I Made My Farm An Extra $500,000, For FREE.
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 8 ก.ย. 2024
- On today’s episode, we started our adventure at the main farm, for an exciting day of harvesting our prototype intercrop soybean plot, I plugged the combine, plus figured out if inter-cropping is more profitable than mono-cropping, got the combine flipped back over to corn, ran a tree in the corn head, broke a gearbox on the combine, and our American Farm Equipment Friends from Argentina came out to help us fix the new corn head. Today was incredibly exciting, due to the fact we discovered an area of profitability in farming we have never seen before. I think there are several ways we can make intercropping better, but there is a lot of work that still needs to be done!
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All you farmers are a lot smarter than people think. And every minute of college paid off. From someone who loves the crops our farmers grow , thank you
12 by 12 seems to work best for "real life" conditions with need for dumping harvest and not driving same line twice too and using most efficient header size. And corn seems to looooove a bit of both "fresh air" and soybean neighbours (specially if one would varie rows each season so same place gets corn->beans-corn. Just wild thinking)
Honestly it really isn’t cole is just stuck in the mindset of only growing only the 2 things that he currently raises there are plenty of others things he could grow that wouldn’t be damaged by the combine
Plus there are better combinations for diseases self fertilization ect
@@Doubie.this is to see if it’s better, if he could make more money off it. I highly doubt they want to get into different crops and get different storage, especially considering what’s going on with their current bin adventure.
I agree too. Seems perfect for efficiency.
Ya the 12 by 12 didn't cause all the issues of the smaller rotations and would allow you to harvest each crop without disturbing the other crop. So next year ya try a 12 by 12 high maintenance test area vs 12 by 12 control :)
I don’t think that’s a great test when your shelling out beans combining corn? How is that a real test driving over the beans?
Cole as a long time viewer. I can say the management of your farm is heading the right direction. Glad to see your farm prosper.
Intercropping is good but you should plant according to what you can pick in each pass. No reason to drive over one crop to pick the other
Intercrop beans dont make anything
Maybe there's a fancy combine which can harvest both corn and soybeans at the same time!
@@barnmaddoif that existed, at least it could be a true candidate for the pronouns “they/them”
I’d do the 12x12 with the high management treatment, I feel like that one would be your best and safest option going further down
Does that mean you need a 12 row planter and a 12 row corn head along with a narrower bean head to do the split crop next year to do more of the 12 x 12 and increase yield?
@@stevejoramo8013they most likely would just use their current 16 row planter and pin up 4 rows, and use their current headers as long as corn was able to be harvested first. Any situation such as a late corn season or downed corn could really screw this entire plan over.
i agree in my non farmer point of view would be the easiest for planting and harvesting and still give you more bang for your buck.
For any of that information to mean anything? You also have to calculate the additional costs for interplotting. It has to take longer to plant and harvest. That increases all expenses, labor, fuel, equipment usage.
And weather risk!
Maybe I missed something, but I don't believe you deducted for the additional operational costs associated with going over the same area TWICE. Now, if you went with smaller rows, a smaller machine with a smaller head to minimize duplicate passes and/or product damage or loss might help. Also, I believe your machines, in essence, will be traveling further to capture your specific crop. Each gap you travel without harvesting will add up. It looks like a winner if you hit the right balance. Happy number crunching.
Also missed the fact that the high management in 4th cost more to produce and therefore requires a higher yeild for breakeven
And the grain cart can't catch on the go. Seems like a lot of pissing around.
No he missed this
The additional op costs come no where near the gains. Additional time in the field could be bad on a year when the weather doesn't cooperate though
He Needs to calculate net profit per acre, per treatment, not gross revenue. Profit is the driver not gross revenue
Don't forget to factor in the extra input cost to harvest the intercrop though! You would have to harvest every acre twice, once with the corn head on and once with the bean head. I'm no farmer but I know that has to add to the fuel and maintenance bill. I wonder how it would do if you did 24 and 24. That way you only had to make one pass and wouldn't have to run over the same ground twice.
Still covering the same amount of ground since every other row gets passed. More hassle yes.
If they have a 12 row planter and head skipping a row wouldn’t add a huge cost increase, and they can tow the other head to each field. It’s a little bit more work but if they get results like the test crop, it’s definitely worth the little bit of extra work
More hassle more waiting. It does work but the extra cost and hassle not worth it. He did one spot in a field. Really need like a 5 to 10 year average to get real numbers. What if that field he tested did 250 or 280 and not 220 average You got to know the average of that field to compare this stuff to not the farm average.
