00:00 You know what? We're getting better and better every year and every evolution of Technology about putting the right nutrients the 00:06 right inputs at the right place for maximum yield. And if you're not looking at your soils and with all 00:15 the technology available to us to get the biggest bang for your buck, you're probably missing out welcome to extreme eggs cutting the curve more than just a podcast. 00:24 It's the place for insights and information. You can apply immediately to your farming operation for increased success this episode of cutting the curve is brought to 00:33 you by AG Explorer with Innovative products that improve fertilizer efficiency protect yield potential and reduce stress. 00:39 I explore helps Growers maximize field potential find out how AG Explorer can help you get more out of your crop at Ag explore.com. And now 00:48 here's your host Damien Mason. Well greetings and welcome to another fantastic episode of extreme acts cutting the curve. We you know, we're so much more than just a podcast it's 00:57 video. It's online learning if you will, it's also it's important information. You can take an apply to your farming operation for greater success. Today. We're 01:06 talking about soil mapping with mass swans and mass Swanson is from Western, Illinois. He's an extreme AG affiliate. It's one 01:12 of the younger guys in our group. He's all so pretty sharp. Dude. We're just talking about his educational attainment a degree and 01:18 a master's degree from Western, Illinois University. He's also now doing sort of an online Master's program 01:24 from Auburn University the great land grant school from Alabama in case you didn't know anyway, so Matt Swanson's all about soil mapping. In fact, he has a side business in addition 01:33 as farming operation where he's doing soil mapping and we want to tell you all about it what it is how it works why you 01:39 need it the results. We are seeing Mr. Swanson Professor Swanson not quite 01:45 work in that direction now. All right, so, you know quick and dirty when Kid soil sampling. They sent you 01:54 out there with the soil probe and a little bag and you you grab the soil sample out of this field and in the next field and then down the 02:00 road field you send it in then we got better about it. We said for god sakes we haven't changed in 50 years. Now, we do grid 02:06 sampling five acre grid two and a half acre grid Etc. So there's soil sampling and then those give me some kind of maps. I've seen them from my farm and I 02:15 make my operator present me those things. So it shows me like every two and a half acres what my numbers are what's different between that and soil mapping? 02:25 Yeah, so typically in the past and even I mean even still currently a lot of guys talk about they talked about Zone sampling 02:35 now grid sampling is is kind of a new I wouldn't say newer thing. I mean we've been doing it for 20 years plus now probably with the Advent of the GPS technically good 02:44 sampling came about about the same time GPS where you could then like you when you started being told like okay this fertilizer applicator, they just put this device in the 02:53 machine and they drive across the field and it varies what it spread them. Like this is brilliant, you know, huge huge technological leap, and 02:59 that's when we started talking about what's happening in this, you know, let's let's bring it from one field sample now 03:05 to every five acre every two and a half acre. That was a pretty big leap. You're saying that now we're taking the next level. 03:12 Yeah, and what we're kind of doing so grids are. Our man-made right and and like anything nature doesn't do squares and unfortunately, basically what we've 03:21 done is put squares on things. Yep, and we were able to bring what we thought the resolution down. But what we found was the 03:27 variability within the grid was too great. We were saying variability even down to we've done one acre grids before and then you would pull five samples 03:36 from different parts of that one acre grid and they were vastly different. Okay in some cases. 03:41 So what we did is okay. Well we need to do zones because that's what our yield maps come in. They come into you see a Zone. There's a Zone a very high yield. Here's a 03:50 Zone a very low yield. And in the past we had used what they call Sergo data, which is basically 1970s. Somebody 03:58 went out with a board a grease pencil and say I think this is where the soil type is and screw it 04:06 in and a lot of cases you talking about like when I get a soil survey map and you know, obviously outside of AG. Nobody knows what that is. They oh, yeah. 04:15 I heard it's real clay like Mike. No, there's blounts and peewamo and Genesee it all these name to 04:21 soil types. You're saying that that was mostly done by hand in the 70s. That's right with grease pencils and Matt boards and they you 04:30 know, you can walk over some of it pull a core. Okay, we think we're gonna classify this soil and this core and this 04:36 and it looks like it covers this area. So we're gonna make this whole area this Muscatine soil and 04:43 it's interesting, isn't it when you think about