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2018
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Authors
Abd Aziz, S
Abd-Elrahman, A
Abdalla, K
Abdelghafour, F
Abdelghafour, F.Y
Abdol Lajis, G
Abonyi, J
Abu Seman, I
Acebron, K
Adamchuk, V
Adamchuk, V.I
Adams, C
Agili, H
Ahamed, T
Ahmed, M
Aizpurua, A
Akhter, F
Al-Busaidi, A
Al-Gaadi, K
Al-Mulla, Y.A
Al-Rahbi, S
Albrecht, U
Alchanatis, V
Alfonso, F
Alheidary, M.H
Ali, K
Ali, M
Alizadeh, E
Alves, F
Alves, G
Amaral, L.R
Ameglio, L
Ampatzidis, Y
Andersen, P
Anderson, L
Andrade, J
Andrade, P
Andrae, J
Andretta, I
Andrew, J
Ansari, M
Apolo-Apolo, E
Aranguren, M
Archontoulis, S
Arif, M
Arnall, D
Arzani, H
Asenso, E
Ashraf, E
Auer, W
Ault, A
Badenhorst, P.E
Badr, G
Badua, S
Bae, I
Baggard, J
Bagheri, S
Bainard, L
Balasundram, S.K
Balmos, A
Balol, G.B
Barnes, E
Barrero, O
Barroso, L
Bastos, L
Batbayar, E
Batchelor, W.D
Bates, T.R
Bauer, P.J
Bazzi, C
Bazzi, C.L
Bean, G
Bean, G.M
Been, T
Beeri, O
Bejo, S
Bekkerman, A
Beltarre, G
Benbihi, A
Benő, A
Berg, A
Berger, A
Berger, A.G
Berry, P
Bertani, T.D
Betzek, N.M
Bhandari, S
Bhansali, S
Bharatiya, P
Bhardwaj, M
Bhusal, S
Binch, A
Biradar, D.P
Bishop, T.F
Bisson, G
Biswas, A
Blacker, C
Blasch, G
Blocker, A.K
Boatswain Jacques, A.A
Bodas, V
Bodnár, K.B
Bohman, B
Boini, A
Bojer, O.M
Bonomi, A
Booij, J.A
Bosompem, M
Bouchard, M
Bouroubi, Y
Bradford, J
Brandes, N
Brant, V
Bredemeier, C
Bresilla, K
Brorsen, B
Bruggeman, S
Bruulsema, T
Buckmaster, D
Buelvas, R
Buelvas, R.M
Bugnet, P
Buri, M.M
Burton, L
Bélec, C
Bűdi, K
CHANDRASHEKAR, C.P
Caicedo, J.H
Caixia, S
Calera, A
Calera, M
Callegari, D
Camberato, J
Camberato, J.J
Cambouris, A
Cammarano, D
Campos, I
Campos, L.B
Campoy, J
Cao, Q
Cao, W
Cardoso, T.F
Caron, J
Carrillo Romero, G
Carter, E
Carter, P
Carter, P.R
Carvalho, R
Carver, S.M
Castellón, A
Castilla, L.A
Castro, T
Cavayas, F
Celades, J.A
Chabot, V
Chagas, M.F
Chaichi, M.R
Chakraborty, M
Channangi, S.M
Chassen, E
Chen, S
Chen, Y
Cheng, Z
Chiang, R
Chiang, R.C
Chokmani, K
Chong, Y
Chowdury, M
Christiansen, M.P
Chung, K
Chung, S
Chyba, J
Ciampitti, I
Clark, J.J
Clarke, S
Claussen, J
Claußen, J
Clay, D.E
Clay, S
Cloutier, G
Coates, A
Coble, K
Cocciardi, R
Codjia, C
Colley III, R
Cong, Y
Conley, S
Conway, L
Cook, S
Cooke, N
Cooper, J
Cordero, E
Corrêdo, L
Cosby, A
Cox, C
Craker, B.E
Crnojevic, V
Crnojevic-Bengin, V
Csatári, N
Cue, R.I
Cugnasca, C.E
Cuitiva Baracaldo, R
Cullop, J
Da Costa, J
Dall'Agnol, R.W
Dallago, G.M
Danford, D.D
Darrozes, J
Das, K
Daughtry, D
Davis, P
Debbagh, M
Deen, B
Derival, M
Desai, B.L
Desai, V
Devine, J
Dhoubhadel, S
Diago, M
Dillon, C
Dimos, N.F
Do, D
Doering, D
Donatti, C
Dong, J
Dong, R
Dongare, M.L
Douridas, N
Douzals, J
Draye, X
Drechsler, K
Drewry, J
Drexler, D
Dreyer, J
Drillich, M
Drover, D
Drummond, S.T
Duarte, C
Duft, D.G
Dukes, M
Duncan, E
Durand, P
Dynes, R
Dyrmann, M
Edge, B
Efrosinin, D
Egea, G
Eitelwein, M.T
Ekanayake, D.C
Erdle, K
Erickson, B
Eriksen, J
Esau, K
Esau, T
Espinas, A
Ettema, J.F
Evans, F
Evans, F.H
Fadul-Pacheco, L
Fajardo, M
Fallon, E
Fang, H
Farooque, A
Fassana, N
Feng, A
Feng, H
Ferguson, R
Ferguson, R.B
Feritas Colaço, A
Fernandez, F
Fernandez, F.G
Fernandez-Novales, J
Ferraz, M.N
Ferreyra, R
Figueiredo, D
Figueiredo, D.M
Filippi, P
Finegan, M
Fleming, K
Fontaine, D
Fountas, S
Fox, C.W
Franco, H.C
Franzen, D
Franzen, D.W
Fraser, E
Fu, W
Fu, X
Fuentes, C.L
Fulton, J
Fulton, J.P
G, S
Galzki, J
Gan, H
Gandorfer, M
Gao, N
García, C.E
Gavioli, A
Gaynor, P
Gendron, L
Gerighausen, H
Germain, C
Gerth, S
Ghoreishi, S
Gibberd, M
Gilbert, L
Gislum, R
Glewen, K
Godinho, R
Gombos, B
Gong, A
Gonçalves Trevisan, R
Gosselin, C
Goyer, C
Grappadelli, L.C
Green, O
Green, R.L
Griffin, T
Griffin, T.W
Grignani, C
Grooters, K
Gross, B
Gu, X
Guimarães, L
Guimarães, M
Gutierrez, S
Hafferman, A
Hagan, B.A
Hagymássy, Z
Ham, W
Hambly, H
Hand, K.J
Haneklaus, S.H
Hannah, L
Harris, G
Harsányi, E