Agree with the logic of adding fuel/maintenance/time as a cost. I would like to think planting the exact width of your corn head and exact width of your bean head would reduce the fuel and maintenance concerns. It may make harvest and planting easier as you take nice wide turns.
What kind of improvement to yields would you need to see to justify getting a small 6 (as a random example) row harvester to do beans between the intercrop corn?
Does the 1s suggest that if u plant just corn on wider row spacings would be more profitable? Simply allows more sunlight in between the rows for the corn
This would also eliminate the time spent harvesting the beans and driving on the same field twice.
I have finally finished all 700+ videos on this channel and absolutely do not regret the time spent 😂
You should look into a brush type setup that can rest against the air intake as it spins to help knock the debris that gets stuck off.
I really appreciate you showing the numbers you get on the intercrop plot. It helps all of us to learn from what you are doing.
I don’t know if one could be found but a old school row header or all crop header would be awesome for that setup, less bean loss when cutting and wouldn’t have to deal with the trash going through the harvester when cutting beans and run faster than the draper. I know it’s a old school head but a 12 row on the 12x12 seems like would be a good combo. I know Deere made a 1253-A head, seen someone intercrop early beans in winter wheat and harvest it with a head like that and seemed to work well.
You are quite the inspiration and you never give up! Every day in every way you get better and better. I can barely get grass to grow🙁
You would have to go with 12's so you can actually harvest 2000 acres. I sure find this interesting. Will be good to see what you do next year.
12 row configuration for their combine, for efficiency less turn overs, they have tractors to simultaneously plant vorn and soybeans.
Hi from oz cole. Very good trial of intercropping. Only thing I can think of that may help is once you decide what planting combination to use, buy a second hand bean front to fit the bean rows only. This will let you get the beans off before you take off the corn thus eliminating any tyre damage to bean yields. This may raise the profit even further.
If you're going to do a kill stop you should immediately restart the engine so you keep oil going to the turbo so you don't cook it
Hiya from Belgium 😊 as an anecdote, today I was taking my daughter to get some lab tests done and we passed by some fields to which she said “wow look at all that wheat” and I answered “no honey that’s corn. It’s time to harvest! Cole is 😂”. She of course stared at me as if I needed some lab tests done too…😂
Little fact about the cornfields in Belgium, most of the Belgian Corn is used for silage (animal feed, kuil in flemish) but for that they will harvest the entire plant, not just the Kernals like the Cole and his family are harvesting (their buyers will probably either sell it to grocery stores, or be used to make corn syrup)
@@TyphyrVast majority will be for ethanol production.
Just when I think I’ve got some energy, I watch Cole and realize I’ve got a l-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-n-g way to go before I even get close to his energy. 😂
Cole is major ocd...it does help. Obsessively trying to make everything perfect, but makes him productive as hell
seemed like you had double the machine time to harvest everything?
Cooper is a man of few words...
Seems harvest is going pretty good. Oops...spoke too soon.
I would opt for the 12 row configuratoon. Think its easier for your operation
Fascinating to see the variables from planting, spraying and combining that can effect the bottom line. You're making farming look like a profession and not just a mere job. Thanks for the great videos. I wish some of these know-it-all college kids at an Ivy League school sees what you do.
Are you gonna do a bigger 12 by 12 intercrop-plot next year?
It seemed to be the best to harvest too. Maybe even better with a smaller Bean header.
Seeing how Cole operates, there's a good chance he'll change the entire operation to intercrop next year.
@@stephenwhitfield2679 I would not go above around 20% of total acres.
Because there are some challanges and kinks while planting, treatment and harvesting that need to be ironed out for an efficient harvest.
But i'm not farming myself, so lets take that with a grain of salt :D
@@Multithreadi7 Not to mention risk. It worked this one time but there is probably some kind of drawback or else I feel like youd see every farmer doing it. it might see a greater yield in a average season but say its far colder one year or far warmer, that could put the whole crop at risk having so much of it exposed
Super cool and educational showing the numbers like that and the experiment itself I find freaking awesome! Looking forward to next years project 😃 loving your content, as well as your dads! He cracks me up haha
A big hello from a small town Thurles in Ireland 🇮🇪
Hello my Irish friend from Detroit Michigan
HELLO farmer from Kansas. Finished beans 2 weeks ago.
The variables to factor into your calculations is how much extra time and costs such as fuel and manpower are associated with making more than 1 pass over the same areas you had to run the bean head through the stocks in the tighter configs. That last pass you said you plugged it up several times and thats time lost every time you have to get out to unplug it. Also the yield loss from running over beans to harvest the corn. You'd spend twice as long harvesting if all fields needed to make 2 passes through to get crops out of the same rows you were already down once.
