This is a YouTube video titled "The Woolliams Ep. 1 - Meet the Woolliams | John Deere Tech at Work" created in March 2019. It features a multi-speaker discussion centered around Larry Woolliams and his family's farming operation, highlighting their use of advanced agricultural technology and automation to improve efficiency and productivity on their 9,000-acre farm. The content includes personal insights about family involvement, technology adoption, and the evolving nature of modern farming.
I'm always trying to be as best as I can be. I always want to knock the ball out of the ballpark.
Larry, he just wants it perfect and he wants a bump of crop every year just like every farmer.
Larry's always asking what's coming out, what's the next best thing?
Everything about technology excites Larry.
Ag is it's not just tractors and plows, it's technology. Now it's automation. It's the ability to do a job faster, more efficient.
I've really targeted trying to stay on the cutting edge of technology and it's proving to be a major benefit. We're a 9,000 acre farm. Yellow peas, canola and malt barley. This year we're going to be adding wheat back into our rotations. And my folks are still actively involved and my wife and I obviously are very involved. My wife, Courtney, we've been together for 13 years and we have two beautiful kids.
Paige, she's 15 and Trace is 10.
Our daughter, she likes the animal side of things. So she has her horse, our son.
Trace, straight out the gate. He has been a John Deere farm kid. It's in his blood.
We're a family that we work hard together and we play hard together. Right now, for us, I'm busy planning out this year's crop, meeting with different crop advisors and trying to put a whole plan together, getting everything in line so that I can upload it right to the equipment.
At the dealership level. I like to be challenged. The dealership likes to be challenged. And that's how we grow our business. We want to make sure that we are kept on our toes. So as Larry, as he is adopting technology and he is trying to learn it himself, we are right there trying to learn it with him.
At all times. I try to make sure that I have everything in order so that it's true. Numbers from start to finish.
It's all about making sure that everything that you have is running as smoothly as possible. Technology is allowing operations at glerries to do that.
So if we went back to that field that was hailed, we could draw that out.
Could, yeah. Technology. Five years ago, a lot of it was not a whole lot of people trusted the data. Not everybody trusted technology. But now as things are evolving, guys are trusting the data, trusting technology. There's a high and there's a critical.
We've been audited quite a few years in a row because they weren't believing the yields that we're pulling off and they surpass the area average. So we've taken yield maps, we've taken the numbers off the green carts, we've taken all of our spreadsheets. And they're finally believing what we're pulling off. We can show them. Here's the true data. It's hard data.
It helps in every way. Even when we're planning what crop to put on what field. It's not on a piece of paper. It's all on a program.
You know, you could have all of your yield information. Spray reports everything in the palm of your hand as soon as the job is done.
And then it tracks everything. It keeps the books organized. Everything's ready.
So this is how the storm kind of came through. I love the fact that from my phone, from my laptop, wherever I am, I can send something to one of these pieces of equipment or even log in to one of my monitors if one of the guys are having trouble and, and help him out.
The more data he gets, the more you can see that whether it's justification of a decision that he made or whether it's something he's looking at to maybe change up variety or change up a fertilizer or spray.
That way I can have a better opportunity of making the right decision for our operation.
Being fifth generation, Larry wants nothing but the best for this farm. He wants to grow it way more than his dad even did and his grandfather did.
Ever since I was a kid, I'd ride around with dad as much as I could in the tractor. The smell of that freshly turned dirt, it's such a rush to me. And every year it just keeps evolving. And I love the thrill of riding that.
Ag is an emotional industry. That's how it's always going to be. But automation isn't going anywhere. Technology is not going anywhere. It's only going to evolve.
So if I can keep evolving with the whole industry, I want to be the best that I can be.
Without technology, farming just kind of stays in the past. And we're taking it to a whole new level. And John Deere has taken it to a whole other level.
It's not work, it's play. I get to play every day.