it? Because you know, like you said you got you buy your Acres on 04:49 a square. Let's say you bought a 80 acre chunk of ground. It's a rectangle and then the map will show you that the blouse 04:55 Blount silt loam layer goes like this. You're like, how did we get? 05:02 Because it's like it's not like it follows a border of a creek. It just says, oh here's this thing and it's a squiggly line. And then from there it Blends into piwamo. Sometimes it's 05:11 because you went up a hill and then it became as you said the Muscatine Blount loam or whatever the hell it is. Yeah. 05:17 You're saying that those might not be accurate. Hey, no, we found there there. you know at the time this is 05:25 Kind of the best available right? But when these when this Program was undertaken by the federal government. It was never designed to 05:32 be a Precision map, you know GPS agriculture. That wasn't even on the radar right? So It was never designed for that for that application. And 05:41 now we're trying to use it for that application or blend it with other things. 05:45 To to build zones and it's not a very accurate way of doing things. So and then we when we went to grids and like well, here's the problem with grids. Right? So 05:54 we have different soil types within that grid. Yeah. We're just not getting a good number. So we threw that even 06:00 within the two and a half acre grid, you might still run across three classified soils. So that's 06:06 right. Absolutely and again even into a one acre grid and some of the places that we Farm now, you've got places where we Farm to that 06:12 in, Illinois where you may have 70 or 80 acres because of the nature of the soil and how it was crazy one soil type maybe one or two Soul types, right? 06:21 So and they're similar Soul types. So it goes both ways, but what we found when we did the grids and we started applying fertilizer based on grids is that the yield 06:30 results weren't matching the grids. So that's a problem. So what we were trying to do is find what I 06:37 tried to do is find something different. and some of the listeners are probably familiar with Gosh, it just the various machines or things like that. 06:48 That tried to accomplish the same thing or refine those zones, but they did it with a ground contact sensor. 06:56 And when you touch the ground there's you have all kinds of other variables thrown into it whether that's water, you know, the moisture content of the soil at the time. Okay. This 07:05 makes sense you any number of other different things. and and so there's some some The concept of solid but we haven't refined it. 07:15 So about five years ago. I ran across this company from Saskatchewan. that does this with a 07:24 electromagnetic sensor basically and what we're trying to do is we're not only capturing the soil difference, but we're also capturing the water holding capacity or 07:33 or the water. The conductivity of the soil basically electrical conductivity is what you're measuring. That's the same thing that various measures. 07:42 But in a different way where you've taken with the SWAT system, you've taken that. Soil contact aspect out of it wait with 07:50 the squats. I just want to make sure I'm comparing the one to the next. Okay, so you had me convinced that all those 07:56 soil survey man. I was the only like kid in my high school like new about soil survey maps are you know, I was all about this Agronomy 08:02 thing and they're telling me that the lines might not even be right. Okay, and that's probably true. But then you said that 08:08 once we realized Why do we need I guess? What if they look like they're probably good enough. And so why do we need the next level that soil serve 08:19 that your soil mapping is and then I want you to re-explain again the difference between how it does it now versus the old days. Yeah. 08:25 So, you know, we went when we went to grids. We just snapped the grids right and then a few guys move to what they call a Veris machine and verus passes and 08:34 basically a Coulter through the ground too coulters, and it sends an electrical charge into the soil to measure how well it conducts water basically. 08:43 Okay. So this is and is that soil specific it's all specific and it's water holding specific. So it's oil type specific because a soil type obviously something 08:55 that's a Sandy Sandy clay loam will have less water holding capacity and therefore less conduct conductivity or connectivity. Yeah conductivity or 09:04 connectivity. I can never keep okay inductivity. Yeah, okay conduction. So what 09:10 we're trying to do with the various machine in the past. In the SWAT box in in with what 09:16 we're doing now. Is we're not necessarily trying to cost classify. This is a Muscatine or this is a stable soil or this is a insert soil 09:24 type here. What we're doing is breaking the fields into zones that have similar water. A characteristics, you know, 09:33 they hold somewhere amounts of water. Yeah, they should water. Whatever and so with the SWAT system, 09:40 which is just a sensor that passes an electromagnetic current through the soil. 09:44 And measures it that way instead of having an actual culture running through the soil. 09:51 