Tom Woodworth has a piece of advice for any youngster considering a career in farming. THE TECHNOLOGY involved appeals to younger workers, said Woodworth, 60. WOODWORTH’S new facility has been a godsend, he said.
“It’s a whole new world,” Woodworth said, with more opportunities to fuse agriculture and technology than ever before.
“No matter what industry you’re considering, technology is changing it,” Woodworth said.
In this case, technology allows farmers to know how better to treat soil, even if the soil conditions are vastly different in a single parcel of land.
Woodworth is the owner of AgVenture of Eastern Kansas and its subsidiary, SoilMaxx, which recently relocated to a larger, more accommodating facility at 700 W. Miller Rd. in Iola.
Formed about a year ago, SoilMaxx is the testing service through which farmers — with Woodworth’s support — do grid sampling and fertility prescription writing for variable rate fertilizer applications.
Woodworth describes it as “precision ag” in practice.
To illustrate, Woodworth called up a map of a 160-acre parcel of land.
Through the SoilMaxx grid sampling, Woodworth sets up more than 30 sampling zones to determine such things as pH levels and other soil conditions.
The information is fed into a mapping system to allow farmers to determine precisely which parts of the field should be treated with fertilizer, and if so, how much.
The end result is developing “yield zones” within each field.
The subsequent yields are then fed into a computer to determine if the prescription was successful.
Just as importantly, Woodworth noted AgVenture is an independently owned seed company, not tied to a particular brand of fertilizer or other equipment.
“We can give farmers the exact information they need,” he said. ‘We have no bias with our recommendations.”
Woodworth also stressed the farmers’ information remains confidential.
“I have two younger employees, who know how to work their way around a computer,” he said. “I couldn’t have done this without them.”
Woodworth grew up on a farm in western Illinois. He started work for a seed company in 1992.
It was in 2006 that Woodworth opened his own business, AgVenture of Eastern Kansas LLC, in a small office just east of Twin Motors Ford.
“There was some risk involved,” he recalled.
It has since paid off, as AgVenture’s reach continued to grow.
The SoilMaxx brand kicked off in July 2014.
The company’s success, Woodworth stresses, comes from a three-pronged approach to improve farmers’ profitability:
AgVenture’s seed products consistently show solid performance; Woodworth and his staff of three full-time employees have the technical know-how to provide full-scale support; and the SoilMaxx’s testing services, bring the cropping plan full circle.
“We have more square footage, improved facilities, and most importantly, the ability to better take care of our customers,” he said. “It was time for us to expand.”
Much of the 11,000-square-foot facility sports AgVenture’s climate-controlled warehouse — a vital component to allow the seed company to hold its product for long-term storage.
“If you’re dealing with carry-over corn, you need to keep it in a climate-controlled environment to preserve the germ,” he explained.
In addition to the 50-by-225-foot warehouse, the building contains a conference and meeting room, offices and an open area with ample space to handle AgVenture’s SoilMaxx equipment.
“Getting this building is huge for us,” he said. “With us on 5 acres of land, there’s room for us to expand even further. We have some big plans with this building.”
Woodworth’s AgVenture franchise, which serves the eastern third of Kansas, extends his reach as far north as Atchison and Leavenworth to a swath of northeast Oklahoma.
For more information about Woodworth’s company, visit www.agventure.com.
Farming technology sparks growth
