Get your degree and plan on getting your MS as well. You are talking about getting a job 4 to 6 years out and the job description will be much different then. Learn the science of agronomy and pick up as much technology as you can. You want to be the field agronomist for >50k acre farms, for the big agREITS, for Sigma Chemical, etc. Or you can be the Senior Agronomists for one of the 5 or 6 big coops in the state of Iowa (West Central, FC, NEW, Heartland, etc.) dealing with 5k acre farmers running precision farming systems.  Read the Scientific Advisory Board Report on Hypoxia in the Northern Gulf of Mexico if you want to see how different it is going to be. Then read about proposed regs on the release of greenhouse gasses by agriculture. And then read about DOE’s drive for renewable fuel sources. And don’t forget a few articles on biochar and on emerging EPA water quality regs on permitting of ag chemicals as point sources.

I have only met a few crop consultants who understand both the science and the practice and they are paid very well. Most will hype soil testing without understanding how spatial variability and laboratory analytical accuracy impact the decision making process. They might know GIS but know beans about spatial statistics as an analytical tool to figure out a farmer’s problems. They may talk about compaction without understanding controlled traffic lanes, or knowing how to measure compaction or knowing basic concepts such as the relationship between soil moisture levels and compaction potential. They hype no-till without understanding the impact of that approach on anaerobic soil microbiology, plant helath and greenhouse gas emissions. They hype tissue testing without any understanding of plant physiology.