Absolutely Jack! I'm afraid that people don't know how high-tech farming has
actually become. It's not just plowing dirt, and throwing some seeds out...

There's contour plowing and planting that uses GPS to reduce erosion,
satellite imaging to understand weather patterns and rainfall, and
understanding soil productivity in order to understand how to sequence
certain crops to best utilize the nutrients in the soil. Then you need to
understand when you need to add supplemental nutrients (fertilizers,
minerals, etc..) at the proper times so to meet whatever the meads of
whatever you're growing...

We all build electronics, but the modern-day farmer, is faced with the same
sort of technical challenge that we are faced with when building electronic
products. Big difference is, that people don't eat motherboards...at least
most don't, that I know of anyway.

That head of lettuce, bunch of carrots, or bag of potatoes, that all of us
buy everyday, are taken for granted...

-Steve Gregory-


> Yeah, even my own mental image of Caterpillar is a farmer sittin' on a
> tractor, but this day and age we have high resolution displays and GPS
> systems and operators sitting in soundprooof environmental chambers with
> 5-speaker stereo systems, computerized maintenance records and emission
> control, etc etc etc.
> In the new millenium there's a lot more to tractors than a choke pull...
>
> seeya,
> Jack
>