Reading Time: 2 minutes A new research project underway in Europe may give farmers a reason to think swarms are a good thing. Far from swarms of locusts or other troublesome pests, the MARS (Mobile Agricultural Robot Swarms) project is working on creating swarms of small, autonomous robots that can seed farm fields on their own. The MARS project […] Read more
Heading to MARS
This new ag robot concept uses swarms of small machines
Thinking small with a big idea
Britain’s “Hands Free Hectare” project is developing the model that you may need to build tomorrow’s farm on
Reading Time: 6 minutes As a kid, I can vividly remember one particular occasion sitting on the steps in my grandparents’ old farmhouse in the late 1960s looking at an issue of Country Guide. One image from its pages still sticks in my memory. It was an advertisement showing Massey-Ferguson’s newest line of tractors. Why did that mental image […] Read more
The ag-robots are here
Get set for the biggest change since the invention of the tractor
Reading Time: 6 minutes Standing in front of a fully autonomous T8 tractor, New Holland’s vice-president, Bret Lieberman summed up what the company is telling its people in just two sentences at this year’s U.S. Farm Progress Show in Boone, Iowa. “This industry has evolved considerably over the last 100 years,” Lieberman said. “I don’t think that any of […] Read more
A new era on the farm begins
We’re living at the dawn of the robot as hired farmhand
Reading Time: 6 minutes A friend has been keeping me posted by email about her trouble finding a full-time employee for the family farm in Saskatchewan. If it didn’t represent such a serious problem for the operation, the details would actually be pretty funny. A few — how do I say it? — less-than-adequate applicants are all her efforts […] Read more
The first true robot tractor
Machinery Guide: The Greenbot autonomous tractor hits the market
Reading Time: 3 minutes Complete automation may well be the dominant focus of ag machinery design in the coming decades. We’ve already seen various levels of robotics introduced into conventional equipment, and a few limited-use autonomous machines have appeared. But no company has yet been willing to offer fully autonomous, market-ready tractors for general field duties — until now. […] Read more
A message from April Stewart, Country Guide's Associate Editor