Is we're basically building new zones, but instead of building a soil type Zone. We're just building a soil water and topography which is where SWAT comes 10:00 from soil water and topography Zone. So I'm really glad you just did that soil water and topography Zone and we're the soil 10:09 mapping you're doing gives me a soil water and topography Zone versus a soil survey map, 10:15 which said you're you're blunt Blount of play clay loam goes over here. Um, but doesn't it roughly follow the soil types the soil 10:24 survey map. Anyhow, It's a combination of two things. You basically gonna have a rough estimation of where the different soil types 10:30 are and the soil types have to be your monster May different and they wouldn't have been classified differently if they weren't different but some 10:36 of them are very similar, you know, if you take a Muscatine at home and a sable those are different soils disables a little more has 10:45 more clay in it's not quite as well drained, but as far as productivity, they're very similar. Yeah. So on a swap map, you may see a slight 10:54 difference because of the water holding capacity, but the thing that really makes it work because essentially what we're trying to 11:00 do is how can we manage off of this right the spot Zone if we can't manage it off of it. It doesn't do us any good. Right? So what 11:06 we're doing with with the swap box or the SWAT zone system is we're building management zones that we can actually manage off and this kind of touches on our 11:15 variable rate seating conversation. in that you know in a dry land environment if I have soils that shed water regularly, or they don't 11:24 hold water. That's an area that we're typically we're going to plan at a lower population in my area on the 11:30 corn side. Whereas if they catch water they hold water, that's an area that we're probably gonna plant thicker because it'll have more water available to 11:38 it and depending on the growing season. We may have a A stand problem because of standing water in those areas. Yeah, so the benefit of the soil mapping 11:48 that I'm already hearing is that the surveys that we that was good stuff frankly. I mean compared to what was before that this 11:57 is sort of like saying yeah, that's still matters. You know, there's these three soil types that are predominant in your 80 acre field. Let's say but what you're really doing is getting past 12:06 that and saying but this area over here is not that different just because there's two different soil types over here and so it helps you farm them better. 12:16 Versus trying to do it by soil type is doing it more by what the area is. Yeah. So the 12:22 thing that makes this a better system the SWAT specifically is that you've Incorporated the topography that the topography into the into the equation, right? So 12:31 everybody you can have the same soil type, but if it's on top of a hill versus in a gully it's gonna shed water versus catch water. Yeah relative to you know 12:40 to the what the standard for that soul type is so what we're and then so you see because of that you also see nutrient movement, you know, if you have something like nitrogen or 12:49 sulfur or Boron that moves with water, yeah areas that catch water are typically going to have higher concentrations of those. 12:57 Areas, that shed water are going to have lower concentrations. Sometimes it's completely it's over concentrated in the lower area and and 13:03 completely leached out of the top area so that the mapping wouldn't help me. Help wouldn't prevent that what's the mapping do 13:13 that doesn't prevent. It just helps you manage around it. I mean, there's no way to prevent it. Now. You can say, okay. Well, here's our topography map 13:19 or our light our data. And we're gonna put tile in based on that that's data manage around that. Yeah, but it's 13:26 still going to have similar characteristics even with tile. Oh, we've are we able to very, you know, we start talking about micronutrients like Boron and 13:35 not are we able to put that only at the at the area that leeches and not in the low area. I mean it's getting to where it's tough to be that that Precision. Yes. 13:44 Well the the equipment we have today is capable of it. It's just a matter of do you have the equipment one you're willing to 13:53 do the work too because what we're doing now with those squat zones is in the past we would just pick, you know, 13:59 kind of based on our experience. Well, we're gonna pick a good area and a bad area to pull a tissue sample at and compare 14:05 contrast the two okay our management it both in season and for the next season and now with these zones, we're say okay, here's a zone five and his 14:14 own six in his own one and his own ten. And we're going to pull tissue samples from all those places and see what the difference is. 14:22 And as long as we have the the equipment that's capable of doing it. We can variable rate whatever nutrients we need in 14:28 those zones based on what they're what we're seeing. Yeah, the soil map we said what it is why you need it it kind of talked about how it works. 