Interesting test though, in practical life a configuration like the 12 x 12 were you make 1 pass through is the most efficient and less time and costs to harvest. The time you lose from making it tougher and longer to harvest is harder to put a dollar ammount to but the fuel and maintenance costs could be calculated somehow if you make the assumption you run the combine and harvest machine twice as much if you make 2 passes.
I see a great 379 pete with pre imisons motor comming with wilson ag hoppers electric tarp an traps for daddy cornstar . An a brand new big bud😉🙂🙂
Does it make a difference which direction the rows are for maximum sunlight?
I would think the #2 would be best for security sake because the #1 depends pretty much solely on corn yield and prices where the #2 was only a $3 off of #1 but was diverse between corn and soy beans so if one had a low price or odd bad yield you still had the other to try and adjust for it. My pennies worth of thought to it.
$3 seems little until you multiple it to which it then becomes thousands if not tens of thousands of dollars. With that said, time and energy aren't free and I feel like those would make up a good bit of that $3 margin to the point of it being worth it to just do #2
Yeah but how do you put a $ amount on the extra time and hassle to do inter crops?
Great job! Thank you so much for sharing! God bless your family!
a quick way to save and change from one crop to the next is to use your ACS from the home screen. or add it to one of your run screens from the layout in the toolbar
I'm enjoying your shows. I lived in East Central Illinois for 15 years after growing up in NYC suburbs. What a culture shock. Harvesting and Combine machine commercials, hog futures on the news.
I didn't understand feed corn at first. I would take the bus to the community College, in the middle of a corn field, and watched them all turn brown, and finally asked why they let the corn die? I didn't live that down for a while. That was in 1978. I moved back to NY, upstate, almost 20 yrs ago, where there are farms but not like in IL. Lots of vegetable farms, and apple orchards, etc. Not much corn and soybeans.
I got back in touch with a friend from Illinois and found out she married a farmer. I asked her what kind of crops? She said, "both of them". That cracked me up, because I knew what she meant and felt stupid thinking he grew anything other than corn and soybeans!
I've learned a lot from you. Love the spreadsheet analysis. I do payroll analysis and love Excel.
My hats off to you guys dealing with your grain setup.. daddy cornstar is the man for making the best of it!
Hi Cole, surely the best width would be to align to the combine head so you can take a complete row of each crop in 1 pass?
You could always perform a regression analysis of your results against your available head configurations. The idea being to get better then the control. Great job , long days. Narragansett Bay
Is there any crop other than soy beans that can be interspaced with corn
Wow, your farms are infinitely more spread out than I imagined. Cool graphic.
Cole, what about planting rows from easy to west so the beans can get more light between the corn?
The whole point was for the corn to get the light. If you go east to west then as the sun rises and sets you are hitting the narrow side of the cornfield. which would make the whole point of intercropping useless.
@@lucuix9901 I disagree. The whole point was to see which combination yields the greatest results. If he had a banner corn yield at the cost of low bean yield what was the cost. Which he explained. My question is, did he experiment with the direction of planting. Will east to west yield better results, more or less wind resistance, if your point is to give the corn more light and you don't care about the beans then why plant the beans.
@@TheLeedog83 you don't get it. The point is that its the corn that sees such a jump in yield that it makes everything worth it. It is why you prioritize the corn over the beans. Look at the results. Beans loss yield but even then they were massively offset by the corn. He isn't going to go east to west cause then it ruins the entier point which is to increase the yield of corn...
@@lucuix9901 you are missing the point. If increasing the yield is more important than the beans then why waste money and time on the beans. You can increase the yield of the corn without intercroping but is there a better line to plant. I know you haven't tried but I'm also not asking you
@@TheLeedog83 You just don't have any idea what you are talking about so its becoming increasingly clear that this is a waste of both of our time...
Michigan got hot with a lot of snow. I hope you got all of your corn harvested before the snow flies there.❤️
You are having to go over the same patch of farm twice with intercropping. Does those costs count using double the amount of fuel?
In my opinion and if I understand the info you have provided Your best option would be to grow your corn in a skip row configuration with the high management and forget the beans . Your growing costs would be considerably lower too.
That’s my thought too, less seed to buy and plant.
Seems the Case folding corn head was a better choice for transporting and repairs
G'day from Australia. So pleased your trial was a success. It has been most interesting to follow it all - love a bit of real evidence!
Question. Does your profitability account for having to go over every acre 2x or more? 2x the combine hours, 2x the grain cart hours, 2x the truck hours, 2x the operator hours if paying employees?
And that’s only the harvesting. Don’t forget passes for ground prep, inputs, planting, spraying, etc.