Hassaballa, A.A
Hatfield, G
Hatley, D
Hauschild, L
Hauser, J.S
Hawkins, E
Haymann, N
Hazra, J
He, Y
Hedley, C
Hegedus, P.B
Heggemann, T
Heinrich, T
Helga, W
Herrmann, I
Hijmans, R.J
Hinck, S
Hinsinger, P
Hodge, K
Hoerfarter, R
Hoffman, E
Hoffmann Silva Karp, F
Holmes, A
Holmes, A.W
Huang, H
Huang, J
Huang, L
Hughes, E.W
Hülsbergen, K.J
Ibendahl, G
Irby, J.T
Issaka, F
Iwasaki, Y
Iwersen, M
Izurieta, C
Jadhav, B.T
Jafari, A
James, P
Jang, S
Jasse, E.P
Jayachandran, K
Jayasuriya, H
Jedmowski, C
Jensen, N
Jeong, D
Jermy, M
Jha, S
Ji, W
Jiang, G
Jiang, H
Jimenez, N
Jing, Q
Jiuhao, L
John, W
Johnson, R.M
Johnston, A
Jones, A
Jones, D.L
Jones, E.J
Jorgensen, R.N
Joshi, D
Jun, D
Junfang, X
Jørgensen, R.N
KC, K
Kabaliuk, N
Kabir, M.S
Kablan, L
Kakarla, S
Kale, M
Kantipudi, K
Kanz, P
Kaplan, G
Karatay, Y
Kargar, S
Karimi, F
Karkee, M
Karp, F.H
Karstoft, H
Kaur, G
Kavanagh, R
Kawagoe, Y
Kayad, A.G
Kechadi, M
Keller, B
Kempenaar, C
Keresztes, B
Kessel, G.J
Khakbazan, M
Khanal, K
Khanna, R
Kholikulov, S
Khosla, R
Khot, L
Khun, K
Kickinger, F
Kikkert, J.R
Kim, Y
Kindred, D
King, W
Kipper, M
Kisekka, I
Kitchen, N.R
Kitcken, N
Klopfenstein, A
Knapp, M
Knight, C.W
Koch, J.K
Kocsis, M
Kodaira, M
Koszinski, S
Kovács, A.J
Kraska, T
Krcek, V
Krieger, S
Kristensen, A.R
Krogmeier, J
Kross, A
Kroulik, M
Kulmány, I
Kumar, S
Laacouri, A
Laamrani, A
Laboski, C
Laboski, C.A
Lacerda, L
Lacoste, M
Lacroix, R
Lafond, J
Lai, C
Lajili, A
Lapen, D
Larsen, D
Laurenson, S
Laursen, M.S
Lauzon, S
Layton, A
Le-Khac, N
Leclerc, M
Lee, J
Lee, L
Lee, S
Lee, W
Lee, W.S
Leenen, M
Leese, S
Lefebvre, D
Lefebvre, D.M
Lefsrud, M
Leksono, E
Levitan, N
Li, D
Li, Q
Li, S
Li, X
Li, Y
Li, Z
Liakos, V
Liang, X
Lidauer, L
Liebisch, F
Lilienthal, H
Lin, Y
Liu, C
Liu, J
Liu, S
Liu, X
Ljubicic, N
Lobo Júnior, A
Longchamps, L
Lopez, H
Lorenz, F
Lottes, P
Lowenberg-DeBoer, J
Lu, J
Luciano, A.C
Luck, B
Luck, J
Lugli, L.C
Láng, V
MacAuliffe, R
Maciel, L
Madramootoo, C
Madugundu, R
Magalhaes, P.G
Magalhães, P.G
Magalhães, P.S
Maharjan, B
Maidl, F.X
Mailloux, A
Maja, J.M
Maldaner, L
Manfrini, L
Manning, M
March, M
Marchant, B
Marin-Barrero, C
Marmette, M
Martello, M
Martin, R
Martinez-Guanter, J
Martre, P
Massey, R.E
Maxwell, B
Maxwell, B.D
May-tal, S
McFadden, J
McLaren, A
McLendon, A
McNairn, H
Meeks, C
Mekonnen, Y
Mendez, L
Meng, J
Meng, L
Meng, Z
Mentrup, D
Mey-tal, S
Meyer-Aurich, A
Mi, G
Miao, Y
Michelon, G.K
Michiels, P
Milic, D
Milics, G
Miller, C
Miller, J
Mills, A
Mills, B
Min, C
Miniotti, E.F
Mirzakhaninafchi, H
Modi, R.U
Mohamed, M.M
Mohd Hanif, A
Molendijk, L.P
Molin, J
Molin, J.P
Mora, H
Morandi, B
Moreda, E.A
Moretti, B
Morgan, S
Morris, T
Mosler, T
Mostaço, G.M
Moulin, A
Mueller, J
Mueller, N
Mulla, D
Mulla, D.J
Muller, O
Mulligan, M
Munar Vivas, O
Munkhbayar, S
Muramatsu, K
Möller, A
NADAGOUDA, B.T
Nadav, I
Nafziger, E
Nafziger, E.D
Nagel, P
Nagy, J
Najdenko, E
Najvirt, D
Nargund, V.B
Nault, J
Nederend, J
Negreiros, M
Nelson, K.J
Neményi, M
Neupane, S
Neves, D.C
Ngo, V.M
Nguyen-Xuan, T
Nietfeld, W
Nieto, J
Nigon, T
Nikravesh, S
Nobakhti, A
Noel, S
Noland, R
Novais, W
Nyéki, A
Nándor, C
Oberthur, T
Oczak, M
Ortega, R
Osann, A
Otoni, L
Owens, J
Oyumaa, M
Pacheco, G.B
Pagani, A
Palacios, F
Pan, R
Pannell, D
Panneton, B
Paraforos, D
Pardaev, S
Parraga, A
Patil, P
Patil, V.C
Payn, R
Pecchioni, N
Peerlinck, A
Pelta, R
Perez, V
Perez-Ruiz, M
Perret, J.S
Perron, I
Perry, C
Perulli, G
Pessl, G
Peters, T
Pethybridge, S.J
Pfeiffer, J
Pham, F.H
Phelan, A
Phillippi, E
Phillips, R
Pieger, K
Pieruschka, R
Pilz, C
Pingle, V
Pires, P.S
Plaza, C
Pomar, C
Pomar, J
Port, K
Porter, W
Porto, A.J
Post, S
Potdar, M.P
Potrpin, J
Poulin, J
Pourshamsaei, H
Pradalier, C
Price, R.R
Prince Czarnecki, J.M
Puntel, L
Pätzold, S
Qian, B
Qiaohua, W
Quirós, J.J
Rabe, N
Ragán, P
Raheja, A
Rainbow, R
Randriamanga, D
Ransom, C.J
Rascher, U
Rasheed, R
Ravindran, P
Raz, J
Raz, Y
Reddy, S
Redmond, C
Reiche, B
