Drones Invade Farms - Precision Agriculture’s Newest Data Collection Tool

Some people still have a misconception of farmers as being old-fashioned, manual laborers planting seeds and pulling weeds by hand. The reality is that farmers have learned to adapt over the years and are utilizing ever-evolving technologies to keep up with demands of a year-round, global food supply. Just think, have you ever had to consider the seasonality of the food you were consuming? Probably not, and that’s thanks to a host of agrarian innovations. Commercial drone technology is just another innovation that is going to make farmers’ lives easier and more productive.  

With the technology readily available and reasonably priced, many farmers can see a clear benefit to being early adapters of drones for precision agriculture. Some of these benefits are: being able to monitor crop health, spotting weeds, and making decisions about resource distribution on a plot-by-plot basis. All of this can be done without the use of drones, true, but what drones bring to the field, literally and figuratively, is efficiency. Rather than walking through hundreds or even thousands of acres to catch every minute detail, farmers now have drones at their disposable to help them make smarter decisions that can decrease resource waste while increasing crop yields.

With the promise of increased yields, more precise watering/fertilizing and overall greater efficiency, it’s no wonder then that rather than wait for the slow roll-out of regulations from the FAA, farmers have been willing to embrace drones as the new tool in their farmer’s toolbox.