Introducing the Smartest Seeder on Earth
By Ainsley Andres
Farms.com
It is no secret that farming is hard – from uncertainty of fertilizer use, margins, seed prices going up, climate change, drought, floods etc.
“Field profitability is not necessarily driven by creating the biggest yield in a field” states Colin Rush at the well-attended 2021 Farms.com Virtual Precision Agriculture Conference & Ag Technology Showcase.
Colin Rush is the Chief Operating Officer at Clean Seed Capital Group. He is a senior executive leader with 25 years’ experience in the global agricultural equipment and ag technology industry. Rush has held senior positions with John Deere, Case IH/CNHi and JCB Canada, so he definitely understands the challenges farmers face.
“Doing things differently is not advice, but rather an exploration of how you can push and drive yield profitability on your farm by reducing operating costs and increasing yield in a sustainable matter,” explains Rush.
Rush unveiled the next-generation machine from Clean Seed, The SMART Seeder MAX, a unique seeding tool that operates effectively in all field conditions. The SMART Seeder MAX allows producers to place seed, fertilizer, and amendments in a single pass, using a coulter and shank combination.
With the SMART Seeder MAX, you can achieve the four R’s (right time, right place, right source, and right rate) of nutrient stewardship to align the economic, environmental, and social components of nutrient management. The scalable planting machine will improve yields, reduce input costs, and reduce the environmental impact of modern planting and seeding.
RIGHT TIME
One of the biggest value propositions of the SMART Seeder Max is that it offers a true no-till single pass coulter shank combination with cutting action. Unlike a regular shank, which may rake and drag trash, the coulter vertically separates furrow fertility, cutting residue and trash material between rows and preserving organic matter.
In addition to the shank part of the SMART Seeder Max, a triple shot blade opener can fracture soil below the furrow. This breaks up compaction, increases soil aeration and improves water infiltration which results in deepening rooting depths, better moisture storage and better drought tolerance.
RIGHT PLACE
The SMART Seeder Max offers up to 5 independent products, as well as 6 different product furrow placement options per row. With a total of 60 independent rows, this patented technology provides highly advanced digital, singulation and volumetric metering systems.
RIGHT SOURCE
The SMART Seeder Max delivers high resolution seed and fertilizer prescriptions down to the square foot across every row of the drill. It provides an opportunity to merge up to five individual products and blend single nutrients accurately without losing efficiency at seeding.
RIGHT RATE
The SMART Seeder Max has 300 different product control points with 5 individual meters per row using stepper motor technology.
“These motors are very power efficient and allow us to be infinitely variable right over top of the row – from essentially ounces per acre that we can put on, up to hundreds of pounds per acre, 250+ pounds, at field speed of 5 mph,” explains Rush.
The SMART Seeder Max offers additional value through the following features:
• Singulation
• Seamless intercropping and cover cropping
• Carbon farming programs
• Dual/tri hybrid planting
• Foot by foot traceability
Clean Seeds’ brand-new facility in Saskatoon is on schedule for occupancy before calendar year-end and will be the bedrock of its operations for both sales and operations in 2022.
The company is expecting to grow nationally and internationally, evaluating licensing and distribution opportunities to demonstrate the scalability of its technology in a variety of key markets.
“In the upcoming year, we are sending out small prototype demonstration units to different markets, to ensure the SMART Seeder MAX Technology works in global areas – some are to more developing markets, and some are to more established markets here,” says Rush.
Clean Seed’s SMART Seeder technologies is the only seeding and planting platform offering VR control, according to Rush. It utilizes the synergy between sophisticated digital electronic metering and intuitive software control, putting row-by-row variable rate technology at the forefront of agricultural innovation.
“We call the SMART Seeder MAX, the smartest seeder on earth for a reason” states Rush. “There’s tremendous value here, and not just in the features and benefits, but how this technology can generate significant value for you on your farm and at your producer level.”
This article was featured in the December 2021 Precision Agriculture Digital Digest — view it here.
Watch Colin Rush's presentation from the 2021 Farms.com Virtual Precision Agriculture Conference & Ag Technology Showcase below.