Reicks, G
Reiter, S
Remacre, A.Z
Remus, A
Rennó, L.N
Rhea, S.T
Rial-Lovera, K
Richard, A
Ridout, M
Rivest, J
Roberson, G
Roberts, A
Rodriguez, J.C
Roehrdanz, P
Rojo, F
Roland, L
Romani, M
Roques, S
Rosburg, A
Rosen, C
Rosu, R
Rovira-Más, F
Rowland, D
Roy, R
Rozenstein, O
Ruckelshausen, A
Rud, R
Rudy, H
Rydahl, P
Rátonyi, T
SATYAREDDI, S.A
Sacco, D
Saenz, L
Saifuzzaman, M
Saiz-Rubio, V
Salvaggio, C
Sanches, G.M
Sanchez, S
Sanderson, J
Sanderson, R
Santos, A
Santos, C
Santos, D
Santos, R
Santos, R.A
Santschi, D.E
Saraswat, D
Sarwat, A
Sattlecker, G
Sauvageau, G
Sawyer, J
Sawyer, J.E
Scanlan, C
Scharf, P.C
Schenatto, K
Schleicher, S
Schmidt, K
Schnug, E
Scholtes, A.B
Scholz, C
Scholz, O
Schulte-Ostermann, S
Schumann, A
Schurr, U
Schweinzer, V
Sell, S.G
Seo, Y
Sessitsch, A
Shafian, S
Shahar, Y
Shaligram, A.D
Shanahan, J
Shang, J
Shang, Y
Sharda, A
Sharp, J
Shearer, S
Sheka Kanu, A
Sheppard, J
Sherman, T.M
Shibusawa, S
Shinde, S
Shockley, J
Shockley, J.M
Shurjeel, H.K
Siegwart, R
Silveira, R.R
Silverman, N
Sinfort, C
Singh, A
Singh, J
Singh, M
Sisák, I
Skerikova, M
Skovsen, S
Smith, A
Snider, J
Song, X
Soni, R
Sorensen, M.D
Souza, E
Souza, E.G
Souza, I.R
Spekken, M
Stachniss, C
Steen, K.A
Steensma, K.M
Steffan, S
Steier, A
Stelford, M.W
Stevens, G
Stewart, S
Stone, K.C
Strachan, I.B
Strasser, R
Strenner, M
Stuckey, E.G
Sturm, V
Sudduth, K.A
Sugihara, T
Sui, R
Sulyok, D
Sunohara, M
Susin, A
Swe, K.M
Sylvester-Bradley, R
Szabó, K
Szabó, S
Séguin, M
Tabatabai, S
Tagarakis, A.C
Takács, A
Tanny, J
Tardaguila, J
Tavares, T
Tavares, T.R
Taylor, A
Taylor, G.W
Taylor, J
Taylor, J.A
Taylor, M.E
Tenni, D
Thies, S
Thompson, L
Thompson, L.J
Tian, Y
Tikasz, P
Tola, E
Townsend, P
Tremblay, N
Trentin, C
Trevisan, R.G
Trindall, J
Tronco, M.L
Trotter, M
Tsogt-Ochir, S
Tsoulias, N
Tsukor, V
Tucker, M
Tulasigeri, V
Tumenjargal, E
Turk, P
Tuttle, G
Uhlmann, N
Uhrmann, F
Umeda, H
Upadhyaya, S
Valente, I.Q
Van Couwenberghe, R
Vargas, F
Vasseur, E
Vellidis, G
Vetsch, J
Viator, R.P
Vidana Gamage, D.N
Vieira, J
Vieira, J.A
Vigneault, P
Villalobos, J.E
Villodre, J
Virk, S
Voicu, A
Vories, E
Vories, E.D
Vosberg, S
Vántus, A
Wagner, P
Wallace, D
Walsh, O.S
Walter, A
Wang, C
Wang, H
Wang, J
Wang, S
Wang, X
Wang, Y
Wangyuan, Z
Ward, J
Ward, M.D
Warner, D
Wasson, L.L
Weersink, A
Welp, G
Werner, A
Whalen, J
Whelan, B
Whelan, B.M
White, M
Whitney, S
Wilson, G.L
Wilson, J.A
Wiseman, L
Wolf, J.G
Woods, S.A
Wright, T.M
Wu, D
Wörlein, N
Xia, T
Xie, R
Xu, X
Yang, C
Yang, G
Yang, L
Yang, Q
Yang, X
Yari, A
Yazdani, S
Yeager, E.A
Yongtao, L
Yost, M
Yost, M.A
Youchun, D
Zabransky, P
Zaman, Q
Zamora, M
Zebarth, B
Zebrath, B
Zendonadi, N
Zhang, A
Zhang, X
Zhang, Y
Zhang, Z
Zhao, Z
Zhihui, Z
Zhou, J
Zhu, Y
Zimmermanm, L
Znoj, E
Zsebo, S
Zsebő, S
Zude-Sasse, M
Zydenbos, S
da Silva, L.D
de Azevedo, K.K
de Figueiredo, D.M
de Menezes, P.L
de Sousa, M.G
de Souza, M.R
van Aardt, J
van Evert, F
van Evert, F.K
van Vliet, L
Ágnes, T
Öhlschuster, M
Topics
Site-Specific Nutrient, Lime and Seed Management
Proximal and Remote Sensing of Soil and Crop (including Phenotyping)
Drainage Optimization and Variable Rate Irrigation
Precision Crop Protection
Education and Outreach in Precision Agriculture
Big Data, Data Mining and Deep Learning
In-Season Nitrogen Management
Precision Agriculture and Global Food Security
Profitability and Success Stories in Precision Agriculture
Precision Dairy and Livestock Management
Applications of Unmanned Aerial Systems
Farm Animals Health and Welfare Monitoring
Site-Specific Pasture Management
Geospatial Data
Small Holders and Precision Agriculture
Robotics, Guidance and Automation
Decision Support Systems
Wireless Sensor Networks
Smart Weather for Precision Agriculture
Precision Horticulture
On Farm Experimentation with Site-Specific Technologies
Land Improvement and Conservation Practices
Workshops
Type
Oral
Poster
Year
2018
Home » Year » Results