No it doesn't. Only tells you the end result and makes it seem like a 2000 acre farm can do 5 million a year or at least that's how he like to make it average out
What about the direction the rows are planted? I'd think that this only works well on N/S rows (at least or the beans), so less beans get too much shade.
Tony Fast harvested his Montana corn with bean header(he grows the corn for his cows) was weird to watch for sure, but it worked!
It would have been interesting to see 60 inch corn as a mono crop. Doesn't present planting or harvest issues.
I wonder how much more the increase in yield would be if you used a root plow to lift and share the hard pan. Then went over it with a tandem drum aerator to level it out. Leaving little cups like holes in the ground for water to soak though.
12 and 12 is pretty good and doesn't clog as much as 1x1. You might get a SMALLER bean head and corn head.
Cole this is interesting but I need more info to decide if it’s really worth it
1 -what in involved in planting? Assuming you have a 24 row planter? Are you able to plant in a single pass both crops?
2-are your beans not typically ready before your corn?
Seems like it would make sense if you could plant the outside 6 rows as beans and middle 12 as corn. In addition have a 30 bean head for your combine
Love your vids
Wow, you are right about Cooper, he really knows the mechanics of the many different machinery and attachments. That takes an incredible amount of knowledge and practice. The friends that showed up to help, amazing! I have never seen anyone with mechanical knowledge also be a gymnast. That was impressive.😊
Agreeing with a lot of comments going forward next years test plot should be 12x12 rows intercropping divided into control and high management not only to get a look at the difference in harvest totals but looking at practical items like ease of planting/ weed control/harvesting (including ease & practicality of unloading - finding a system to reduce losses)
Good to see your positive thoughts in a time you Really could complain ❤
If your corn yields are up 25-50% and your loss out the back of the combine is staying consistent at 1-2 kernels per square foot that's a win. 🌽
If 1x1 intercrop is best, im assuming due to spacing, wouldnt just doing monocrop corn but wider spaced rows do better??
Use the phrase "liquid sunshine" for the "bin site" because eventually it will be resolved. :)
I was comparing the numbers you've made and myself I would place my bet on the 12 and 12 row intercrop. This because you get a good yield jump in the corn without getting much to any yield loss with the soybean. where as the 1 and 1 row intercrop you basically lose 75% of your soybean harvest for a small profit difference (you'll need a bigger sample test on this to really see if there will be a difference on the 12 and 12 row intercrop vs the control crop)
It would also be interesting to see what the yield increase you would get when you add the high management on the inter-cropping.
WOW, that sounds great. Good job. ⚘️
Another thing to consider is that with intercrop you can get away using smaller machines and heads, meaning reduced maintenance and running costs overall.
So maybe go to 42 inch row spacing???
Thanks for all test and results for me in Colombia south America 1 and one is easy to plant
Córdoba, Argentina presente 😅🇦🇷
with this style of intercropping would the best way of harvesting be using a head that matches the row configuration that you chose
I do enjoy your experiments. I can’t believe some big agricompany hasn’t snatched y’all up to do just this type thing. 🫡
My 2 cents on the alternating crops. With a 12 row head, I’d do the 12-12. Don’t remember you mentioning if the cost of fuel and extra time on the machinery is factored into your computations. I like getting the most from each pass…..a 12 row head taking 12 rows of product seems the most efficient way in both fuel usage and running time on the equipment. I also like each pass taking out an entire swath, with the head in the “proper” position for that crop. No running over the second crop and that would hopefully reduce the amount of shredded debris that is picked up when harvesting the alternating crop. Great test, looking forward to more experiments. 👍🏻
Been watching you guys for 5 years love your channel may god bless u every set of the way in your life’s
Suck up time. You qualify for the free hat Cole has coming.
Yield is the key factor but there's more to the story. You have to factor in double lor more time to plant and to harvest. Next, how does the hybrid spray compare for cost? Then you have gas plus wear and tear on the equipment for double or more passes.
I think for intercropping you´d have to be in a region that can do double crops. So you can have one crop growing and one getting harvested.
I hope they get back early in the morning so they can get everything fixed.
That's great that you were able to fix a lot of it in your own shop. 👍
6:58; could you plant something other than soybeans in the 1 to 1 rows?
Great job 👍you done it my friend now plant the whole thing that way 😁
Don’t forget to lime
It would appear that your cost for harvesting would go up as you end up making two passes across your fields. Did you factor that cost in somewhere? Would you change the size of the heads to match the row size?
what if you do a mix of 1 corn, 12 beans?
Pressley, Kooper, Lucas, Sebastian, & Cole LLP. Nice work gentlemen!
