It used to be you could spot a farm “techie” by the yield
monitor and GPS receiver in his combine. Not anymore. Now there
is hardly a new combine being built without a yield monitor in
it. And last year an estimated 40% of corn acres in North
America went through a yield monitor, just 10 years after its
introduction.  So just how do you tell the farm techies of
today? Is it by their use of a pocket PC? Variable rate
applicator? Soil penetrometer? Or digital camera?  Yes. And no.
The techies use all those tools. But it is how they use them and
to what extent that sets them apart from the rest of the farm
population, which, by itself, is more high tech than the average
group of consumers.  According to Mick Johnston, consultant with
The Consulting Company (TCC), a GPS data-processing and
consulting service, farmers who are at the top end of the
technology curve use site-specific technologies not just as gee-
whiz gadgets but as tools to make better management decisions.
“Most farmers are not using these tools f