14:37 But I want you to get more into how it works. I want you to come and soil map my property in Indiana. Tell me how do we tell me from the beginning to then how we 14:46 make it happen? First of you say Amy. First off. I not work. You say give me a bunch of money. Yeah. 14:52 so it's Basically, what you would do is you say I want you to do this field we're gonna go in and if you have a shape file, 15:00 which is a Precision standard Precision farming file that has your boundaries, we'll have those but we don't necessarily need them. 15:06 We'll drive into the field. There's a sensor mounted on the back of a pickup or a side-by-side or a Jeep or anything like that. It's about 15:14 four foot long in the sensor is not a cheap piece of equipment, obviously. and basically you just drive back and forth across the field and 15:25 you know. Intuitively, you would say, okay. Well, you know the narrower your passes are the better your data is gonna be 15:33 what the company would tell you is that there they found that the variability kind of evens out at about 80 foot swaths. All right, so we 15:42 drive about every 80 feet across the field go around the waterways if you would prefer. And run the sensor is and then we send that 15:51 data. to Saskatchewan They merge it with the lidar data in their. Software because it takes a lot of horsepower to do that. 16:01 Computing horsepower to do that and then we get about 20 copies of the map back. 16:08 And what we do what they call ground truthing. So basically the different variations are we put 16:14 more emphasis on topography where we put more emphasis on ECU or whatever and it's just ratios. 16:20 And you sit and we sit with the grower and say okay, here's five that makes sense to me as the swap mapper. You 16:27 tell me which one of these matches your results in the field the closest. and 16:34 what we found in this ground you think phase is you'll see every little high spot, even if it's a foot wide and you 16:40 can drive right to it and find it. It's it's quite amazing amazing technology and it's amazing in my part of, Illinois. 16:47 Or you're on the the flat and black how much Topography is even some of those flat. Um, so you talk about going out 16:53 and doing this stuff. Now, how do I use it? Yeah, so what we do is we once we have once we select the zone map that we use. 17:01 We're gonna go into this stuff. I miss soil mapping. Okay, you do the soil mapping. Now. How do I use? 17:07 We do the mapping we get that Maps back the grower and I would sit down and say okay this map makes the most sense to me based on. 17:15 Five years a yield results or however you want to say it and it can be as simple as you know, I drive the combine. I 17:21 know in this part of the field, it's always really good. We know that we typically don't have 17:27 a standing water problem. But we know that area probably has a lot of water based on the swap map. So that would make sense. And that's kind of a simplified explanation of 17:36 how we're doing the ground treating once you have once we've decided on a map. We're gonna say, okay. What's the first application that we're going to vary? 17:45 And typically that's going to be Where I'm from anyway, a seating rate type map and we'll base our fertility prescriptions off of that seating right 17:54 then. So we're already doing this. I mean all our guys extreme AG will talk about their yield maps that comes on. You know, it's on the combine. Matt Miles 18:03 said a year ago. We were recording something maybe a year and a half go about technology. He said I won't even let the combines run if all of the 18:12 technology is not hooked up. Whereas five ten years ago, like who gives a damn just get the crops harvested. He said no the yield maps and all that stuff matters. So 18:21 if we're already have that stuff how different is this and then I assume they overlay and we can you guys both so here is here is the argument 18:30 that I would make so we've used yield Maps. I for a period of time worked for a for a Case IH dealer in and that's what I did. I helped calibrate your monitors. 18:39 And all those things and they are capable of incredible accuracy when they are properly calibrating. The problem being is they're not often done 18:48 that way and more so out in the past wait where they're not often done. That way you mean that they actually are there they're spitting out 18:57 numbers and they're showing you colors but it's not accurate. Well, it depends on the machine and it depends on the grower, but 19:03 typically a standard type yield monitor now knew that the newer deer machines with the scales integrated things like that a little bit different but 19:11 The the style that most people are familiar with is just an impact plate and typically that needs to be recalibrated every two or three points of moisture. 19:20 In every hybrid change because the green characteristics are different and I can tell you with a hundred percent certainty that 19:26 that does not happen. Consistent. Now there are some newer systems that are better and and the weight system. The deer uses is is certainly better and I 19:35 expect to see that adopted once it comes across the industry once it comes off patent, but they're supposed to recall right? You said you're supposed to recalibrate your 19:45 yield monitor for every how many points of moisture every two to three points of moisture change in every hybrid difference. 