What we like, and why we'd keep it on our iPhone, is the ability to listen to Brownfield's radio reports.  Great if you are working in the shop or you're simply tired of reading.

AgWired

Rating: 4

Purpose: It's the app-end to agwired.com. 

Price: Free

Our take: Let's you follow @AgriBlogger Chuck Zimmerman's every move. 

AgWeb News & Markets

Rating: 4

Purpose: Similar to DTN, real time agribusiness news, blog posts, editorials

Price: Free – ad supported

Our take: Not much to say, it's basically a native-app front end to the popular AgWeb website

Farm Futures Magazine

Rating: 3.5

Purpose: Farm Futures Magazine in electronic format. IT includes some enhanced content such as videos & slide shows.

Price: Free

Our take: It's a magazine in an app (mappazine?)- nothing more, nothing less.  It does give you access to past issues which is pretty sweet.

NH Weather (New Holland)

Rating: 3

Purpose: More news, weather and price data, this time brought to you by New Holland Ag.  Includes a convenient 'Dealers' link to find and contact your nearest New Holland dealer.

Our take: New Holland's take on the ubiquitous company sponsored news/weather/prices app.

Agrowdata

Rating: 2

Purpose: High level global commodity prices and market news.  Includes some useful conversion tools to go from units as bushels to tons and acres to hectares.

Price: Free but a subscription might be required after 7 days (unclear on website)

Our take: It's pretty macro. More useful for a NYC trader than a guy in Des Moines trying to figure out where he can get the best cash prices. 

Product recommendations

Seed Guide (Great Lakes Hybrids)

Rating: 5

Purpose: Seed product guide for Great Lakes Hybrids.  Lets you see agronomic data for corn and soybean seeds including agronomic, disease, & soil type ratings.

Price: Free

Our take: Very visual, easy to use - best-in-class when it comes to a seed catalogue. It's what you'd get if you crossed an already high performance seed catalogue with a high performance app. 

Weed Manager PLUS (Monsanto)

Rating: 4

Purpose: Helps producers get weed management advice tailored for their region after putting in some basic information about the crops they grow and the cultivation methods used. In addition to product (Monsanto products of course) recommendations it also tells you what sort of possible incentives you might be eligible for and gives you a link to call a Rep. As a bonus it includes a tool to calculate tank mixes (on Monsanto products) and do unit conversions.

Price: Free

Our take: Brought to you by the Big M - enough said right? Easy to use, looks good. These guys seem to know what they're doing when it comes to designing apps. 

2013 Pioneer Planting Rate Estimator

Rating: 4

Purpose: Lets you look at historical yield-population response curves to determine the optimum planting rate for Pioneer hybrids.

Price: Free

Our take: Looks and works as advertised, though not optimized for the iPhone 5. Would be nice if you didn't have to put in 'seed cost assumptions' and rather it simply told you how much the seeds cost but that's pretty complicated it seems in this day and age.  Being able to mark hybrids as your 'favorites' so that you can pull them up later quickly is a nice touch.

Farm Forum (Case)

Rating: 3

Purpose: Case IH's Farm Forum & Canadian Farming magazine in electronic format.

Price: Free

Our take: Is it an app or is it a magazine? We'll call it a mappazine.

ag Seed Select (Monsanto)

Rating: 1

Purpose: Monsanto's catalogue of seeds in app form.

Price: Free

Our take: This was a big surprise - the other “ag X” apps from Monsanto are pretty good but this one is a dud. Looks slick, but we found it pretty slow to use and it was the only app that crashed on us.

Beck’s Hybrids Sales

Rating: 1

Purpose: Beck's "Experience" catalogue/magazine in electronic format

Price: Free

Our take: Surprise! Another mappazine.  This time though we have to call out that when you create a mappazine if you're not careful you'll quickly end up in a position where to use said mappazine you have to download a huge file. This one is 577mb.  It better be downloading a whole bag of seed along with the catalogue at that size!

Social Networking 

cropNation

Rating: 1

Purpose: A social media platform where farmers can connect and share information about their farming operations.  Most recent posts are a month or so old.

Price: Free

Our take: Brought to you by Growmark. Interesting (& familiar) concept.  App design feels like it's a window on the cropNation website rather than a full-fledged native app. 

In conclusion...

Now that we've looked at 40 different (well some not so different) apps, it's time to make three concluding remarks. 

First off. It's time to innovate. Fellow #agnerds, let's move away from news/prices/weather apps, mappazines, one-off tank-mix utilities, and incomplete farm management tools.  Our farms, fields, and the industry as a whole deserve better.  I'm surprised a bit with the big cos, but we shouldn't wait for them to lead this change. Syngenta after all can't even get a tank mix app right and we didn't really see anything from Bayer (more active in the UK we think) or BASF in this list.  Monsanto seems to be on the right track  and Pioneer is close behind. 

Second. Design matters. Buttons should look like buttons and please don't make them tiny. Farmers drive tractors. Even expensive tractors bounce around.  Big (or at least not tiny) buttons are easier when you're bouncing! We love the Corn N Rate Calculator because with it's clean layout and normal sized buttons it's so darn easy to use - even in a bouncy tractor. Don't make me think.

Third. Let's think open. Every app in this list seems to be building its own walled garden to the detriment of its users.  Just using the sign-up process as an example there was not a single common way of authenticating users to be found (Facebook, Twitter, Google, oAuth, etc ).  We created almost 40 accounts and entered the same field information a dozen times to review 40 apps!  As a user I don't want to have to enter the same field information & gps coordinates every time I want to try a new app. And my data, well, no questions asked it should belong to me. Where are the apps that let compare hybrids across brands or which lets me pipe my Ag Leader generated data into my iPad one day and mash it up with my Trimble generated data the next?

We'd love to hear your thoughts and questions on this series, the state of ag apps, or anything else ag tech related.  Please drop us a line at [email protected] or say hi to @yieldpop. 

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Semester Inc

It is often said that many things can be learned in textbooks, but students say real life experiences add even more value to their education. To that end, Iowa State University’s College of Agriculture and Life Sciences recently set up Semester Inc., a program to help students get hands-on experiences within the ag industry by delivering a tangible business development project for a company.

Yield Pop is thrilled to be part of the Semester Inc program. For the next few months, three students - Michael Dolch, senior in Agricultural Education from Vilisca, IA; Kate Greif, senior in Agricultural Communications from Prairieburg, IA; Emily Lyle, junior in Agricultural Studies from Haverhill, IA - will be working with us on a market research project.

Like them, we hope to learn lots of things that we can't find out in textbooks or on the internet.

From left to right: Michael Dolch, Kate Greif, Emily Lyle

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Top 5 on Yield Pop

What's hot on Yield Pop? Here's what's been trending in the last week ...

US

What are the best mobile agriculture apps?

Should I rent farm land at $320/acre?

If there is a seed corn shortage in 2013, what should I do?

How can I make the best use of crop insurance this year?

What will happen to corn prices in 2013?

UK

What is the latest date to plant winter wheat seed?

Oil seed rape - has anyone seen light leaf spot?

What is the best bait to trap rats?

Spring barley - are you going to try Raxil Star?

UK smartphone farm apps: which ones are you using?