Year

Filter results276 paper(s) found.

1. A Case Study Comparing Machine Learning and Vegetation Indices for Assessing Corn Nitrogen Status in an Agricultural Field in Minnesota

Compact hyperspectral sensors compatible with UAV platforms are becoming more readily available. These sensors provide reflectance in narrow spectral bands while covering a wide range of the electromagnetic spectrum. However, because of the narrow spectral bands and wide spectral range, hyperspectral data analysis can benefit greatly from data mining and machine learning techniques to leverage its power. In this study, rainfed corn was grown during the 2017 growing season using four nitrogen ... A. Laacouri, T. Nigon, D. Mulla, C. Yang

2. A Comparative Study of Field-Wide Estimation of Soil Moisture Using Compressive Sensing

In precision agriculture, monitoring of soil moisture plays an essential role in correct decision making. In practice, regular mesh installation, or large random deployment of moisture sensors over a large field is not possible due to cost and maintenance prohibitions. Consequently, direct measurement of moisture is possible at only a few points in the field. A value for the moisture may then be estimated for the remaining areas using a variety of algorithms. It is shown that althou... H. Pourshamsaei, A. Nobakhti

3. A Comparison of Three-Dimensional Data Acquisition Methods for Phenotyping Applications

Currently Phenotyping is primarily performed using two-dimensional imaging techniques. While this yields interesting data about a plant, a lot of information is lost using regular cameras. Since a plant is three-dimensional, the use of dedicated 3D-imaging sensors provides a much more complete insight into the phenotype of the plant. Different methods for 3D-data acquisition are available, each with their inherent advantages and disadvantages. These have to be addressed depending on the parti... O. Scholz, F. Uhrmann, S. Gerth, K. Pieger, J. Claußen

4. A Comprehensive Stress Index for Evaluating Plant Water Status in Almond Trees

This study evaluated a comprehensive plant water stress index that integrates the canopy temperature and the environmental conditions that can assist in irrigation management. This index—Comprehensive Stress Index (CSI)—is based on the reformulation of the leaf energy balance equation. Specifically, CSI is the ratio of the temperature difference between a dry leaf (i.e. a leaf with a broken stem) and a live leaf (on the same tree) [i.e. Tdry-Tleaf] and the difference between the v... K. Drechsler, I. Kisekka, S. Upadhyaya

5. A Gap Analysis of Broadband Connectivity and Precision Agriculture Adoption in Southwestern Ontario, Canada

In Southwestern Ontario (Canada), the availability of broadband, or high-speed internet, likely influences the adoption of precision agriculture (PA) technologies and functions of these technologies which enable real-time data sharing between the field and the digital cloud, and back again to the farm-level user. This paper examines the reasons why PA technologies are, or are not adopted, and adoption in relation to varying levels of broadband access. Broadband access is defined here with var... H. Hambly, M. Chowdury

6. A Long-Term Precision Agriculture System Maintains Profitability

After two decades of availability of grain yield-mapping technology, long-term trends in field-scale profitability for precision agriculture (PA) systems and conservation practices can now be assessed. Field-scale profitability of a conventional or ‘business-as-usual’ system with an annual corn (Zea mays L.)-soybean (Glycine max [L.]) rotation and annual tillage was assessed for 11 years on a 36-ha field in central Missouri during 1993 to 2003. Following this, a ‘precision a... M.A. Yost, N.R. Kitchen, K.A. Sudduth, S.T. Drummond, R.E. Massey

7. A Pilot Study on Monitoring Drinking Behavior in Bucket Fed Dairy Calves Using an Ear-Attached Tri-Axial Accelerometer

Accelerometers support the farmer with collecting information about animal behavior and thus allow a reduction in visual observation time. The milk intake of calves fed by teat-buckets has not been monitored automatically on commercial farms so far, although it is crucial for the calves’ development. This pilot study was based on bucket-fed dairy calves and intended (1) to evaluate the technical feasibility of using an ear-attached accelerometer (SMARTBOW, Smartbow GmbH, Weibern, Austri... L. Roland, L. Lidauer, G. Sattlecker, F. Kickinger, W. Auer, V. Sturm, D. Efrosinin, M. Drillich, M. Iwersen, A. Berger

8. A Precision Management Strategy on Soil Mapping

With the experience of field mapping practice during the last decade, a simple conclusion of four-level-field-management strategy was summarized. Level 1 was to describe the spatio-temporal variability of the fields, such as soil mapping and yield/quality mapping, and then to recognize the evidence in the field. Level 2 was to understand why the variability came out with help of farmers’ experience, such as mushing up of the date, memorizing the work history and the environmental condit... S. Shibusawa

9. A Tool for Monitoring Genetic Selection Differentials in Dairy Herds in Canada

A software tool was developed to allow a dairy producer and/or agricultural advisor to monitor the genetic selection differentials (GSD) that a dairy farm is making. The objectives of this study were (i) to monitor GSD in individual farms, over years, so that producers can be advised as to whether or not they are achieving their selection objectives (and hence optimizing productivity and profitability); (ii) the development of a prototype software tool and visualization model to assist produc... B.A. Hagan, R.I. Cue

10. Accelerating Precision Agriculture to Decision Agriculture: Enabling Digital Agriculture in Australia

For more than two decades, the success of Australia’s agricultural and rural sectors has been supported by the work of the Rural Research and Development Corporations (RDCs). The RDCs are funded by industry and government. For the first time, all fifteen of Australia’s RDC’s have joined forces with the Australian government to design a solution for the use of big data in Australian agriculture. This is the first known example of a nationwide approach for the digital transfor... J. Trindall, R. Rainbow

11. Active and Passive Sensor Comparison for Variable Rate Nitrogen Determination and Accuracy in Irrigated Corn

The objectives of this research were to (i) compare active and passive crop canopy sensors’ sidedress variable rate nitrogen (VRN) derived from different vegetation indices (VI) and (ii) assess VRN recommendation accuracy of active and passive sensors as compared to the agronomic optimum N rate (AONR) in irrigated corn. This study is comprised of six site-years (SY), conducted in 2015, 2016 and 2017 on different soil types (silt loam, loam and sandy loam) and with a range of preplant-ap... L. Bastos, R.B. Ferguson

12. Active Canopy Sensor-Based Precision Rice Management Strategy for Improving Grain Yield, Nitrogen and Water Use

The objective of this research was to develop an active crop sensor-based precision rice (Oryza sativa L.) management (PRM) strategy to improve rice yield, N and water use efficiencies and evaluate it against farmer’s rice management in Northeast China. Two field experiments were conducted from 2011 to 2013 in Jiansanjiang, Heilongjiang Province, China, involving four treatments and two varieties (Kongyu 131 and Longjing 21). The results indicated that PRM system significantly increased... J. Lu, H. Wang, Y. Miao

13. Active Canopy Sensors for the Detection of Non-Responsive Areas to Nitrogen Application in Wheat

Active canopy sensors offer accurate measurements of crop growth status that have been used in real time to estimate nitrogen (N) requirements. NDVI can be used to determine the absolute amount of fertilizer requirement, or simply to distribute within the field an average rate defined by decision models using other diagnostics. The objective of this work was to evaluate the capacity of active canopy sensors to determine yield and N application requirements within a site at jointing stage (Fee... A.G. Berger, E. Hoffman, N. Fassana, F. Alfonso

14. ADAPT: A Rosetta Stone for Agricultural Data

Modern farming requires increasing amounts of data exchange among hardware and software systems. Precision agriculture technologies were meant to enable growers to have information at their fingertips to keep accurate farm records (and calculate production costs), improve decision-making and promote effi­cien­cies in crop management, enable greater traceability, and so forth. The attainment of these goals has been limited by the plethora of proprietary, incompatible data formats among... D.D. Danford, K.J. Nelson, S.T. Rhea, M.W. Stelford, R. Ferreyra, J.A. Wilson, B.E. Craker

15. Adoption of Precision Agriculture Technology: A Duration Analysis

Precision agriculture technologies have been available for adoption and utilization at the farm level for several decades. Some technologies have been readily adopted while others were adopted more slowly. An analysis of 621 Kansas Farm Management Association (KFMA) farmer members provided insights regarding adoption, upgrading, and abandonment of technology. The likelihood that farms adopt specific technology given that other technology had been adop... T.W. Griffin, E.A. Yeager

