Overview:
Traction Enterprise Business provides flexibility when you build Crop Plans by allowing you to easily create and manage Crop Plans for your perennial crops.
Requirements:
- Make sure you've already worked with your CSM and/or Support in setting up your Crops.
- Setup your Fields/Boundaries, Land Agreements and Inputs.
Process:
Let's take alfalfa as an example. As a perennial forage crop, alfalfa is planted once and harvested for several years. As such, there are three steps to making sure your alfalfa Crop Plan is accurate.
1) Show the planting date/year in the Crop Plan template
If a stand has already been established in a previous year (for example you're building a Crop Plan for second year alfalfa), there is no need to add a Planting Task when creating Crop Plans for perennial crops, like alfalfa.
Instead, be sure to name the Crop Plan so you're able to tell how old the stand is, if needed.
That being said, when no Planting Task is assigned to a Plan, the colored "Crop Category" (indicated below as a green icon labeled "Alfalfa") will be assigned based on the Harvesting Task assigned to the Crop Plan.
You can also choose to manually assign a Crop Category by clicking on the left-hand-side of your Plan name, opening the drop down menu and selecting the relevant crop type (see screenshot below).
2) Create a Crop Plan for each alfalfa Field Season
Make an alfalfa Plan specific to each year of the alfalfa stand so that your crop rotations remain on track. For example, an alfalfa Plan can be named "Alfalfa Year 3" in its third year, and "Alfalfa Year 4" in its fourth year, etc.
3) Make sure all alfalfa Harvest Tasks are represented in the Plan
Include mowing, merging, and chopping or baling in the plan for each cutting as Other task-types. Choose the task in which you will actually be recording how much you are taking off the field and use a Harvest task-type for that task. We'll only want one Harvest task-type per cutting to keep from clouding up yield reports with false data.
Note: In this method, your planting costs will only be attributed to the first plan with the planting task in it. If you would like to spread that cost over each following year after planting, follow these steps:
- Record planting when you do it, at full rate and cost.
- That same year, create a Financial Account and select "Revenue" to account for the fraction of that cost you want to allocate over the years. (If you are allocating over 4 years, your Revenue account would be for 3/4 of the total cost). Allocate to each alfalfa Plan.
- Each following year, create another "Cost" Financial Account to account for the fraction of the cost for that year. (If following the 4 year example above, each year you would allocate another 1/4 of the cost). Allocate to each alfalfa Plan.
Keep in mind that it is important to name your Financial Accounts in a manner that accurately reflects what it is. (that is, Year 2 alfalfa Cost or Year 1 alfalfa Adjustment).
Related Articles:
How should I plan intercropping with two Crops on a particular Field?
How do I change my Field Plans assignment?