19:51 And that doesn't that nobody does that nobody does that? No, I mean I we've done it. I've done it in the past before we change the system we 20:00 have now and it's but the problem is you go field to field you may have to recalibrate and And essentially what deer has done with their new the 20:09 yield the scale system is they've automated that process. So that's why it works as well as it does. 20:18 But even even if let's say you plant let's say you have one hybrid on one half the planner and another hyper on the other half. You're creating so much grain quality or grain. 20:30 What's the word I want to use? Grain or grain property change that it's going to be hard even in that system to keep it up. 20:37 Exactly. All right, so do we then take the yield map and overlay it with the soil mapping that you're doing or does it or is it do you think it's not accurate enough to 20:46 matter? So here is what I would say. I do not like using yield mapping to build zones because if you in the past had an area that was 20:56 very low yielding and you rely solely on that yield map to build your zones. You can have what turns into kind 21:02 of a self-fulfilling prophecy. This is zone is always been low yielding. So it's going to continue to be low yielding because we're now we're gonna start managing it 21:09 because it's low yield. What I would say is let's build something that's independent of yield mapping which is what we're doing with the swap box. 21:17 And then get two or three year and manage it. Just according. To the to the soil mapping and then once we get two or 21:25 three years in we say okay we have this Zone that's one zone in the swap box. Maps 21:32 but when we look at the yield Maps, we've got a couple sub zones that maybe we should break out and treat differently. 21:38 So I just I like that idea that maybe what yield maps have allowed us to do is just then go ahead and do what we what we kind of were prone 21:47 to do. Anyhow, well this area is always our best area. So we got to go ahead and pump the nutrients to it. And then this area 21:53 over here sucks. So we're just gonna let it go and in some cases that's not even accurate, you know, you may have an area that's traditionally High 21:59 yielding because the natural fertility is very very good and you may actually be hurting yourself by putting extra nutrients 22:05 on them. Yeah, right, right. So the slow mapping you think you should use this mapping. Independent of yield Maps. Yes, at least 22:14 for the first few years until you've confirmed that those owners are there. So basically what we're doing is instead of taking a results, you know, this is what our results are. So this is what 22:23 we're going to do going forward. Let's put some science in there and say, okay, here's what the water holding is. Here's what the Topography is. 22:29 Let's look at the fertility based on that. And then we'll manage based on the fertility in the topography. See what our results are if they match our old 22:38 yield Maps. That's great. I suspect in my experience. That's not always the case though. 22:44 Understood so now applying it we say okay, we're going to use it on you're gonna use this independent of the yield stuff. And then what's the first year second year third year. What how am 22:56 I what do I do? I just changed my practices you you sit down at the grower and say Here's what the soil map tells me. You should be doing first off you're gonna have a little 23:05 bit of historical resistance because they're going to say no our yield Maps don't agree with 23:11 100% And one of the things that we can do and I think I don't think it's going to be as different as they expect it to be but it is good. It should change your 23:17 management in some ways unless you just happen to have a soil that has very little variability, but that's not as common as people think it is, you know 23:25 in my neck of the woods, especially on the flat and black people say all that. That's the fields very consistent. Well, 23:31 I doubt it. I I highly doubt it. And there's always differences in water and it's usually water water holding capacity in my area is going to 23:41 be the biggest change. So what we're going to do, like I said, we're gonna build those seed zones and to piggyback off our variable rate corn discussion from 23:48 a few. From a while ago. We could say. Okay. We've got a Zone one. 23:54 Which is typically our highest and driest areas. Okay in our in a Zone 10, which is typically our lowest and wettest areas. 24:02 Now depending on where you are in the country, you know North Dakota Zone 10 may be underwater eight years out of 10, right? 24:08 in my area that's typically not the way it would go a Zone 10 is gonna probably be the area that has the most water. 24:18 And if we manage that properly that should be one of our higher yielding areas. 