16. AgDataBox – API (Application Programming Interface)

E-agricultural is an emerging field focusing in the enhancement of agriculture and rural development through improve in information and data processing. The data-intensive characteristic of these domains is evidenced by the great variety of data to be processed and analyzed. Countrywide estimates rely on maps, spectral images from satellites, and tables with rows for states, regions, municipalities, or farmers. Precision agriculture (PA) relies on maps of within field variability of soil and ... C.L. Bazzi, E.P. Jasse, E.G. Souza, P.S. Magalhães, G.K. Michelon, K. Schenatto, A. Gavioli

17. Agricultural Remote Sensing Information for Farmers in Germany

The European Copernicus program delivers optical and radar satellite imagery at a high temporal frequency and at a ground resolution of 10m worldwide with an open data policy. Since July 2017 the satellite constellation of the Sentinel-1 and -2 satellites is fully operational, allowing e.g. coverage of Germany every 1-2 days by radar and every 2-3 days with optical sensors. This huge data source contains a variety of valuable input information for farmers to monitor the in-field variability a... H. Lilienthal, H. Gerighausen, E. Schnug

18. Agricultural Robots: Drivers, Barriers and Opportunities for Adoption

In the next decades, agriculture is to feed a rapidly growing population, while tackling changes in climate, overexploited resources, changes in markets and competition with other sectors. Agriculture is, therefore, expected to move towards a more sustainable intensification. In this context, robotic technologies are aimed to reduce labor, using fewer resources and improving agricultural productivity. There is growing demand and awareness of the potential use of such technologies in the farmi... K. Rial-lovera

19. Agronōmics: Eliciting Food Security from Big Data, Big Ideas and Small Farms

Most farmers globally could make their farms more productive; few are limited by ambient availabilities of light energy and water. Similarly the sustainability of farming practices offers large scope for innovation and improvement. However, conventional ‘top-down’ Agricultural Knowledge and Innovation Systems (AKISs) are commonly failing to maintain significant progress in either productivity or sustainability because multifarious and complex agronomic interactions thwart accurate... R. Sylvester-bradley, D. Kindred, P. Berry

20. AgronomoBot: A Smart Answering Chatbot Applied to Agricultural Sensor Networks

Mobile devices advanced adoption has fostered the creation of various messaging applications providing convenience and practicality in general communication. In this sense, new technologies arise bringing automatic, continuous and intelligent features for communication through messaging applications by using web robots, also called Chatbots. Those are computer programs that simulate a real conversation between humans to answer questions or do tasks, giving the impression that the person is ta... G.M. Mostaço, L.B. Campos, C.E. Cugnasca, I.R. Souza

21. Akkerweb: A Platform for Precision Farming Data, Science, and Practice

The concept of precision farming (PF) was formulated about 40 years ago and the scientific knowledge for some applications of PF in The Netherlands has been available for almost 20 years. Also, in many cases equipment is available to implement PF in practice. In spite of all this PF uptake is still limited. An important reason for the limited uptake of PF is in the challenges that must be overcome to let data flow from sensors to data storage, to combine data sources and process them into rec... F.K. Van evert, T. Been, J.A. Booij, C. Kempenaar, G.J. Kessel, L.P. Molendijk

22. An Active Thermography Method for Immature Citrus Fruit Detection

Fast and accurate methods of immature citrus fruit detection are critical to building early yield mapping systems. Previously, machine vision methods based on color images were used in many studies for citrus fruit detection. Despite the high resolutions of most color images, problems such as the color similarity between fruit and leaves, and various illumination conditions prevented those studies from achieving high accuracies. This project explored a novel method for immature citrus fruit d... H. Gan, W.S. Lee, V. Alchanatis, A. Abd-elrahman

23. An Automatic Control Method Research for 9YG-1.2 Large Round Baler

When manual or semi-automatic round baler working, the tractor driver have to frequently manual the machine according to the bale process at the same time of driving. The driver easily feel fatigue in this operating mode for a long time, so the consistency of the bale’s density can not be guaranteed. And there may be wrong operation. In this article, we use the model 9YG-1.2 large round baler as a research prototype. We study the information collection and processing of the baler’... J. Dong, Z. Meng, Y. Cong, A. Zhang, W. Fu, R. Pan, Q. Yang, Y. Shang

24. An Economic Feasibility Assessment for Adoption of Autonomous Field Machinery in Row Crop Production

A multi-faceted whole farm planning model was developed to compare conventional and autonomous machinery for grain crop production.  Results suggested that autonomous machinery could be an economically viable alternative to conventional manned machinery if the establishment of intelligent controls was cost effective.  An increase in net returns of 22% over operating with conventional machinery was found.  This study also identified the break-even investment price for intelligen... J.M. Shockley, C. Dillon

25. An Economic-Theory-Based Approach to Management Zone Delineation

In both the academic and popular literatures on precision agriculture technology, a management zoneis generally defined as an area in a field within which the optimal input application strategy is spatially uniform.  The characteristics commonly chosen to delineate management zones, both in the literature and in commercial practice, are yield and variables associated with yield.  But microeconomic theory makes clear that economically optimal input application strategi... B. Edge

26. An Efficient Data Warehouse for Crop Yield Prediction

Nowadays, precision agriculture combined with modern information and communications technologies, is becoming more common in agricultural activities such as automated irrigation systems, precision planting, variable rate applications of nutrients and pesticides, and agricultural decision support systems. In the latter, crop management data analysis, based on machine learning and data mining, focuses mainly on how to efficiently forecast and improve crop yield. In recent years, raw and semi-pr... V.M. Ngo, N. Le-khac, M. Kechadi

27. An On-farm Experimental Philosophy for Farmer-centric Digital Innovation

In this paper, we review learnings gained from early On-Farm Experiments (OFE) conducted in the broadacre Australian grain industry from the 1990s to the present day. Although the initiative was originally centered around the possibilities of new data and analytics in precision agriculture, we discovered that OFEs could represent a platform for engaging farmers around digital technologies and innovation. Insight from interacting closely with farmers and advisors leads us to argue for a change... S. Cook, M. Lacoste, F. Evans, M. Ridout, M. Gibberd, T. Oberthur

28. Analysis of Soil Properties Predictability Using Different On-the-Go Soil Mapping Systems

Understanding the spatial variability of soil chemical and physical attributes allows for the optimization of the profitability of nutrient and water management for crop development. Considering the advantages and accessibility of various types of multi-sensor platforms capable of acquiring large sensing data pertaining to soil information across a landscape, this study compares data obtained using four common soil mapping systems: 1) topography obtained using a real-time kinematic (RTK) glob... H. Huang, V. Adamchuk, A. Biswas, W. Ji, S. Lauzon

