New precision measuring system for wheat herbicides

Multiple safeguards exist so that the system only allows dispensing product combinations that meet U.S. Environmental Protection Agency label requirements for each of the input/mix products, it was noted by Wojcik. 

Rich KellerDuane Poynter is president of Poynter’s Ag Supply, Sawyer, N.D. Duane Poynter, president of Poynter’s Ag Supply, Sawyer, N.D., had a PrecisionPac in his facility in 2011, and he commented that the flexibility of filling the transfer bags to the needs of the farmers was highly appreciated by his customers.

“We can package a product mix for a guy’s particular size sprayer or for the specific size of field that is being sprayed,” Poynter said. “We had growers that bought from us just because we could do that for them compared to other dealers who couldn’t.”

Poynter noted that 2011 was extremely wet in his sales territory, which is on the far outskirts of Minot, N.D. He said the ground was so wet last year that packaging of herbicides was even done in half sprayer load transfer bags for larger sprayers.

“It was so wet that some guys could only load their sprayer half full, but if they were fortunate enough to be able to fill their sprayer, then they put in two packages of herbicide,” he explained.

Poynter also said there was less worry about inventory control as different products were needed during the season because late planting and wet soils resulted in different weeds than typical for the area. Growers also had to deal with weeds on “prevented plant” acres.  

As Wojcik explained, “From year to year things can look different. The retailer doesn’t have to carry a whole bunch of herbicides that he might have had to carry in the past. He has a system that can mix and match and do different ratios to meet the needs the grower has.”

Additionally, in 2012, DuPont announced it will be moving to a Vendor Managed Inventory (VMI) process for these PrecisionPac systems. This means that retailers will not own the input product inventory. The retailer does not take ownership of the herbicide until the moment it is dispensed and then sold to a grower. 

“Because DuPont owns the input product in the PrecisionPac system, the retailer has a tremendous opportunity to free up cash that would normally be tied up in product inventory,” said Wojcik.

North Dakota was the major test market for PrecisionPac machines in 2011 with eight of them located there. One each was in South Dakota, Minnesota, Montana and Idaho. This year North Dakota continues to be the center for such machines with 17 in the state. Idaho is next with four machines and Colorado has three. The other states with one or two machines are South Dakota, Montana, Minnesota, Washington, Delaware, Virginia, Pennsylvania and Nebraska.