24:24 So you back off a variable rate corn seeding discussion our Zone 10s. Are going to be where our highest seating rates are at in a Dryland environment. And 24:32 our Zone ones are going to be where our lowest seating rates are because the water is there because the water is there because the water 24:38 is there and so you want to have you you can support more seeds with more water and 24:45 what is variable seating the big because we did a discussion about that and you told me before we hit record that these two would die in do I need soil mapping if I 24:54 don't variable seed? If I don't vary if I don't do variable rate seating do I need soil mapping? Yes, I think so. And 25:01 here's why because you're still unless you're putting all of your nutrition up front. 25:06 And you're not doing any in season management? And even then the soil mapping is still gonna help you with your getting your nutrition, right? Even if you're pre-applying it now, most 25:15 of the people that are listening to this podcast or probably not we're gonna go out and broadcast to learn 300 to DAP 25:21 and potash and we're gonna put 200 pounds in hydros on most guys that are taking the time to listen to this podcast are probably not those people. Yeah, even those people could benefit from 25:30 it if they would be willing to give it shot and I think what I would encourage guys is is most planners 25:36 nowadays have the ability to run. You know, we can run a prescription on one side of the planner based on our soil mapping and we can do your standard practice on the right side. 25:44 And then go Harvest and then manage them accordingly and then go Harvest it and see what the data is and we're not typically always 25:50 looking for higher yield. Although that's great. Yeah, we're really looking for is higher return on investment. So if we 25:56 have based on our soil Maps, we pull back our seating rate or pull back our fertility and save you 20 to 50 26:02 dollars an acre. That 20 to 50 dollars acre spends the same as 10 extra bushels does yeah. So what's interesting? 26:10 is because you know for my time and with extreme Ag and going through all this great learning and helping all of our followers find this information is 26:19 that you'd think that we're all about putting more product out there. Hey, you know, we got this company agerson sponsors concept Agate, you know, 26:28 start going through all the you know, the Explorer, you know, you're through all these wonderful products from our own bio now Pro Farm Etc. 26:34 We got all these products extreme AG is pushing product pushing product. But really what we're trying to do is push Precision 26:40 you precision and judicious use of the product because what like soil mapping is gonna teach me is I'm throwing too much stuff out there. Yeah Kelly 26:49 here. It talks about all the time. The Holy Grail of Iowa farming is corn production. The Holy Grail corn production in Iowa is still more nitrogen at 26:58 it nitrogenation and what you just said and what we continually say is yeah, we're all about using products but use them 27:04 in proper. The quantities and in proper locations to get maximized, you know people like to say the word efficient, I think 27:13 maximize should be a better goal right maximize the thing maximize what you got whether you maximize if you have a limited amount of water, let's maximize 27:22 that amount of water. Let's pull our seating rate back. So we're not growing plants that aren't getting as extra grain. For example. You know, even if you take a product like you were talking about the accomplished 27:32 product, you know where you're extracting nutrients from last year's residue. If you have an area that has good grain. It's gonna have good residue 27:41 you're gonna have more extracted nutrients for example in that area out of something like that accomplished product and the other ones like it. 27:47 so This soil mapping thing in the water, especially in a non-irrigated environment. But even in an irrigated environment is is much 27:55 more important than people are giving it credit for I think. Money, you just told me 28:02 that what I can do is I can be smarter and more judicious in areas where I've been over applying because of the soil mapping. I can then bump it 28:11 up in areas where a few more resources or a few more seeds per acre would get me a whole bunch more money. So we want to make money how much am I 28:20 spending on soil mapping to even find this data so our average cost right now and it's kind of dependent on where it is because you know, we cover the entire state 28:29 of Illinois and parts of Missouri and in Indiana and really if if somebody's you know interested in working with us, I don't have a border so 28:38 to speak except for the the transportation costs, but right and we charge about 15 dollars an acre. 28:45 And unless you do some kind of massive landforming project, you know. 28:50 You run a scraper to level stuff out or things like that that are more common in the Delta, especially. Yeah, you're by 28:59 the way your listener. He's sitting and he's sitting in Miles Farms office right now down and southeast Arkansas. If you sitting at his desk in 29:08 Illinois, he never would have said that nobody goes out and scrapes off ground where we're from. It's only a thing down in the South. You know that yeah. Yeah as the