Category Archives: Nutrients

Agronomy, Nutrients, Precision Agriculture, Projects, Soil

PA Symposium14

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Notes from Adelaide – September 2014

Queensland University of Technology is investigating robotic technologies as a new generation of tools for site-specific crop and weed management. Tristan Perez described “AgBot”, a platform currently being manufactured to a design by QUT. AgBot is 2m long, 3m (adjustable) wide and 1.4m high.

AgBot - image from Queensland University of Technology
AgBot – image from Queensland University of Technology

Tristan suggests the use of a swarm of small light robots, that operate at lower speeds and have a suit of sensor-acting devices, could lead to a better application of agrochemicals. He also sees them having a key role addressing herbicide resistance as they could enable use of mechanical or microwave weed destruction techniques.

Now we have your attention:

LandWISE’s Dan Bloomer attended the 17th Precision Agriculture Symposia of Australasia in Adelaide. This event is a collaboration between SPAA and the University of Sydney, bringing together researchers and practitioners with the aim of promoting the development of PA to profit agricultural production.

The Symposium has a broad coverage including new technologies, big data, precision cropping and viticulture and spatially enabled livestock management.

As well as an excellent range of speakers, the symposium is a very good networking opportunity for people active in this space. There is a close alignment with LandWISE interests and the supporting Trade Displays were very relevant and informative

Link to the Symposium page here>

A few notes about some of the other presentations:

Lucas Haag, Professor at Kansas Sate University and Partner and agronomist in his family’s large farming operation, described the evolution of PA in the dryland environment of the US High Plains. While a very different context to New Zealand agriculture, the lessons appear readily transferable.

He noted the critical role of autosteer, rather than yield mapping, in accelerating the adoption of precision agriculture tools among a wide spread of cropping farmers, and the subsequent search by those farmers to gain additional return on that significant investment. This is a pattern very familiar to us.

A take home message from Lucas was the use of PA technologies to make better whole field or whole farm analysis and decisions. While they use PA tools to help evaluate new varieties, seed treatments and other new product options, machinery management decisions have added considerable value to their business.

Examples included evaluating the economics of grain stripper versus conventional header harvesting, grain cart logistics and the value of a dedicated tender truck to support spraying operations – all applications that were not anticipated. Better telematics and machine monitoring technologies and costs of machinery suggest this will continue to be an area of focus.

Miles Grafton from the New Zealand Centre for Precision Agriculture at Massey University discussed ballistic modelling of spread patterns from fertiliser spreaders. LandWISE has a particular interest in this due to our current SFF Project on Fertiliser Applicator Calibration.  Miles and Ian Yule have already been giving support for the project.

As manufacturers have increased claims of spreading width, and farmers and contractors have increased bout widths accordingly, arable farmers have noted increased striping and lodging in crops where blended fertilisers are applied. The Massey studies identify the different ballistic properties of blend components, and the increased bout widths, explain these symptoms.

A number of presentations included reference to UAV technologies. Some are very sophisticated and used to carry very high-spec sensors. Some are just used to get up above the crop for a new perspective. Regardless, the potential benefits are clear and the price dropping and capability rapidly rising.

Luke Schelosky of RoboFlight Australia their approach using either piloted or unpiloted aerial vehicles to capture ultra-high resolution imagery  create 2 cm resolution maps. As we have seen before, the key to the technology is the processing software rather than the choice of vehicle.

Miles Grafton also reported Massey work using remote sensing for pasture management. They use a number of Remote Piloted Aerial Systems (RPAS) including multi-rotor (e.g. QuadCopter) and fixed wing (e.g. Trimble UX5) as well as a range of multi- and hyper-spectral sensors and imaging systems. While at an early stage, Massey research is showing promise in remotely sensing pasture quantity and quality, including assessing pasture nutrient levels.

Lucas Haag also discussed the role of UAVs, suggesting three unique features create special potential:

  • Temporal Resolution -The data are fresh, not from the last cloud free satellite pass
  • Spatial Resolution – the user can control flight height and pattern to gain the redolution needed for the intended use of the data
  • A separate step – because it requires a separate trip to the field, there is opportunity to add external knowledge before inputs are applied. This allows, for example, adding historical yield monitor knowledge  (and perhaps knowledge of herbicide mistakes) to UAV NDVI imagery when creating a Nitrogen application map.

Lucas further addressed spatial and temporal variability measures determined from Yield Maps, contrasting Normalised Yield and Yield Stability. Multi-year Normalised Yield provides the measure of Spatial Variability or spatial yield potential, and the standard deviation (defined perhaps as stable high, stable low and unstable yield) provides a measure of temporal (over time) variability.

