SA farm ready to power up Australia’s first John Deere P690 drill

Excitement is building for Wick Dayman as he prepares to put one of Australia’s first P690 Precision air hoe drills to work, sowing his family’s winter crop between Wallaroo and Moonta, in South Australia’s Copper Triangle.

Warburto Farms is owned and operated by Dayman and his wife Charmaine, daughter Sarah and son-in-law Nathan, who work with three employees to crop 4400ha of wheat, barley, lentils and field peas in a 360mm rainfall zone on the northern Eyre Peninsula.

Above average summer rain prior to Christmas has been followed by a fairly dry January, February and March, but with a reasonable base of subsoil moisture, Dayman anticipates the new seeder will swing into action soon.

He first saw the John Deere P690 on social media and was attracted by the machine’s parallelogram tyne placement, which features 25.4 to 30.5cm (10 to 12inch) spacing and new dual knife openers that place fertiliser 3.8cm (1.5in) horizontally and 1.9cm (0.75in) vertically away from the seed, to achieve even emergence and equal access to nutrients.

Dayman ordered a P690 through his local dealership, Emmetts Kadina, and it was put together on the farm by the Daymans and Emmetts technicians.

“The purchase was a bit sight unseen but I’ve used John Deere machines for pretty much my whole life. We’ve got a couple of R Series 4WD tractors, two S790 harvesters, a self-propelled John Deere sprayer and we run an array of smaller tractors,” Dayman explained.

“It was the principle of how the parallelogram tynes work that attracted us to the P690. The ability to vary the pressure on the sowing tynes while in the field, and the fact that it can be controlled from the cab will be a big advantage when we have different operators.

“We can set a ballpark pressure and it automatically maintains the pressure as conditions in the field change.”

The Daymans have been using a K-Hart disc seeder but Dayman said the evolution of newer pre-emergent chemicals had prompted a return to the tyne machine.

According to John Deere, the P690 drill delivers up to 15.5 per cent larger working widths to cover more hectares in a day and 24 per cent less weight compared to the P500 series, with the aim of reducing compaction, time on the tractor and fuel consumption.

The inclusion of 12.2, 18.3, 21.3, 24.4 and the P690’s 27.4m(40ft, 60ft, 70ft, 80ft and 90ft) widths will also suit existing Controlled Traffic Farming systems. Dayman said the new seeder is only 3m wider than Warburto Farms’ previous machine, and while they don’t strictly run on controlled traffic tram lines, they do follow the same lines using RTK guidance.

P690 Precision Air Hoe Drills leverage John Deere’s existing integrated air seeding technologies as well as RelativeFlow blockage sensing, which Dayman welcomed.

“We’ll pick up efficiency with this new machine. The blockage sensing is most definitely useful to us as it’s important to identify problems before we get a potential blockage,” he said.

RelativeFlow blockage sensing allows farmers to see the flow rate of seed and fertiliser from inside the tractor cab. Sensors are located on all primary towers and secondary hoses to monitor flow of products and provide a better view of the flow rate of seed and fertiliser, from the cart to the opener.

All equipment in the new range is appointed with precision technology and a JDLink connection to John Deere Operations Center, making it easy for operators to monitor what's happening in the field during seeding and collect valuable data to inform decision making post-sowing.

Dayman said he is looking forward to testing the new machine in South Australian conditions.

“Farming is always evolving and changing and this is a natural progression for us. Also we have a really good relationship with Emmetts Kadina for John Deere parts and service and it’s only 10km from the main farm. It makes sense to have things all together.”