Multiple weather station updates aid crop management decisions

Date:01-29-2024

Growers using Agrovista’s weather station services can now access a suite of new and updated on-screen features to help optimize crop management following an extensive overhaul of the company’s data platform.

Several hundred weather stations provided by Agrovista are in use across the UK. These measure a range of parameters including rainfall, air temperature, soil temperature, soil moisture, relative humidity, leaf wetness, solar radiation, and wind speed, depending on which option growers choose (see below).

Each station provides location-specific data that is transmitted to a central server for processing, providing a range of high-quality weather-based information that individual growers can access via their own online dashboard on a range of devices.

The information includes live weather data, weather forecasts, crop disease predictions, irrigation management (in combination with soil moisture sensors), and various alerts to help protect crops while reducing field visits.

The most obvious change is the new dashboard design, which presents a wide range of data in a cleaner, more accessible format, says James Martin from Agrovista Weather.

″The modernized dashboard display will be beneficial to all, but will be especially useful for smartphone users, helping them to easily access all the information they need,″ he explains.

Delving deeper, weather, spray, and disease forecasting are now included on the same platform. ″Before they were on a separate system – now we’ve embedded them, improving access,″ says James.

Up-to-the-minute weather data helps growers make immediate decisions, while detailed short- and medium-term weather forecasts aid planning.

These forecasts, along with additional measurements such as leaf wetness, are also used to model accurate disease forecasts for a range of combinable root and fruit crops for precise integrated pest management planning. A further forecast that indicates spraying conditions is also available.

In addition, access to rainfall measurements in the local area for the past 24 hours and previous seven days provides a valuable overview for growers who irrigate.

″This is particularly useful for crops further away that are covered by a weather station,″ says James. ″Growers with moisture probes can also find out which areas of the crop are near to field capacity and which areas require irrigation, and how much.″

The update also includes an irrigation probe dashboard with a soil forecast, indicating where moisture might be in seven days without rain. The dashboard also shows rain amounts, soil moisture levels, and temperature measurements, as well as EC measurements for soft fruit growers.

″We are also working on water monitoring for irrigation pumps, so growers can record water usage and pressures within the dashboard,″ says James. ″We also provide a similar feature for polytunnel systems.″

New crop development indicators have also been introduced; growing degree days for all types of crops, growing degree hours for soft fruit crops, and cooling day degrees for crops like blackcurrants that need a certain amount of chill over the winter. ″Using these, growers can obtain thresholds for key management decisions and inputs,″ says James.

Dashboard access is available via an app that works across different devices. ″Overall, we now have a more comprehensive tool that is easy to use and allows growers to really connect with their data,″ says James.

″It pools relevant data from different sources and delivers a lot more value for money, putting real-time weather insights into growers’ hands.″