Professional farmers and ranchers, as well as homesteaders use farm equipment to improve efficiency. While the use of a hand spade may not seem equal to the use of a tractor, both are tools that ensure a greater return on productivity for your efforts.
Even with the right equipment, though, it’s important to plant, reap and sow at the right time and during the right season, too. Keeping your farm on a consistent schedule can make a huge difference in the value, fertility and efficiency of your homestead.
Mechanized Agriculture
For mid and large-sized farms in the past, agricultural equipment meant horses, oxen and mules. Modern times, however, have produced mechanized alternatives that help increase food production every year. It’s thanks to the historical advancements in farming machinery that urbanization and industrialism have spread throughout the United States and abroad.
Currently, the focus has shifted to updating and improving these pieces of equipment. Why? The goal is to make them more environmentally friendly, while retaining their effectiveness.
Reducing Operating Costs
Even at half-speed, farming machines work twice as fast as manual labor. They are also being redesigned and upgraded through the use of technology into eco-friendly tools. These upgrades ensure further use for the future as well as economic and environmental savings.
In everything from 3D printing mechanical pieces to converting farm waste into energy, “future-proofing” your equipment saves you in the long-run.
Here are five pieces of farm equipment that can increase your productivity and also remain relevant and valuable to you and your farm over time:
Tractors
Traditionally, farmers use tractors to expedite several farm chores. Ploughing, tilling and planting fields are the main operations farmers use their tractors, but you can also handle your landscape maintenance and routine lawn care as well as moving and spreading your farm fertilizer.
Tractors serve farmers on both small and large farms, and they can be used for a wide range of applications.
Harvesters
Harvester machines come in different shapes and sizes depending on the crop you’re using them for. Each machine automates crop harvesting in a way that reduces harvest time and maximizes efficiency.
Harvesters can increase your farm’s productivity as well as prevent needless waste of resources. They gather crops that are still standing or have already been cut into a swath. They separate and store seeds from the leaves and the chaff as well.
Planes and Helicopters
The implementation of aerial tools can shave days off your schedule. Seed planting by air can serve your farm better than ground application. Using a helicopter or plane to plant your seeds can help prevent soil compaction. It also prevents wheel track damage on your land and helps you take advantage of brief windows of opportunities in the weather for fast planting over large areas of land.
The same advantages are available if you decide to switch seeds for fertilizer. By spreading dry fertilizer via air, you cover a larger area, which results in a deeper pattern of distribution and can help create a better, healthier crop.
Milking Machines
As your farm grows and your livestock increases, your chores increase as well. With the addition of cattle or bovine animals, manual milking can become a time-consuming chore, which makes a milking machine a valuable investment.
These machines allow you to multitask while your animal gets taken care of. They keep the milk safe from external contamination and reduce work time significantly.
Forestry Mulcher
Also known as a masticator or brush cutter, your mulching machine shreds vegetation faster and more efficiently than your hand ax and saw. The more industrial versions can help you clear multiple acres of vegetation a day, but even the more compact machines are useful when needed.
Your mulcher will expedite land clearing, wildfire prevention, vegetation management and even wildlife restoration. While you may not require this particular machine in the beginning stages of your homestead, as your farm inevitably grows and expands, clearing more space will become necessary.
Future Status and Conclusion
The right farm equipment can help reduce your workload on your farm or homestead. That farm equipment combined with the knowledge of the best times and seasons for certain applications can help ensure your operation gets off to a productive and efficient start.