29. Analyzing Trends for Agricultural Decision Support System Using Twitter Data

The trends and reactions of the general public towards global events can be analyzed using data from social platforms, including Twitter. The number of tweets has been reported to help detect variations in communication traffic within subsets like countries, age groups and industries. Similarly, publicly accessible data and (in particular) data from social media about agricultural issues provide a great opportunity for obtaining instantaneous snapshots of farmers’ opinions and a method ... S. Jha, D. Saraswat, M.D. Ward

30. Application of a Systems Model to a Spatially Complex Irrigated Agricultural System: A Case Study

Although New Zealand is water-rich, many of the intensively farmed lowland areas suffer frequent summer droughts. Irrigation schemes have been developed to move water from rivers and aquifers to support agricultural production. There is therefore a need to develop tools and recommendations that consider both water dynamics and outcomes in these irrigated cropping systems. A spatial framework for an existing systems model (APSIM Next Generation) was developed that could capture the variability... J. Sharp, C. Hedley

31. Application of Routines for Automation of Geostatistical Analysis Procedures and Interpolation of Data by Ordinary Kriging

Ordinary kriging (OK) is one of the most suitable interpolation methods for the construction of thematic maps used in precision agriculture. However, the use of OK is complex. Farmers/agronomists are generally not highly trained to use geostatistical methods to produce soil and plant attribute maps for precision agriculture and thus ensure that best management approaches are used. Therefore, the objective of this work was to develop and apply computational routines using procedures and geosta... N.M. Betzek, E.G. Souza, C.L. Bazzi, P.G. Magalhães, A. Gavioli, K. Schenatto, R.W. Dall'agnol

32. Application of Variable-Rate Irrigation for Potato Productivity

Variable-rate irrigation (VRI) has the potential to increase yields and reduce water consumption and energy costs. Spatial and temporal variability of soil and field properties can impact the efficiency of irrigation and crop yield. The VRI technology allows for the precise application of irrigation to meet crop water demands in controlled amounts prescribed for specific management zones within a field. Sensitivity to over and under-irrigation and the high-water requirements of potato make th... A. Yari, C. Madramootoo, S.A. Woods, V.I. Adamchuk, L. Gilbert

33. Applying a Bivariate Frequency Ratio Technique for Potato High Yield Susceptibility Mapping

Spatial variation of soil characteristics and vegetation conditions are viewed as the most important indicators of crop yield status. Therefore, this study was designed to develop a crop yield prediction model through spatial autocorrelation between the actual yield of potato (Solanum tuberosum L.) crop and selected yield status indicators (soil N, EC, pH, texture and vegetation condition), where the vegetation condition was represented by the cumulative normalized difference vegetation index... K. Al-gaadi, A.A. Hassaballa, E. Tola, R. Madugundu, A.G. Kayad

34. Assessment of Crop Growth Under Modified Center Pivot Irrigation Systems Using Small Unmanned Aerial System Based Imaging Techniques

Irrigation accounts for about 80% consumptive use of water in the Northwest of United States. Even small increases in water use efficiency can improve crop production, yield, and have more water available for alternative uses. Center pivot irrigation systems are widely recognized in the irrigation industry for being one of the most efficient sprinkler systems. In recent years, there has been a shift from high pressure impact sprinklers on the top of center pivots to Mid Elevation Spray Applic... M. Chakraborty, T. Peters, L. Khot

35. Assessment of Red-Edge Based Vegetation Indices Derived from Unmanned Arial Vehicle for Plant Nitrogen Content Estimation

Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) have become increasingly popular in recent years for agricultural research. High spatial and temporal resolution images obtained with UAVs are ideal for many applications in agriculture. The objective of this study was to evaluate the performance of red edge based vegetation indices (VIs) derived from UAV images for quantification of plant nitrogen (N) content of spring wheat, a major cereal crop worldwide. This study was conducted at three locations in Idaho, ... O.S. Walsh, S. Shafian

36. Assessment of the Information Content in Solar Reflective Satellite Measurements with Respect to Crop Growth Model State Variables

To increase the utilization of satellite remote sensing data in precision agriculture, it is necessary to retrieve the most relevant variables from the satellite signals so that the retrievals can be directly utilized by agricultural management entities. The variables that make up the state vector description of existing crop growth models provide inherent relevance to on-farm decision making because they can be used to predict future crop status based on changing farm inputs. In this study, ... N. Levitan, B. Gross

37. Automated Segmentation and Classification of Land Use from Overhead Imagery

Reliable land cover or habitat maps are an important component of any long-term landscape planning initiatives relying on current and past land use. Particularly in regions where sustainable management of natural resources is a goal, high spatial resolution habitat maps over large areas will give guidance in land-use management. We propose a computational approach to identify habitats based on the automated analysis of overhead imagery. Ultimately, this approach could be used to assist expert... C. Pradalier, A. Richard, V. Perez, R. Van couwenberghe, A. Benbihi, P. Durand

38. Autonomous Mapping of Grass-Clover Ratio Based on Unmanned Aerial Vehicles and Convolutional Neural Networks

This paper presents a method which can provide support in determining the grass-clover ratio, in grass-clover fields, based on images from an unmanned aerial vehicle. Automated estimation of the grass-clover ratio can serve as a tool for optimizing fertilization of grass-clover fields. A higher clover content gives a higher performance of the cows, when the harvested material is used for fodder, and thereby this has a direct impact on the dairy industry. An android ... D. Larsen, S. Skovsen, K.A. Steen, K. Grooters, O. Green, R.N. Jørgensen, J. Eriksen

39. Barriers to Adoption of Smart Farming Technologies in Germany

The number of smart farming technologies available on the market is growing rapidly. Recent surveys show that despite extensive research efforts and media coverage, adoption of smart farming technologies is still lower than expected in Germany. Media analysis, a multi stakeholder workshop, and the Adoption and Diffusion Outcome Prediction Tool (ADOPT) (Kuehne et al. 2017) were applied to analyze the underlying adoption barriers that explain the low to moderate adoption levels of smart farming... M. Gandorfer, S. Schleicher, K. Erdle

40. Calculating the Water Deficit of Apple Orchard by Means of Spatially Resolved Approach

In semi-humid climate, spatially resolved analysis of water deficit was carried out in apple orchard (Malus x domestica 'Pinova'). The meteorological data were recorded daily by a weather station. The apparent soil electrical conductivity (ECa) was measured at field capacity, and twenty soil samples in 30 cm were gathered for texture, bulk density, and gravimetric soil water content analyses. Furthermore, ten trees were defoliated in different ECa regions in order to estimate the leaf... N. Tsoulias, D. Paraforos, N. Brandes, S. Fountas, M. Zude-sasse

41. Can Optimization Associated with On-Farm Experimentation Using Site-Specific Technologies Improve Producer Management Decisions?

