AG Pilots

ILM_Patrick said:
I've been reading a lot about the need for AG Pilots. Is anyone in here AG, or no anyone who is?
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There is an urgent need, right up to the moment that someone opens up shop one town over ;-)

Difficult industry to get into as every operator is looking for a pilot who walks in with 2000hrs of turbine taildragger time and all the applicator certs in hand. There are fewer 'cheap' piston spray planes around for a newbie to cut his teeth on. Lots of liability involved, not necessarily from the flying part but from overspray on some neighboring properties.

Very seasonal business. Unless you are tied in with a local non-flying job, you are going to be a migratory bird following the different crops around. Doesn't really matter as long as there is a post office so you can mail the checks to your ex-wife every month.
 
weilke said:
There is an urgent need, right up to the moment that someone opens up shop one town over ;-)

Difficult industry to get into as every operator is looking for a pilot who walks in with 2000hrs of turbine taildragger time and all the applicator certs in hand. There are fewer 'cheap' piston spray planes around for a newbie to cut his teeth on. Lots of liability involved, not necessarily from the flying part but from overspray on some neighboring properties.

Very seasonal business. Unless you are tied in with a local non-flying job, you are going to be a migratory bird following the different crops around. Doesn't really matter as long as there is a post office so you can mail the checks to your ex-wife every month.
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Until you inevitable miscalculate and plow a field with your skeleton.
 
How are ag pilots paid? Similar to CFI, or can they earn a decent living?
 
Ben Diss said:
How are ag pilots paid? Similar to CFI, or can they earn a decent living?
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I know a few that have made a decent living, but the risks make it a short term gig for most people.
 
Have been for the last 8 years. What would you like to know?
Salty said:
Until you inevitable miscalculate and plow a field with your skeleton.
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thats just not the case. Yes it is a job with thin margins but properly managed death on the job is far from a guarantee. Highly unlikely actually. More than any flying job I have ever had the consequences of unprofessional behavior are immediate and significant but the risk is manageable to a level that makes it a viable career. I know guys with 40 years of experience that don’t have any incidents on their record. I know a few with half the experience that might as well get their name changed to “crash”.
 
Ben Diss said:
How are ag pilots paid? Similar to CFI, or can they earn a decent living?
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I had an ok seat, nothing special about it. My minimum annual salary was 90k and average actual pay was 120k. If you’re willing to work year round and live in California average there for an experienced pilot is in the 200k+ range. I know a guy that’s dual rated and his 5 year average is over 300k but he works his butt off. I don’t like money that much. I only worked 6 months out of the year and never traveled from home to make my low six figures.

The hard part is getting started. My first two years were less than 20k but it goes up quick when you actually know what you doing and get into bigger aircraft.

Don’t do it for the money. If you do you’ll be miserable. You have to actually like agriculture and want to be an ag pilot. If not you won’t be satisfied.

I loved it and made a very comfortable living for me. I’m currently going back to the airlines and I feel like i have been robbed. I will miss ag but such is life.
 
Go talk to Billy down in GA :)
 
I grew up in Ag aviation. My dad retired in 1981 after 35 years and well over 10,000 ag hours...and live another 20+ years. He got out of the business before my brother and I were old enough to start in it. It wasn't the safety aspect so much as the growing expense, farmers who weren't paying their bills, government regulation by all the alphabet agencies. He never mentioned the danger as a reason for not wanting us to be ag pilots. He taught us both how to fly and even the basic mechanics of ag flying. He was simply concerned in the early 80 about if we could make a decent living. especially as turbines were becoming "the thing" at a price of over $100,000 back then. At that time, it was significantly less regulated than today (but it was coming) and everyone and their brother was hanging out a shingle and undercutting prices. IIRC, it was about $2/acre then. No one was getting rich where we were located.

My brother is still in ag business but I went into the Army and retired before pursuing a civilian career. We both are still friends with a number of ag pilots. It is a much better organized and professional industry than 40 years ago. Technology is greatly improved. Turbines have the lion share of business. It is a difficult industry to break into if you don't know anyone in it, especially don't know an operator to have an entry point. Lots of guys are second or third generation. Many others have been trained and groomed by existing operators.

Many ag pilots start as loaders. If they stick with it and show a good attitude, a willingness to work hard and do the grunt work while earning their ratings (if they don't already have them), they can work their way into a seat slowly. Without a bunch of tailwheel and turbine time, you aren't just going to throw out a resume and get a job. It is an EXTREMELY small community across the country (and to lesser degree, the world). If you get a good name, it will pay off. If you get a bad reputation, you are doomed.
 
I have a friend who flies the AT-802A (turbine Air Tractor) in the midwest. He started flying a piece of junk Pawnee for an operator in the midwest and then eventually found a nice gig flying the AT-802A (I think he has flown the AT-402A as well). He said he had no formal training in the air tractor (I know they have a "trainer" version). Said he read the POH and flew the thing lol. I guess the old saying, "an airplane is an airplane is an airplane" is true...He works 6 months out of the year I think. He makes good money doing it and then lives in Oregon the other 6 months of the year..hunting, fishing, etc with his wife. It's not a bad life.
 
I remember as a kid back in the 60s watching the local ag sprayer fly under the power lines and through the gap between the power lines and fence in an old bi-wing plane with a radial engine.

I thought that was the coolest job ever.... But now when I go back to that area and see how little space there is between the fence and power lines.......WOW..!!!
 
Its a good gig if you can get in. Every Ag pilot I have met along the way liked his job (unlike the airline guys who incessantly whine about management, the union, management, the union, management, the union.....).
Just like any other part of the Ag industry, you have to be cut out to roll with the ups and downs. Demand fluctuates with commodities prices and most importantly the weather. You may sit around for weeks doing nothing while it is dry just to be swamped in fungicide contracts after a week of rain when the ground based guys can't get into the fields. With enough ag experience, you can get into other gigs like wildland firefighting which pay well and offer a different flying environment from the corn and potato fields.
 
I've said many times that ag pilots are all a little nuts, and I stand by it. However, they are also really freaking good pilots, for the most part. Hats off.
 
Ive said many times that Okies are all a little nuts, and I standby it! However, some of their women are really beautiful, for the most part.......

Flying Ag is not for everyone, but I wouldn't trade it for anything.



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I just watch them going out of my home base, with a heavy load of chemicals, down between the trees and over to the cotton fields, and wonder about them . . . . So low, so slow, so insistent on not talking on the radio as they come and go . . . . I do my best to dodge them. Thankfully their (faded) yellow paint shows up well against the pine trees. I'm just never sure how many there are until I talk to the ground crew (which is blessed hard to do if they weren't there when I left!).
 
I started farming in the late '70's and we had about 8 crop dusters in the area. Now we have only one. The decline of the industry can be attributed to several factors such as GMO technology that has reduced the need for pesticide spraying and the other factor is cost. Forty years ago the cost per acre was about $2 and now it is about $8/acre. Most farmers have ground machines and spray their crops for less than by air. Some pesticides are not labeled for application by air and must be sprayed by ground. During periods of wet weather where ground application is limited you have no other option than aerial application. As stated in earlier replies, if you want to make money you have to be willing to move around and the nomadic lifestyle can be difficult especially where families are involved. When crop dusting was in it's heyday, the journeymen pilots would drive up from Florida with their campers in tow and park them on the edge of the grass strip. When the spraying was done in the fall they would load up and move on.
 
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