As Charles Stackhouse of Lima, N.Y., put it: “A sense of vibrancy seems to characterize the entire show.” Promotion in American Agriculturist, its website and the New York Farm Show website “boosted our attendance at the New York Forest Owners Association’s woodlot seminars and our booth.” And the Forest Owners Association president added: “The show is clearly a massive undertaking, very professionally organized and executed.”

* Precision ag: The first Precision Ag Decision-making seminar, hosted by New York Farm Viability Institute, drew a strong crowd and “quite positive evaluations”. That’s the report from NYFVI Director David Grusenmeyer.

SPINNER OF THE FUTURE: GEA wheeled in its three-cow “road travel” model of the Dairy ProQ robotic rotary system that’s so new that it hasn’t been installed on a U.S. farm yet.

Take-home lessons from all sessions – covering new ag tech for field and hort crops, transforming field and feed data into profitability, autosteer’s financial impacts, variable-rate seeding tech, and farmer experience – are still available. The presentations were recorded so you can see them online at http://bit.ly/1R0JPJL.

NYFVI’s precision ag steering committee will now look ahead at what should be done next to best help farmers profit from precision ag tech adoption. Anyone with suggestions or a desire to be involved in the planning should contact Grusenmeyer at [email protected] or 315-453-3823.

* Dairy robotics: Follow-up conversations with dairy equipment companies presenting the “Dairy Robotic Update” workshop were extremely positive with farmer responses. Several already know what they’d like to promote at the 2017 farm show.

PRECISION AG’S FIT: Cornell University's Harold Van Es homed in on greatest opportunity areas and new technologies enhancing precision management.

Robotic technology is slowly but steadily moving onto dairy farms. While the game-changing milking technology now offered in the United States by four manufacturers is size-neutral, robotic tech is spreading to labor-saving feeding and feed management tasks.

The latest parlor innovations for the show brought robotic arms to rotary parlors with a minimum size of 28 stalls. And now, stand-alone post-dipping arms are available.

John Lehr, moderator for the program and farm business consultant for Farm Credit East said: “Ten years ago, we were excited about just the prospect of robot milkers. Today, we’re excited about robots on a much larger scale. What’ll be next?”