12x12 would be the best because you also have to take into consideration the amount of time it takes to harvest. With the 12x12 you don't have any overlap in harvesting. whereas with the 1x1 you have to cover the whole field twice. Also, you have to pay for twice the amount of fuel in the combine.
try planting corn at 36" rows and see if you get a per acre improvement on corn.
Did you also check the amount of time you spent combining the intercrop area compared to if it was just 1 crop ?
If there's a difference one way or another in time and fuel cost, is it even a significant amount ?
That's the big factor he's leaving out of his calculations. Fuel cost will be huge when scaled up.
So, looking at the 1&1 row, if you were to plant all your corn fields just every other row, no beans, just corn, but only every other row, you would cut your seed usage in 1/2, but produce about 80% more bushels of corn. With the saving s of the seed money, would that be about a wash? But, would cut down your initial overhead of the season.
I’m not a farmer, and I don’t play one on the internet, but it ssems the big diffference is airflow and amount of sun. Maybe just plant every other row or some other variation on a theme.
12x12 seemed more practical, but I was surprised by 1x1... I wonder if you can plant something else(along with corn) in 1x1 to make it less of a pain.
you need to keep on multi crop but optimize row setup and add in plowing+ compost/manure/ph - the high management has lots of extra costs which is why it may be deceiving - you can crunch the numbers and count the beans over the winter - almost time to start in on big projects once harvest is over - you should be able to get some 200 acre days and finish up quick - the bins will be a work in progress but hopefully be functional enough to getrdone - that is a good investment despite the litigation - you will get it hammered out and more optimized for next year but now you have some decent arb opps and a little more leeway and less torage costs than at the co-op - overall positive and you have to look at the positive but you still should have diy it - hope you can finish house and build a nice garage/office - you may need the writeoffs for tax strategy to drop you down a bracket - worth considering since sometimes if you don't spend it you just end up giving it to the irs
Cooper needs to upload more vids
If you do the 1 in 1 but don’t plant beans would the 0 input cost be better than messing with the low bushel count and labor/fuel or harvesting?
That's what I was thinking. Aren't these results saying that basically regular corn is planted too close together? There's probably some optimum between normal spacing and the 1x1 spacing. I realize the equipment isn't set up for that today but if the money is there, equipment will follow. Higher yield and lower input.
Pretty awesome I would say. Good job bringing revenue to your farm.
Seems like the way to do the intercropping would be to plant your rows 1 combine wide for each crop. Do one pass for each crop. Seems like a waste of fuel to do a pass for 8 rows when you have a 12 row head, or whatever you have. Or for the 1 row 1 row, you have to do 2 passes to get everything. Of course, I am a professional youtube farmer, so I pretty much know everything.
It’s actually none of your business bully
@@kenhofer8063 ok Ken, if you think what I said is being a bully, you might be mentally incapacitated. Go read other comments, people are saying the same thing. Good Luck in Life.
❤ I was hoping for a great no break down harvest season this year. Guess that never happens.
So the most ideal would be 12 / 12 and harvest the beans first because I think you could get 1 complete pass in 1 combine. And then do the corn (so you don't have to run over the beans to get to the grain cart to unload when the combine gets full halfway?
My guess is the row to row spacing was made some time ago based on plant density and not total harvest yield. Assuming more plants equals more harvest. Your previous video made me believe rows are too crowded for maximum yield.
Love the explanation
Listen cole……you sound like a genius to me.
Am I wrong in thinking you need to adjust the yield numbers due to the intercrop being shared 50/50 and depending on how many rows are being cut? In other words your yield monitor is measuring the total corn coming into the machine and calculating the amount/ acre assuming the full width of the head is cutting and in the intercrop the rows are only using a portion of the head.
I think you are not wrong about adjusting the yield number
Cole you just need fields 100 feet wide by 25 miles long ..
What's the break-even yield on the beans for each configuration? I can't even guess, but it seems like on some of those configurations, considering fixed costs, you'd do better by omitting the beans and spraying with corn-specific products. Then you could play with non-uniform plant spacing to see if you can get some of the benefits (better cooling at night, optimized light, etc.) without screwing around with multiple passes over the same ground, spoiling the beans while harvesting the corn, etc.
Smaller intercoms might work if the other crop doesn't have stuff that falls off
What other kind of crop could you plant between the rows of corn?
So 12 by 12 and add high management looks like it's the way to go for all round ease of harvesting etc
Hey Cole, why not try 1 row corn, 2 rows of beans (rinse & repeat). with this order, the soy beans would have more sunlight as your crops grow.
Not cost effective, you have to plant every field twice