Comments
Sure. Just get those robots that look like Arnold Schwarzenegger to do all your farm work for you. What could possibly go wrong?
Posted by Virtual in Carnate on 10/22/22 at 08:36 AM
In the 1960s, someone got the idea of automating farming by making a lane with Jersey barriers, filling it with dirt, and mounting an overhead crane on it, replacing the winch with a plow, cultivator, etc. as the seasons changed. Since he was the CEO and majority stockholder of an ag company, they prototyped a section (I want to say it was 1/4 mile long, but I only saw it once, and I was about 10 years old, so it's more impression than memory).
I talked to him in the late 1970s, and he waxed lyrical about all the projects he tried over the years and why most of them failed (his first invention founded the company and made him a fortune). He said that one worked wonderfully. The problem was money. You could buy a section of land cheaper than setting up that scheme on 40 acres, and putting a minimum wage farm worker in a $30K tractor was a drop in the bucket.
I talked to him in the late 1970s, and he waxed lyrical about all the projects he tried over the years and why most of them failed (his first invention founded the company and made him a fortune). He said that one worked wonderfully. The problem was money. You could buy a section of land cheaper than setting up that scheme on 40 acres, and putting a minimum wage farm worker in a $30K tractor was a drop in the bucket.
Posted by Phideaux on 10/22/22 at 10:21 AM
Not that weird - part of this is true already. Farmers already control their watering robots remotely.
Posted by Richard Bos on 10/22/22 at 12:15 PM
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Category: Farming | 1930s | Yesterday’s Tomorrows