Crop production input decisions have become increasingly difficult due to uncertainty in global markets, input costs, commodity prices, and price premiums. We hypothesize that if producers had better knowledge of market prices, spatial variability in crop response, and weather conditions that drive crop response to inputs, they could more cost-effectively make profit-maximizing input decisions. Understanding the drivers of variability in crop response and designing accompanying management str... B.D. Maxwell, A. Bekkerman, N. Silverman, R. Payn, J. Sheppard, C. Izurieta, P. Davis, P.B. Hegedus

42. Can Unreplicated Strip Trials Be Used in Precision On-Farm Experiments?

On-farm experiments are used to evaluate a wide variety of products ranging from pesticide and fertilizer rates to the installation of tile drainage. The experimental design for these experiments is usually replicated strip trials.  Replication of strip trials is used to estimate experimental error, which is the basis for judging statistical significance of treatment effects. Another consideration for using strip trials is greater within-field variability than smaller fields us... G. Hatfield, G. Reicks, E. Carter

43. Canopy Parameters in Coffee Orchards Obtained by a Mobile Terrestrial Laser Scanner

The application of mobile terrestrial laser scanner (MTLS) has been studied for different tree crops such as citrus, apple, olive, pears and others. Such sensing system is capable of accurately estimating relevant canopy parameters such as volume and can be used for site-specific applications and for high throughput plant phenotyping. Coffee is an important tree crop for Brazil and could benefit from MTLS applications. Therefore, the purpose of this research was to define a field protocol for... F. Hoffmann silva karp, A. Feritas colaço, R. Gonçalves trevisan, J.P. Molin

44. Canopy Temperature Mapping with a Vineyard Robot

The wine industry is a strategic sector in many countries worldwide. High revenues in the wine market typically result in higher investments in specialized equipment, so that producers can introduce disruptive technology for increasing grape production and quality. However, many European producers are approaching retirement age, and therefore the agricultural sector needs a way for attracting young farmers who can assure the smooth transition between generations; digital technology offers an ... V. Saiz-rubio, M. Diago, J. Tardaguila, S. Gutierrez, F. Rovira-más, F. Alves

45. Changing the Cost of Farming: New Tools for Precision Farming

Accurate prescription maps are essential for effective variable rate fertilizer application.  Grid soil sampling has most frequently been used to develop these prescription maps.  Past research has indicated several technical and economic limitations associated with this approach.  There is a need to keep the number of samples to a minimum while still allowing a reasonable level of map quality.  As can be seen, precision agriculture managemen... P. Nagel, K. Fleming

46. Characterization of Soil Properties, Nutrient Distribution and Rice (Oryza Sativa.) Productivity As Influenced by Tillage Methods in a Typical Gleysols

Global emphasis and interest in conservation Tillage in agricultural soils has tremendously increased in the last few years, especially no tillage with its potential to improve soil physicochemical properties, reduce nutrient leaching as well as improve crop productivity in a more sustainable manner.  Several questions still exist with regard to the true role of no tillage in improving soil fertility. A two year field study was conducted to characterize the effects of different tillage m... F. Issaka, L. Yongtao, L. Jiuhao, M.M. Buri, E. Asenso, A. Sheka kanu, Z. Zhao

47. Comparison of the Performance of Two Vis-NIR Spectrometers in the Prediction of Various Soil Properties

Spectroscopy has shown capabilities of predicting certain soil properties. Hence, it is a promising avenue to complement traditional wet chemistry analysis that is costly and time-consuming. This study focuses on the comparison of two Vis-NIR instruments of different resolution to assess the effect of the resolution on the ability of an instrument to predict various soil properties. In this study, 798 air dried and compressed soil samples representing different agro-climatic conditions across... M. Marmette, V. Adamchuk, J. Nault, S. Tabatabai, R. Cocciardi

48. Compensating for Soil Moisture Effects in Estimation of Soil Properties by Electrical Conductivity Sensing

Bulk apparent soil electrical conductivity (ECa) is the most widely used soil sensing modality in precision agriculture. Soil ECa relates to multiple soil properties, including clay content (i.e., texture) and salt content (i.e., salinity). However, calibrations of ECa to soil properties are not temporally stable, due in large part to soil moisture differences between measurement dates. Therefore, the objective of this research was to investigate the effects of temporal soil moisture variatio... K.A. Sudduth, N.R. Kitchen, E.D. Vories, S.T. Drummond

49. Computer Vision Techniques Applied to Natural Scenes Recognition and Autonomous Locomotion of Agricultural Mobile Robots

The use of computer systems in Precision Agriculture (PA) promotes the processes’ automation and its applied tasks, specifically the inspection and analysis of agricultural crops, and guided/autonomous locomotion of mobile robots. In this context, this research aims the application of computer vision techniques for agricultural mobile robot locomotion, settled through an architecture for the acquisition, image processing and analysis, in order to segment, classify and recognize patterns... L.C. Lugli, M.L. Tronco, A.J. Porto

50. Corn Nitrogen Fertilizer Recommendation Models Based on Soil Hydrologic Groups Aid in Predicting Economically Optimal Nitrogen Rates

Nitrogen (N) fertilizer recommendations that match corn (Zea mays L.) N needs maximize grower profits and minimize water quality consequences. However, spatial and temporal variability makes determining future N requirements difficult. Studies have shown no single soil or weather measurement is consistently increases accuracy, especially when applied over a regional scale, in predicting economically optimal N rate (EONR). Basing site N response on soil hydrological group could help account fo... G.M. Bean, N.R. Kitchen, J.J. Camberato, R.B. Ferguson, F.G. Fernandez, D.W. Franzen, C.A. Laboski, E.D. Nafziger, J.E. Sawyer, P.C. Scharf

51. Correlating Plant Nitrogen Status in Cotton with UAV Based Multispectral Imagery

Cotton is an indeterminate crop; therefore, fertility management has a major impact on the growth pattern and subsequent yield. Remote sensing has become a promising method of assessing in-season cotton N status in recent years with the adoption of reliable low-cost unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), high-resolution sensors and availability of advanced image processing software into the precision agriculture field. This study was conducted on a UGA Tifton campus farm located in Tifton, GA. The ... W. Porter, D. Daughtry, G. Harris, R. Noland, J. Snider, S. Virk

52. Correlations Between Meteorological Parameters and the Water Loss of Maize from Silking to Harvesting

The University of Debrecen provides outstanding conditions for the development of “Smart Weather for Precision Agriculture” programs. The reliability of research is provided by the Polyfactoral Long-term Field Experiments of Debrecen (hybrid x fertilisation x plant density x tillage x irrigation) established in 1983. Within this research program, it is possible to examine various crop cultures, cultivars and hybrids under changing natural, environmental and weather circu... K.B. Bodnár, J. Nagy, B. Gombos

53. Creating Thematic Maps and Management Zones for Agriculture Fields

Thematic maps (TMs) are maps that represent not only the land but also a topic associated with it, and they aim to inform through graphic symbols where a specific geographical phenomenon occurs. Development of TMs is linked to data collection, analysis, interpretation, and representation of the information on a map, facilitating the identification of similarities, and enabling the visualization of spatial correlations. Important issues associated with the creation of TMs are: selection of the... E. Souza, K. Schenatto, C. Bazzi

