Planting Peas in a Big Way!

This is a picture of my peas being planted earlier this week. I grow them under contract with Birds Eye in Waseca. I prepare the field and they come in with this 40 foot air-drill being pulled by the biggest John Deere tractor available. It has between 500 and 600 horsepower! There might be more computer screens in the cab than the Space Shuttle when it was flying! There is one to monitor the operation of the drill, one for the guidance system and a couple more that monitors the operation of the tractor. The computer is communicating with 7 different satellites to get a "fix" on it's position and uses that to drive itself across the field. The peas are held in the yellow cart being pulled behind the drill. It has a belt conveyer that is used to load the peas from a truck into the cart. Until a few years ago I would plant the peas with a fifteen foot drill and the peas were brought to the field in fifty pound bags. That would mean I would handle twelve-thousand pounds of seed one fifty pound bag at a time! Isn't progress Great?