Cheryl McCarthy presented crop sensing and weed detection work being undertaken at the National Centre for Engineering in Agriculture at the University of Southern Queensland. Colour and depth image analysis is enabling them to identify weeds in real time, and spot spray them at 10 – 15 km/h. Interesting to note this requires analysis of 30 images per second, as at least three image frames per plant are needed for sufficient confidence.

Two Trade Displays that caught attention were SST Software and PA Source; both aimed at helping farmers and their advisors access the benefits of Precision Agriculture.

Mark Pawsey demonstrated SST Software’s Sirrus programme, a cloud based data access, storage and analysis package. Of additional interest was their decision to open their agX Platform to other developers creating supplementary apps. This reflects the opening also of the John Deere platform and similar moves by other organisations.

Ben Jones of PA Source spoke at LandWISE in 2012 and has facilitated our use of that platform for supply and analysis of spatial data including yield maps, EM maps and satellite data.  New offerings include www.watch.farm and www.pastack.com.

Watch.farm delivers Landsat satellite sourced vigour maps to your email every 16 days (cloud cover permitting). Part of the watch.farm package includes change maps, so you can track growth change in individual paddocks.  We want to try this service in the current summer season and see it having a significant role to play if the resolution coverage is satisfactory in the “Land of the Long White Cloud”.

PAStack also uses Landsat imagery, “stacking” images from as far back as 1999 to 2013 to see which areas provide more or less biomass and how consistent they are. We will also investigate this product as there appear to be a number of uses of potential benefit to LandWISE farmers and their supporters.

LandWISE People, Nutrients, Projects, Water

Tennessee Visitors

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LandWISE is hosting two students from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville.

Rachel Eatherly and Makenzie Read are interns through a Massey University programme and are at LandWISE for the month of June. They are both studying Natural Resources and Environmental Economics, which influenced their decision to study abroad in New Zealand through Massey University’s Agricultural College.

Rachel Eatherly    Makenzie Read

Makenzie is concerned with methods of maintaining economic growth while minimizing the impact on water sources. Rachel is interested in sustainable farming practices to minimize the impact on the environment while also increasing profits and production.  So the interests of both align very well with LandWISE.

While at LandWISE, Rachel and Makenzie are considering the implications of applying the Tukituki Plan Change 6 to cropping on the Heretaunga Plains. In particular, they are examining the levels of awareness, the scale of potential impact, and what changes may be required if Plan Change 6 were to be implemented. They appreciate the support they have received from farmers, council, industry and other stakeholders. We will post their report once complete.

Their visit to New Zealand began with a two week tour starting in Christchurch. Travelling with five other colleagues and Massey representatives through Otago to the West Coast and Marlborough they saw our fascinating South Island landscapes and visited farms as well as natural areas. They then travelled around the North Island including stops at National Park, LIC in Hamilton, Auckland, Rotorua and Taupo before arriving in Hawke’s Bay.

Rachel and Makenzie

Rachel and Makenzie at Mt Nicholas Station on Lake Wakatipu
Agronomy, Controlled Traffic Systems, Drainage, Irrigation, MicroFarm, Nutrients, Precision Agriculture, Soil, Tillage, Water

LandWISE 2014 Event update

Ever Better: Farmers, land and water

Awapuni Function Centre, Palmerston North. 21-22 May 2014

Just two days to go to LandWISE 2014! The final programme and some tasters of individual presentations are on the website.

In a change to previous years, our “outdoor session” on Day 2 includes a bus tour of a small catchment with intensive land use – vegetable cropping and dairy farming – and a regionally significant lake. This will be in the middle of the day, with buses returning to the conference venue for the final afternoon presentations and panel discussion.

We have a focus on farm plans to avoid or minimise off-farm impacts, especially from sediments and nutrients. This is a critical issue now, and farmers need to understand how new expectations may affect their day to day activities.

Register hereSponsorSheet64

Many thanks to our Conference Sponsors and the many speakers and others who bring you this opportunity. We especially thank our Platinum Sponsors, BASF Crop Protection, AGMARDT and John Deere.

Please pass this message on to your friends and colleagues you believe would gain benefit from attending.

Irrigation, Nutrients, Precision Agriculture, Soil, Water

Good practice, precision agriculture and farm plans

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Good farm plans ensure we understand our resource base – primarily our land, water and climate – and manage to make production efficient. What will a cropping farm plan look like? What should be included?

