Photo by Elia Scudiero, UCR
Water management is a major challenge facing agriculture in California and other dry regions. A new University of California Riverside (UCR) system can map soil moisture tree by tree, so growers water only where and when it’s needed.
The system, detailed in the journal Computers and Electronics in Agriculture, is the work of Elia Scudiero’s research group. Scudiero is associate professor of precision agriculture and the director of UCR’s Center for Agriculture, Food, and the Environment. This research was conducted at UCR’s Citrus Research Center and Agricultural Experiment Station.
BEYOND SOIL MOISTURE SENSORS
Currently, some growers rely on soil moisture sensors buried in the ground to determine when to irrigate. These sensors are expensive and typically installed in only a few locations, leaving growers to guess how conditions vary across hundreds or thousands of trees.
“The information those sensors provide is very limited,” Scudiero said. “It really only tells you what’s happening in the immediate areas where they’re placed.” Soil moisture and its availability to trees can vary greatly from spot to spot within a single field.
The new system replaces limited sensor data and guesswork with detailed maps. A robot moves through an orchard measuring a property of the soil called electrical conductivity. These readings, combined with data from the fixed moisture sensors already in the ground, allow researchers to build a statistical model that predicts water content across the entire field. The result is a tree-by-tree picture of water distribution.
“Using this method, growers … can water specific trees if they’re dry,” Scudiero said.
Maintaining the right moisture level is important for plant health. Trees that receive too little water become stressed and more vulnerable to pests and disease. Too much water can deprive roots of oxygen.
REDUCED RISKS
Enhanced precision could also keep orchards from folding. Growers already face tightening regulations on groundwater use while water costs continue to rise. “If water becomes limited, farmers have two choices,” Scudiero said. “They can retire orchards, or they can find ways to produce the same crops using less water.”
The technology may also reduce fertilizer pollution. When fields are overwatered, nutrients applied to crops can wash below the root zone and into groundwater, polluting it.
“If you apply only the amount of water the plants actually need, you reduce the risk of washing those nutrients away from the roots of the crops and into the environment,” Scudiero said.
NEXT STEPS
Scudiero’s team has already filed a patent related to how the robot interacts with sensors without disturbing their measurements. Future work will focus on testing the system with commercial growers.
Private industry partners may eventually adapt the technology into commercial products. The payoff for this research could be significant for growers.
“More crop per drop,” Scudiero concluded.
Source: University of California
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