{"id":780,"date":"2017-09-30T17:06:42","date_gmt":"2017-09-30T09:06:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.agrinoon.com\/agriculture\/?p=780"},"modified":"2017-09-30T17:06:42","modified_gmt":"2017-09-30T09:06:42","slug":"new-technologies-clemson-university-offer-potential-big-savings-agriculture","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.agrinoon.com\/agriculture\/2017\/09\/30\/new-technologies-clemson-university-offer-potential-big-savings-agriculture\/","title":{"rendered":"New technologies from Clemson University offer potential big savings for agriculture"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"detailbox\" class=\"post-content\">\n<div>\n<div>\n<div>\n<div>Keywords:\u00a0weather stations , soil-moisture sensors , nutrient-management technology<\/div>\n<div>Tests on new nutrient-management technology under development at Clemson University showed savings of up to $54 an acre on cotton production.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>Those savings could mount quickly; South Carolina plants more than 180,000 acres of cotton, according to the National Agricultural Statistics Service.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>In another test, Clemson automated tillage technology reduced fuel usage by nearly half on soil tillage needed to protect row crop yields.<\/p>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>\u201cDeep tillage is the most fuel-consumptive thing you do in the field,\u201d said Jonathan Fox. He is a plant and environmental sciences master\u2019s student speaking at the Row Crop Field Day at Clemson\u2019s Edisto Research and Education Center (REC) near Blackville.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div>Most sandy soils in South Carolina have a compacted zone. It is called a hardpan, that roots can\u2019t penetrate. The hardpan, usually at a depth of 10 to 16 inches, can be 2 to 8 inches thick. If not tilled, the hardpan will prohibit roots from reaching water and nutrients found in deeper soil.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>\u201cThe hardpan can reduce crop yields by as much as 50 percent. It makes plants more susceptible to drought stress,\u201d Fox said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>Fox is working with agricultural engineer Ahmad Khalilian and other specialists at the Edisto REC. They try to develop a real-time, variable-rate tillage system. The system uses sensor technologies to pinpoint the depth and thickness of that soil hard pan. The technology communicates with the tillage equipment to automatically adjust the blade depth on the go. As a result, farmers don\u2019t till soil if they don\u2019t need to and don\u2019t till deeper than needed.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>\u201cIn turn, what that gives us in my research so far is fuel savings of up to 45 percent for farmers,\u201d Fox said.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Fox\u2019s project was among several on display at the field day at the Edisto REC. It is home to the university\u2019s precision agriculture program that utilizes new technologies to make farming more efficient, profitable and environmentally friendly.<\/p>\n<div>Jose Payero is a Clemson University irrigation specialist. He is installing weather stations and soil-moisture sensors at farms across South Carolina and developing the online platform. It will allow farmers to use the collected data to conserve water and energy by reducing irrigation. Farmers can contact Payero about participating at<a> jpayero@clemson.edu<\/a>. Payero said the online platform is about a month from completion.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div>Agricultural engineer Kendall Kirk is developing a system. he calls the system \u201cDirected Prescriptions\u201d. Developing the system is for prescribing variable seeding rates that would help farmers optimize spatial assignment of rates.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>\u201cWe\u2019re not just looking at yield. We\u2019re looking at profit. What\u2019s the ideal seeding rate for your field to maximize profit?\u201d Kirk said.<\/p>\n<div><\/div>\n<div><span style=\"color: #000000;\">With the help of post-doctoral associate Wei-zhen Liang, Kirk\u2019s group is also developing image analysis software to quantify soybean leaf defoliation. Farmers typically use a visual estimate to determine if insect damage has reached a level that requires treatment. That defoliation is often over-estimated, however, and farmers spend money on unneeded <a class=\"anchor\" style=\"color: #000000;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.agropages.com\/CompanyDirectory\/CList-12-----1.htm\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">insecticide<\/a> treatments, Kirk said. Kirk and Liang are developing a website. Farmers could upload leaf or canopy images and receive a spray recommendation on the website.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div>\u201cJust a 5 percent spray reduction would save farmers $420,000 in South Carolina alone,\u201d Kirk said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Kirk\u2019s work presented at the field day was supported by Cotton Inc. and the South Carolina Soybean Board. Farmers interested in learning more about the variable-rate seeding technology or the defoliation image analysis software or in participating in a field trial for these technologies can contact Kirk at <a style=\"color: #000000;\" href=\"http:\/\/kirk2@clemson.edu\/\">kirk2@clemson.edu<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div>Also on display at the Edisto REC field day was a sensor-based, variable-rate nitrogen applicator that can be used with center-pivot irrigation systems in cotton fields. Clemson University Ph.D. student Phillip Williams received a $94,808 grant from the National Institute of Food and Agriculture to develop and test the technology.<\/p>\n<div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"post-content\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Williams plants a \u201cnitrogen-rich\u201d strip of cotton to evaluate the field\u2019s maximum, or target, yield. He then flies a drone mounted with an infrared camera over the field to measure nutrient content in plants. He uses a global positioning system to map the field\u2019s nutrient deficiencies. That information, along with planting date and historical yield data, is plugged into an algorithm developed at Clemson to tell how much <a class=\"anchor\" style=\"color: #000000;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.agropages.com\/CompanyDirectory\/CList-2-----1.htm\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">fertilizer<\/a> needs to be applied and where. A variable-rate applicator connected to an irrigation system then applies only the amount of <a class=\"anchor\" style=\"color: #000000;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.agropages.com\/CompanyDirectory\/CList-2-----1.htm\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">fertilizer<\/a> needed at variable rates throughout the field.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"post-content\">\u201cIt is essentially micromanaging your fertigation through this irrigation system. It hopefully can optimize nitrogen rates, increase yields and increase profits for the growers,\u201d Williams said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"post-content\">In an on-farm trial, Williams demonstrated savings of up to $54 per acre. Using the technology, Williams reduced fertilizer applications by nearly two-thirds over the conventional rule-of-the-thumb applications of 90 pounds of nitrogen per acre. Despite the reduced fertilizer applications, yield was unchanged, and because the applicator would work in tandem with an irrigation system, it also would save time and fuel by eliminating a second trip through the field for nitrogen applications. Farmers interested in participating in trials of this technology can contact Williams at <a href=\"http:\/\/pbw@clemson.edu\/\">pbw@clemson.edu <\/a>or visit www.clemsonnitrogencalculator.com.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"post-meta\"><b>Source:\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/b>Clemson University<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Keywords:\u00a0weather stations , soil-moisture sensors , nutrient-management technology Tests on new nutrient-management technology under development at Clemson University showed savings of up to $54 an acre on cotton production. Those savings could mount quickly; South Carolina plants more than 180,000 acres of cotton, according to the National Agricultural Statistics Service. In another test, Clemson automated&hellip; <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.agrinoon.com\/agriculture\/2017\/09\/30\/new-technologies-clemson-university-offer-potential-big-savings-agriculture\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">New technologies from Clemson University offer potential big savings for agriculture<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"two_page_speed":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-780","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-industry-news","entry"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>New technologies from Clemson University offer potential big savings for agriculture - Agrinoon<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.agrinoon.com\/agriculture\/2017\/09\/30\/new-technologies-clemson-university-offer-potential-big-savings-agriculture\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"New technologies from Clemson University offer potential big savings for agriculture - Agrinoon\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Keywords:\u00a0weather stations , soil-moisture sensors , nutrient-management technology Tests on new nutrient-management technology under development at Clemson University showed savings of up to $54 an acre on cotton production. 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