We will achieve greater efficiency by carefully monitoring our inputs and outputs, and applying just enough to get the results we want. Nutrients, water, cultivation and crop protection can be necessary inputs but we don’t want too much of a good thing. We also get efficiency by planning so each action fits properly into the mix of daily, weekly, monthly and longer term events.

The 2014 LandWISE Conference in Palmerston North will focus on the constant drive to improve performance on and off farm. Farming never has, and never should, stand still. Much on-going improvement is now linked to precision agriculture, and the timely application of intelligence. But we must still get the basics right.

LandWISE farmers are leaders in precision agriculture. Initial steps for most were GPS tractor guidance, offering immediate input efficiency gains and importantly reducing fatigue. Many farmers have stopped there. Others have leapt ahead.

Leaders are capturing increasing benefits by mixing precise positioning with automation, sensor technologies, smart software and their own ingenuity. Some hone in on precision nutrient management with detailed mapping and variable rate application. Others have become highly skilled at level surveying and land shaping to assure good drainage.

Precision agriculture is a whole shopping trolley of tools and techniques. The best options for one farmer on one farm may be quite different for another. Massey University Professor of Precision Agriculture Ian Yule describes this as “bricolage”, a French word for tinkering.

In fine arts bricolage describes the construction or creation of a work from a diverse range of things that happen to be available. Farmers tend to be excellent tinkerers. When aware of the huge choice in the precision agriculture shopping trolley, they are able to develop a unique package that best suits them and their farm system.

The LandWISE Conference provides a meeting place where opportunities and ideas can be shared and custom solutions built from what happens to be available.

Keynote speaker Rod Collins from Agri-science Queensland is an experienced research agronomist, working with growers to implement a voluntary self-assessment and planning process. He will share thoughts on Implementing Best Practice, multi-sector efforts to integrate environment and economics, and accelerating adoption of farming practices that improve catchment water quality.

On Day 1, Conference delegates can also anticipate stories from Controlled Traffic for vegetables in Tasmania, impacts of reverting from CTF to RTF in Auckland, advances in crop sensing at regional scale, and precision ag research and implementation in New Zealand and overseas. There will be updates on nutrient management, irrigation management, drainage planning, technologies and implementation, and land shaping.

On Day 2, we turn our focus to the Arawhata Catchment near Levin. With the Tararua Vegetable Growers’ Association and Horizons Regional Council, we will tour Lake Horowhenua and farms. We will look at tools that can help us improve drainage and increase production while reducing sediment and nutrient losses.

With farm plans forming the base of future management and regulation, we’ll think about what is involved. What should a cropping farm plan look like? Where might we get information to support our planning? How can precision agriculture help?

LandWISE 2014: Ever Better – farmers, land and water

21-22 May 2014
Awapuni Function Centre
Palmerston North

Many thanks to our Platinum Conference Sponsors, BASF Crop Protection and John Deere. Thanks also to Gold sponsors, Potatoes New Zealand and Process Vegetables New Zealand, Horizons Regional Council and Trimble Ag specialists, GPS Control Systems.
More details 

Nutrients, Precision Agriculture, Projects, Soil, Water

New Project: Fertiliser Calibration

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JDcalibrationLandWISE has been granted funding to develop fertiliser application calibration procedures suitable for farmers applying nutrients with their own equipment. The two year Ministry for Primary Industries’ Sustainable Farming Fund project is co-funded by the Foundation for Arable Research (FAR) and the Fertiliser Association of New Zealand (FertResearch). Work will begin in July.

Why have this project?

Intensive farming is under intense scrutiny as impacts on soil and fresh water are questioned. Nutrient budgeting is a critical aspect of fertiliser practice. Knowing what should be done is important. Knowing what is actually done is important too. This project will allow on-farm checks to ensure and demonstrate that their own or contracted application equipment is performing to expectations.

Recommendations and nutrient management plans from fertiliser and agricultural consultants assume the fertiliser material will be spread evenly and accurately over the target area at the target application rate. Poor spreading can negate the best management plans and result in significant production losses and pollution of waterways.

The Fertiliser Industry Code of Practice for Nutrient Management notes greater precision in fertiliser application is increasingly important if profits are to be lifted by more intensive farming.  Intensification brings a greater risk of negative impacts on farm profits and on the environment through errors and inefficiencies in fertiliser application. Fertiliser and its application is often the single biggest discretionary expense.

What will be done?

This project will deliver protocols, guidelines, templates and training modules for farmers doing their
own ground based fertiliser application. Calibration is familiar to farmers for agrichemical application. It is increasingly applied for irrigation, to achieve water use efficiencies and reduce the risk of drainage and leaching. The new aspect is applying to fertiliser placement, distribution uniformity measures as well as gross per hectare application rates.

