Sustainable Practices
Murphy Farms knows the importance of having healthy land and a clean environment. As a family that relies on the land, we uphold our commitment to sustainable agriculture by employing best practices aimed at reducing water and energy usage, as well the carbon footprint of our operation.
Fertigation is the practice of applying fertilizer through the pivot irrigation system. This technique helps us reduce our energy consumption.
Fertigation
GPS Auto Steer
All of our crop production machinery use GPS Auto Steer. This technology allows us to plant, cultivate, spray and harvest with precision (less than 1 inch accuracy). This helps us minimize all crop inputs such as seed and fertilizer, while also maximizing harvest efficiency and reducing stress on our employee operators.
Soil Moisture Testing
We continuously monitor soil moisture using strategically placed soil moisture probes throughout our fields. These probes provide continuous, real time data showing actual moisture levels in the soil. Using this data allows us to improve the efficiency of our water use, as we adjust the irrigation of each field to ensure our crops receive just the right amount of water.
Tissue Testing
We frequently perform tissue sample testing on all our crops. The data allows us to respond to the crop’s needs by adjusting for certain nutrients throughout the crop’s lifecycle.
Direct Fertilizer Banding
Direct fertilizer banding is a process where both liquid and dry fertilizer is applied in narrow bands within a few inches of the plants. This ensures the plants’ roots are able to easily reach and uptake the fertilizer which increases fertilizer efficiency and allows us to reduce our fertilizer use.
Low-Pressure Water Pumps
Low-Pressure Water Pumps help us reduce energy and water consumption while still ensuring crops receive optimum water coverage.
Strip Tillage
Strip tillage is a pre-plant, low impact soil preparation method whereby only a narrow band of soil is vertically tilled for each row instead of tillage over the entire ground surface. Employing strip tillage reduces our energy usage and protects the soil by leaving the crop residue in the untilled surface areas between the rows.
Irrigation System Retrofitting
We retrofit our pivot irrigation systems every 5-7 years. This ensures our irrigation systems always operate at highest efficiency which reduces our water usage and improves our yields.
High Efficiency Sprinklers
Our pivot irrigation systems use close-spaced, high-efficiency sprinklers that emit water in large droplets at low pressure. This minimizes water vapor and drift losses, and maximizes uniformity of water coverage over the entire field.
Cover Crops
We plant cover crops between our main crop plantings. Cover crops help keep the soil in place and improve the soil fertility overall.
Automatic Shut Offs
These enhancements to our pivot irrigation systems help us improve the efficiency of water use in all of our fields.
End Gun Cutoffs
These enhancements to our pivot irrigation systems help us improve the efficiency of water use in all of our fields.
Pressure Regulators
These enhancements to our pivot irrigation systems help us improve the efficiency of water use in all of our fields.
Drop Hoses
These enhancements to our pivot irrigation systems help us improve the efficiency of water use in all of our fields.