Robert Utterback, an agricultural economist, addressed a packed room at the National Farm Machinery Show held in Louisville, Kentucky, in February.

Please don’t tell me your operator’s manual is only taken out to use as a temporary booster seat. With farm equipment becoming more and more computerized and high-tech, many farmers marvel at what new machines can do.

Hay and forage supply is improved over the 2011-2013 time frame, when regional droughts and Upper Midwest winter survival affected forage supplies. With current increased forage supplies, the price of hay has declined somewhat from the highs of the past few years, but not as much as one might expect given the decline in the commodity groups of grain and grain byproducts.