'Living and working in a remote area can, on occasions, feel like you are operating away from the beating heart and existing under the radar. I was both shocked and totally surprised when we won and this recognition does mean a lot to me and my family. I am excited to be on this new path with SoilEssentials and really looking forward to what the KORE platform allows me to do. I enjoy experimenting in farming, so this is an ideal opportunity to try something different.’
Location: Easter Ross
Crops grown: Winter wheat for animal, fish feed and distilling, spring barley for malting, oilseed rape and spring oats for feed and milling
Land managed: 140 hectares
Donald Ross, winner of the AgriScot Scottish Arable Farm of the Year Award 2018 has taken on board his precision farming prize with real enthusiasm. He farms in Easter Ross, in the north east of Scotland and has a passion for soil health which he regards as his greatest asset and aims to leave it in better condition than when he took the farm on.
His 280 ha mixed arable, beef and sheep farming business carries 100 suckler cows and 250 ewes, growing winter wheat for animal or fish feed and distilling, spring barley for malting, oilseed rape and spring oats for feed and milling.
Earlier this year access was granted to our precision farming portal KORE and, with the addition of Donald’s field boundaries, we were able to assign satellite imagery to his account straight away for the growing season. We then gathered his multiple years of historic yield data (2011 – 2018), which we processed, analysed and reported back easily through KORE. As Donald has access to his own drone, he had the ability to fly his fields and upload the imagery into KORE for viewing, monitoring and managing his crops, without the need to walk his fields – saving him valuable time. He could then identify any particular issues he saw and go directly to them, if needed.
If you are interested in keeping up-to-date with Donald and his farming activities, he is a regular contributor on Twitter – follow him @vaderbogger
