“We’ll use byproducts such as wood scraps, old wooden pallets, baled cotton stalks, baled peanut vines and baled wheat straw as fuel for the boiler,” he explains.

This year, as he uses the boiler for the first time, he’s testing various mixes of wood scraps and crop residues to see which works best.

“This boiler will cut our curing costs from $1,000 per barn using diesel fuel to less than $150 per barn,” he says. “Overall, this system will save me more than $100,000 in curing costs.”

He spent $53,000 in diesel costs to cure his tobacco in 2007, and with recent increases in diesel costs, he figures he would have spent $110,000 to cure tobacco this year if he didn’t have the boiler.

“I also plan to heat my pullet houses with the boiler system as well,” he adds. “This boiler should save me an additional $40,000 per year in heating the chicken houses.”

McKinnon grew strawberries for about three to four years and that experience led him to diversify into blueberries.

“Blueberries aren’t as perishable as strawberries,” he explains.

McKinnon’s blueberry yields are among the highest in the state, and he has shared his experiences with other growers while hosting field days. He planted his first blueberries in 2000, starting with highbush varieties and later adding rabbiteye varieties to extend the harvesting and marketing season.

He grows the blueberries using raised beds, bark mulch, underground drip and overhead sprinkler irrigation, and both hand and mechanical harvesting.

This year, he’s investing in a new locally owned blueberry processing plant. He says the plant should be in operation for the 2009 season and will be capable of individually quick-freezing fresh blueberries. It will also create about 35 seasonal jobs during the five-month processing season. The fruit will be marketed nationally through the Michigan Blueberry Growers organization.

In 1993, he started growing cotton and began phasing out corn and soybeans. When he started growing cotton, ginning capacity was limited, so he and six other farmers built a new cotton gin in 1995. He started growing peanuts in 1994 and gradually expanded over the years as he bought peanut poundage quota. As corn prices rose dramatically earlier this year, he started growing that crop again. Late planting forced him to select a tropical corn hybrid with genetically engineered insect resistance.

He and his dad started growing chickens in 1962, and McKinnon has grown them continuously over the years.

“I now have five houses of pullets and one house of roosters that I grow for Pilgrim’s Pride,” he says. He also uses the chicken litter as a fertilizer for all his crops except blueberries.

Beverly Sparks with the University of Georgia’s Cooperative Extension Service is the state coordinator for the Farmer of the Year award in Georgia. Eddie McGriff, Extension agent in Coffee County, nominated McKinnon for the award. McGriff says he nominated McKinnon because of his innovative farming practices, the involvement of his entire family in the farm operation and for his willingness to share his farming expertise with other growers.

As the Georgia state winner, McKinnon will now receive a $2,500 cash award and an expense paid trip to the Sunbelt Expo from Swisher International of Jacksonville, Fla., a jacket and a $200 gift certificate from the Williamson-Dickie Company, and a $500 gift certificate from Southern States.