land 29:17 leveling is definitely a bigger thing in the Delta than it is at home for sure. But unless you do something like that that map 29:23 is probably good for 10 years. Okay, so that's the thing when you just said, okay, you can work anywhere as a matter of Transportation. Well, you're 29:32 not going to this guy's field every every fourth day you're going there once and we're once or twice and that'll be it. You're gonna have the data you need and then 29:41 it's gonna be a matter of applying the applying the findings and applying the data and and the 15 bucks an acre. 29:51 $15 an acre and here's the hell of it. I don't need to do this every year. Like you said that that day does Not Really Gonna Change. So if I've amortize this over five years, 30:00 that's three bucks a year. Yeah, not a big deal. Can I make that back? I would say in our experience with it, 30:09 especially when tied in with variable rate seating and as we're 30:13 taking more products and variable rating them. I I would expect. I would say based on 30:21 an early data. It's a 10x return. And that's probably on the low side depending on what the year does. Yeah, so 30:29 It's it makes us money because we reduce our inputs on some acres and it makes us money because we find that there's areas that we could actually be putting 30:38 more inputs in and getting that you know, this synergies or the exponentials as we talk about. Yeah, let's say you have a Zone one. That's a high and dry area and you 30:47 have a lot of water. Okay, so you fix the water problem, but that water is still moving nutrients out. Yeah. So 30:53 in that case you may be you're applying more nutrients in season to those Zone ones because you've got the water. 30:59 But the nutrients are not there. So now if you put the nutrients there, you've got water you've got nutrients. You've got drainage. 31:05 And you know those hillsides I know some of the guys, you know from Iowa have seen in a wet year those hillsides may be the best corn you 31:11 have. Yeah, bigger, whatever because the water gets off of it and you just have to manage it according speaking of 31:17 if you've been to Kelly Garrett's Farm. There's not a field he has that's not a hillside. Trust me. I've never I've never seen 31:23 anything. That was the hills. I hey last thing here man, Swanson about soil mapping. What caution do you have? I mean told us how it works. You told 31:32 us why to do it and you talk about the money you talked about the potential return. What can I do something wrong? Is there anything I 31:38 should is there a pitfalls or anything I should watch out for him. Is there any mistake you've made or seen so there's 31:44 two there's two things. I would say that one something that is a pitfall or a potential misunderstanding and 31:50 the other one is something that we're working on improving. Okay. Well, let's talk about the thing. We're working on improving first. So swap mapping 31:59 was built essentially if you want to call it that and Saskatchewan western Canada where you've got fields that are 32:05 And hundreds of Acres, right? So what I already knew you're gonna go with this in the Prairie Provinces some of these fields that we that we have that Kevin Matthews 32:14 Farms, North Carolina. They're like 18 Acres with Woods edges. They don't experience that in the Prairie Provinces. No, and so the issue with that is 32:24 Um, those guys are not met are not maybe used to managing by the acre. Even like some other people in Canada are actually 32:31 there's a guy that works for the company. That's from Friends Edward Island where they do a lot of you know high value stuff potatoes needs to 32:39 be made differently. So when you get a zone map, it may have 50 acres in that zone. 32:44 And if there's anything that's that, you know, the one acre grids taught us. Is that something like pH can can 32:50 vary by? Really by the foot but obviously nobody can afford to do that. So right one of the things we're working on is breaking those zones up 32:58 into smaller zones for things like pH. And for those guys that have like nutrient management plans or hog manure or something where there's a government thinkers. We're 33:07 working on that right now. So don't have Zone Map size. I think is what you're saying was one. Yeah the side the size of the Zone itself. Basically, what we would do is take all of the zone 33:16 5 instead of being it. Let's say it's 50 acres instead of it being one zone, you know, if you have a nutrient management plan that says 33:22 it has to be two and a half we'll break that zone up into two and a half acre grids essentially to have more 33:28 samples per zone. So that's the one thing that we're working on updating basically for use in smaller field sizes. And for guys that have NPS 33:37 The thing the other thing it's a misunderstanding is guys when they look at these Maps guys and gals, I guess when they 33:43 look at these Maps. Are thinking of them as like a yield map or a yield potential map and that's not necessarily the case. That's not the 33:50 way you want to look at it. What you're really looking at is a is a map of the water holding capacity. Okay. 33:57 so or the water the typical