Rice farming in America has become a precise science, a world of specialized equipment, lasers and computers. The modern process of rice cultivation includes:

• Land planes and other specialized equipment to scrape and shift the soil to level the land, and prepare an ideal seed bed.
  
• Heavy equipment that makes light work of building even fields that gently slope, enabling uniform flooding and controlled draining.
  
• Laser guidance systems to aid in precision field leveling and help determine where water control levees will be placed.
  Acres of seeds are quickly planted to an exact depth by grain drills, or cast over dry or flooded fields by airplane.
  
• Gravity guides fresh water, pumped from deep wells, nearby rivers, canals or reservoirs to provide a constant water depth on the field of 2 to 3 inches during the growing season.
  
• Fertilizers and crop protectants are evenly applied from the air utilizing modern global positioning (GPS) technology to ensure a consistent and healthy crop.
  Improved cultural practices to both enhance grain quality and uniformity, and to sustain and conserve the environment.
  

When the rice is mature, the water is drained from the fields. Sophisticated combines cut the rice, separating the grain from the stalk, and funnel it into trucks for transporting to dryers. At large commercial installations or small drying facilities on the farm, forced warm, dry air gradually removes moisture from the grain to a level suitable for storage and ready for milling.