Precision irrigation Regenerative agriculture Optimized irrigation Water Talk Podcast
UNIVERSITY of WISCONSIN–MADISON
PI_texture.png
 

Precision irrigation

The future of soil and water management is real-time, fine-scale monitoring using a combination of ground-based sensors, meteorological networks, and remote sensing.

Our lab specializes in high-resolution sensing of crop water use, soil properties, and abiotic stress. We partner with growers, agencies, stakeholders, and other scientists to work towards our future vision of precise, integrated decision support for agricultural soil and water management. By complementing ground-based sensors and satellites with high-resolution remote and proximal sensing, we can identify “hot spots” within a field, assess which crops are best suited for precision management, and evaluate the in-season efficacy of precision management interventions.

Current explorations in Precision Irrigation:

Want to learn more about photogrammetry or crop stress? Come to UC ANR Drone Camp!

Drone Camp is a great program for professionals interested in using remotely piloted vehicles for imaging row crops, orchards, and vineyards! Dr. Nocco and Logan Ebert are excited to be Drone Camp instructors. We teach two in-depth workshops about processing drone imagery using photogrammetry and mapping crop water stress. DroneCamp is designed for a wide range of skill levels and interests, from complete beginners with little to no experience in drone technology, to intermediate users who want to learn more advanced data processing and analysis. Check out the link below to access videos from previous Drone Camp workshops!

more drone camp info!

Tree Remote Sensing of Evapotranspiration (T-REX) and water stress

Graduate Student Researcher Erica Edwards is working with a large group of researchers at UC Davis, UC ANR, the USDA, and Utah State University to develop remote sensing algorithms for crop water use (evapotranspiration) and stress (stem water potential) in almond orchards. Her work will help to understand when thermal imagery will be most useful for irrigation management in almond orchards. Our project is part of a larger effort called the Tree Remote sensing of Evapotranspiration eXperiment (T-REX) that involves coordinated flights across different UAS platforms, satellite overpasses, and ground measurements.

T-REX Press

ET mapping: how often, how high to fly?

Graduate Student Researcher Logan Ebert is using the High Resolution Mapping of Evapotranspiration (HRMET) model to map evapotranspiration over annual row crops (WI potato, CA processing tomato) and orchards (Cherry, Almond). His work bridges the gap between research and practice in precision monitoring of crop water and salinity stress. Logan is asking very interesting questions about how high we need to fly for water and salinity management as well as how we can best scale information from the ground to the air.