water status that you know status of that area, so You need to manage them. 34:05 Like it's a water holding map and manage accordingly as opposed to a yield potential map. 34:10 I think that's a really good way to get you know wrap this whole thing up. It's a water holding map. And then the only 34:16 thing that somebody might say is why I'm a problem with water holding. You know, I've got this feeling it's all flat and you know, 34:22 all this and you would say you might have stuff you don't aren't aware of it's probably not as flat as you think it is in my 34:28 experience. Like I've we've been in some really flat fields that actually have 80 feet of elevation change from one side to the other. You just 34:35 don't see it. Yeah, you know, unless you're right on top of the highest point. But even with irrigation, you know, if if you 34:43 have a SWAT map and then you have irrigation over the top of that. This is something that that really makes something like 34:49 variable rate irrigation matter, you know or okay, we have this area that even with irrigation. It's still going to be dry. 34:57 So we're still gonna adjust our seating rate accordingly for that dry area and we have this area over here that with irrigation because we 35:03 don't have vehicle maybe we don't have variable rate irrigation. It's going to be the wettest part of the field because it holds water pretty well 35:09 anyway, and then we're putting more water on top of so yeah, and I can see another person that would say, well it doesn't matter. I don't 35:15 need I don't need this soil mapping at swans. Let's talk about because I have irrigation. Well, it doesn't just because you're putting 35:21 water out there doesn't mean that each soil is reacting the same way to the water right again, and again, you can have the same 35:27 soul type in different topography in your nutrient status in your water status is gonna be different and that has to be managed differently. 35:34 This is the next evolution. It will it catch on? I mean hell grid sampling still. No, there's still people that don't soil sample. I mean, 35:42 I've got good friends. Now today that that do 100, you know quarter sections hundred sixty acre fields that pull four samples out of the whole field. So I it's I mean, 35:51 it's a little disgusting to think about I think the the thing is that guys like me are gonna have to prove that it works one and I absolutely believe it works one. 36:00 But then you're gonna have to make the management as simple as it can be. Yeah. Yeah, but I don't want to go back to what you just said. You know, 36:09 you just said I got friends that have 160 acre fields and they pull four samples out of the whole thing and still think they're doing a great job associating. I'm bothered that you call those 36:18 people friends. I think that they have no place here at extreme Ag and we should just say if that's who you are. You know, what we don't need you. 36:24 Well, I think in my area especially a lot of that came from frustration with grid sampling, you know, we go out and pull all of these samples and our 36:33 yield Maps don't match the samples here don't you know and that's where it comes from. And the reason that is is because we're not using the right layer as the base layer. That's that's 36:42 a real good statement because it may be they got a little bit pissy because they spent all the money on grid sampling and they didn't see any any bump 36:51 in in return on profit or or you know yield and like, you know, maybe we're over sampling and you can make that that was their concern but they were sampling wrong 37:00 would be your point. Yeah, you know you see like, okay. Well, we did our variable rate map and this year we're heavy in this area. And the next 37:06 time we do the variable rate map now we have nothing in that area. You know, it's just it doesn't make any sense and 37:11 If you want to learn more about soil mapping the company that you represent is out of Saskatchewan. What's the name of it? It's they 37:17 it's swap Maps is is the name of the product swap Maps like means like stands for soil water and topography. It's a new way of looking at your fields. And I think this is gonna 37:26 I I think I'll catch on but it's like everything it's gonna be catching on for the the five percent of the people that really want to be cutting edge 37:32 and then we'll see where it goes. So stay tuned. His name is Matt Swanson. He'll keep us posted about this. He's an extreme 37:38 AG affiliate Western, Illinois. He also is doing so mapping and he's he's good guy to have on here cuz he 37:44 likes to talk about stuff that you can use back on your farming operation. Thanks for being here Professor Swanson. I appreciate Damien anything until next time. I'm Amy Mason 37:53 and this is extremely exciting the Curve. Thanks for listening to another edition of cutting the curve for more insights and information that you can apply to your farming operation. Visit 38:02 extremeact.bar. Are your craft stressed out AG explore has you covered with a full line of products designed to reduce crop stress and improve yields 38:11 check out agexplore.com and start protecting your yields and topics.