Until 6 years ago, we used to let the contractor spray liquid nitrogen. We felt that this was getting quite expensive, so we started looking for a fertiliser spreader, which ended up being the Vicon R-OM GEOSPREAD spreader. Mainly because Vicon has a user-friendly terminal and GEOSPREAD.
Normally you buy a certain amount of fertiliser which you want to apply to your field, but with Vicon R-OM GEOSPREAD, you can be more precise, by which we realized a saving of 10% on fertiliser. That 10% is mainly caused by the closing of the sections in case of overlap. We now use our Vicon spreader together with IsoMatch GEOCONTROL and IsoMatch FarmCentre. This enables us to spread our grassland more accurately with the help of prescription maps. I create these prescription maps on my computer, where I decide on the amount of pure nitrogen I am going to spread per acre, after which we can use biomass maps to determine the individual dosage on the fields. I then send it wirelessly to my IsoMatch Tellus PRO. I download the prescription maps in my tractor and drive off to my fields. By the means of my GPS location, it knows where I am and I select the prescription map for the field in question and can start spreading.
I can now work much faster and also more precisely at the same time. Which certainly saves me 20% if not more on fertiliser. Normally we would spread around 30 tonnes of fertiliser on our fields, which means we have already saved 6 tonnes of fertiliser. As for time, I think we work twice as fast now, giving me the possibility to do other things as well.”
Carlo van de Lagemaat
Woudenberg - The Netherlands
90 acres, dairy farmer.