Most fertiliser applicator manufacturers provide guidelines to calibrate equipment. However, usually only the bulk application per hectare is determined, not the uniformity of application. This is a critical omission, as poor distribution significantly impacts yield and increases risk of leaching losses.

Ground based application includes a wide range of application methods to apply a vast array of fertiliser products, requiring careful matching of equipment and technique to the fertiliser and production system.

FertSpreadThe project will address the two broad types of ground based spreading equipment:

  • equipment that spreads fertiliser beyond the width of the machine – e.g. bulk spinners
  • equipment where the swath width is equal to or less than the width of the machine – e.g. boom sprayers, combine drills, pneumatic top dressers.

The key performance criteria will be defined and expected levels provided.
Clear calibration protocols will be supported with guidelines and templates to ensure their correct implementation and for record keeping.

A training module and resources suitable for delivery to farm fertiliser managers and staff will be developed. Training opportunities will be provided at various locations around the country.
Together the project outputs will enable farmers to suitably calibrate equipment and record data pertaining to efficient use of nutrients. Their records will support industry QA programmes and demonstrate regulatory compliance.

For more information, contact Dan Bloomer at LandWISE:

FARFertResearchsff no web address sm

Agronomy, Irrigation, MicroFarm, Nutrients, Projects, Soil

Playing with Peas

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At the LandWISE MicroFarm, we are scoping the use of plant growth regulators to lift yields of peas for processing.

In our region, peas are produced for the global market, and the global price sets the local price. You’ll struggle to find a farmer that says the pay-out is generous. We could focus on increasing the price by $5 a tonne or even $50 a tonne. But that will make us uncompetitive. 

So how can we make it a profitable crop?

We could cut costs, though there is little left to remove. Peas don’t usually get fertiliser or slug bait, insecticides or disease sprays. Most get little or no cultivation. They do get herbicide treatment, but many chemicals are relatively cheap.

What’s left?

“Yield is king!” say LandWISE farmers. 

The yields of many crops have increased enormously over the last twenty years.  Pea yields have not, and are highly variable and unpredictable.  Even in good looking crops, yield can be disappointing.

As with any one pass harvest fresh vegetable crop, top yields need good plant, pod and seed numbers, all ready for harvest at the same time. Sometimes parts of a paddock are behind, sometimes parts of plants are left behind.

If part of a paddock matures differently, it is often because the plants emerged at different times. The cause may be soil moisture or temperature differences. Maybe it is compaction related.

If some plants mature at different rates it may be sowing or soil conditions causing uneven emergence.

If some pods mature at different times, maybe flowering was prolonged. If we condense flowering, all the plant’s resources go into peas that get harvested.

Farmers have noted drought-stressed crops can out-yield more vigorous ones. The stressed plants seem to have flowering curtailed, while vigorous ones continue flowering and have late pods and peas that will not be mature at harvest.

The MicroFarm group is looking at plant growth regulators to condense flowering and therefore the harvestable proportion of the crop.

Plant growth regulators control things such as shoot and root growth, internode length, flowering, fruit set and ripening. They are widely used in horticulture and have been used to manipulate flowering times.

We are applying a few options that have shown to have effect elsewhere. It is a first look to see if this is something worth researching further.

Our Discussion Group members’ experience has been brought together to formulate our “grand plan”.

Five different PGR products are being applied to the crop at different growth stages. The PGR’s include gibberellic acid, anti-gibberellin (Cycocel 750, Regalis), cytokinin (Exilis) and anti-ethylene (ReTain). These are potentially potent materials: one of our treatments is 8 grams per hectare.

The treatments are being applied in 3m x 10m strips, but are not being replicated in this initial scoping study. We do however have two sowings so we will get a couple of chances to compare. We will observe effects and yields. If we see evidence of a benefit, we will do a more detailed study.

Gibberellic acid was applied when peas were 10-15cm high. A rapid lengthening and yellowing of treated plants was quickly seen. The yellowing has reduced in time, but the plants are still double the height of their untreated neighbours.

But it is flowering we are interested in and that is still just around the corner. We have noted two flowers in one treated plant, and none elsewhere in the paddock.

The next set of treatments was applied about 10 days before anticipated flowering date. We are watching things closely.

Many thanks to the people involved in formulating the plan, and now implementing it: Plant Growth Regulators were supplied by BASF Crop Protection, Agronica and Fruitfed Supplies. Treatments were applied by Peracto. Plant & Food are monitoring the effects.

PGRSponsors

A report of results of the season’s PGR trials is posted on the MicroFarm website.