I think my biggest takeaway from today was speaking with Kevin Butt on his farm about sprayers and the types of chemicals used on his family farm. I don’t think I understood the importance of precision agriculture until we were on site with Kevin’s father talking about the history of chemical use in commercial agriculture. In the past, if one gallon of pesticide or weed killer worked, then farmers assumed two gallons would work just as well. As we know now, this can lead to chemical runoff and pollution of nearby water sources.

Now, in the larger study of precision agriculture, farmers can spot-treat problems in their fields with the help of drones; chemical sprayers can be hooked up to GPS and map out acreage that’s already been sprayed. This ensures that pounds and pounds of chemicals aren’t being applied to large swaths of acreage when it’s not necessary.

Before this trip, my biggest problem with commercial agriculture was the use of chemicals and treated seeds. And while I am still not completely on board with these practices, I understand that in an effort to become more efficient and environmentally sound, precision agriculture seems to be doing its intended job. The use of technology ensures that farmers are planting seed in a uniform fashion and maximizing their land use.

As we were listening to Kevin and his dad speak, I kept asking myself “Well, why use chemicals in the first place, why use treated seed in the first place?” Because in my experience farming on small acreage, we use heirloom seed and organic practices and we don’t run into bug and pest problems all that often. And we can spot treat with oils and natural practices. But now, I understand that for farmers to grow the corn that pays their bills, treated seeds ensure that farmers have a profitable crop.

In my experience farming, I’m are not producing thousands of pounds of a single product in a growing season where one bout of disease can wipe out half my season’s crop. So precision ag and treated seed isn’t useful to me, but farming across the state of Iowa is a completely different kind of business, and I am beginning to understand that the risk of small-scale farming is nothing compared to conventional agriculture.