54. Crop Price Variation and Water Saving Technologies in Alborz Province of Iran

Considering the importance and scarcity of water resources, the efficient management of water resources is of great imp,ortance. Adoption of modern irrigation technology is considered to be a key of increasing the efficiency of water used in agriculture. Policy makers have implemented several ways to induce the adoption of new irrigation technology. The empirical studies show that farmers are reluctant to utilize the use of new irrigation methods. This study aims to assess factors affecting o... S. Yazdani, S. Nikravesh, S. Bagheri

55. Data Clustering Tools for Understanding Spatial Heterogeneity in Crop Production by Integrating Proximal Soil Sensing and Remote Sensing Data

Remote sensing (RS) and proximal soil sensing (PSS) technologies offer an advanced array of methods for obtaining soil property information and determining soil variability for precision agriculture. A large amount of data collected using these sensors may provide essential information for precision or site-specific management in a production field. In this paper, we introduced a new clustering technique was introduced and compared with existing clustering tools for determining relatively hom... M. Saifuzzaman, V.I. Adamchuk, H. Huang, W. Ji, N. Rabe, A. Biswas

56. Data Fusion of Imagery from Different Satellites for Global and Daily Crop Monitoring

Satellite-based Crop Monitoring is an important tool for decision making of irrigation, fertilization, crop protection, damage assessment and more. To allow crop monitoring worldwide, on a daily basis, data fusion of images taken by different satellites is required. So far, most researches on data fusion focus on retrospective analysis, while advanced crop monitoring capabilities mandate the use of data in real time mode. Therefore, our project goals were: (1) to build a data-fusion online sy... O. Beeri, R. Pelta, S. Mey-tal, J. Raz

57. Data Power: Understanding the Impacts of Precision Agriculture on Social Relations

Precision agriculture has been greatly promoted for the potential of these technologies to sustainably intensify food production through increasing yields and profits, decreasing the environmental impacts of production, and improving food safety and transparency in the food system through the data collected by precision agriculture technologies.  However, little attention has been given to the potential of these technologies to impact social relations within the agricultural industry.&nb... E. Duncan, E. Fraser

58. Data-Driven Agricultural Machinery Activity Anomaly Detection and Classification

In modern agriculture, machinery has become the one of the necessities in providing safe, effective and economical farming operations and logistics. In a typical farming operation, different machines perform different tasks, and sometimes are used together for collaborative work. In such cases, different machines are associated with representative activity patterns, for example, in a harvest scenario, combines move through a field following regular swaths while grain carts follow irregular pa... Y. Wang, A. Balmos, J. Krogmeier, D. Buckmaster

59. Delineation of 'Management Classes' Within Non-Irrigated Maize Fields Using Readily Available Reflectance Data and Their Correspondence to Spatial Yield Variation

Maize is grown predominantly for silage or gain in North Island, New Zealand. Precision agriculture allows management of spatially variable paddocks by variably applying crop inputs tailored to distinctive potential-yield limiting areas of the paddock, known as management zones. However, uptake of precision agriculture among in New Zealand maize growers is slow and limited, largely due to lack of data, technical expertise and evidence of financial benefits. Reflectance data of satellite and a... D.C. Ekanayake, J. Owens, A. Werner, A. Holmes

60. Delineation of Site-Specific Nutrient Management Zones to Optimize Rice Production Using Proximal Soil Sensing and Multispectral Imaging

Evaluating nutrient uptake and site-specific nutrient management zones in rice in Costa Rica from plant tissue and soil sampling is expensive because of the time and labor involved.  In this project, a range of measurement techniques were implemented at different vintage points (soil, plant and UAVs) in order to generate and compare nutrient management information.  More precisely, delineation of site-specific nutrient management zones were determined using 1) georeferenced soil/tis... J.E. Villalobos, J.S. Perret, K. Abdalla, C.L. Fuentes, J.C. Rodriguez, W. Novais

61. Delineation of Soil Management Zones: Comparison of Three Proximal Soil Sensor Systems Under Commercial Potato Field in Eastern Canada.

Precision agriculture (PA) involves optimization of seeding, fertilizer application, irrigation, and pesticide use to optimize crop production for the purpose of increasing grower revenue and protecting the environment. Potato crops (Solanum tuberosum L.) are recognized as good candidates for the adoption of PA because of the high cost of inputs. In addition, the sensitivity of potato yield and quality to crop management and environmental conditions makes precision management economicall... A. Cambouris, I. Perron, B. Zebarth, F. Vargas, K. Chokmani, A. Biswas, V. Adamchuk

62. Deriving Fertiliser VRA Calibration Based on Ground Sensing Data from Specific Field Experiments

Nitrogen (N) fertilisation affects both rice yield and quality. In order to improve grain yield while limiting N losses, providing N fertilisers during the critical growth stages is essential. NDRE is considered a reliable crop N status indicator, suitable to drive topdressing N fertilisation in rice. A multi-year experiment on different rice varieties (Gladio, Centauro, and Carnaroli) was conducted between 2011 and 2017 in Castello d’Agogna (PV), northwest Italy, with the aim of i) est... E. Cordero, D. Sacco, B. Moretti, E.F. Miniotti, D. Tenni, G. Beltarre, M. Romani, C. Grignani

63. Design and Analysis of ISO 11783 Task Controller's Functionality in Server - Client ECU for Agricultural Vehicles

A modern agricultural vehicle's electronic control units (ECU) communicated based on the ISO 11783 standards. The connection of different machines, implements, different manufacturers into a single bus for the exchange of control commands and sensor data are a challenge for the precision agriculture. One of main functionality is the Task controller in the intelligent monitoring system. The task controller is to log data and assign set-point values for automated work (task) seque... E. Tumenjargal, E. Batbayar, S. Munkhbayar, S. Tsogt-ochir, M. Oyumaa, K. Chung, W. Ham

64. Design and Performance Experiment of an Outer Grooved-Wheel Fertilizer Apparatus with the Helical Tooth

Traditional outer groove-wheel fertilizer apparatus (OGWFA) with the straight tooth exists the problem of breakage and pulsation in the fertilizing process. A new type of OGWFA with the helical tooth has been designed to solve this problem, and the amount of fertilizer can be adjusted. The helix angle of the helical tooth has been optimized by theory analysis and DEM simulation. It reveals that the helix angle should be ranged from 34.4° to 68.8°. The performances of the OGWFA with th... D. Jun, X. Junfang, Z. Wangyuan, W. Qiaohua, D. Youchun, S. Caixia, Z. Zhihui

65. Design of Ground Surface Sensing Using RADAR

Ground sensing is the key task in harvesting head control system. Real time sensing of field topography under vegetation canopy is very challenging task in wild blueberry cropping system. This paper presents the design of an ultra-wide band RADAR sensing, scanning device to recognize the soil surface level under the canopy structure. Requirements for software and hardware were considered to determine the usability of the ultra-wide band RADAR system.An automated head ... M.M. Mohamed, Q. Zaman, T. Esau, A. Farooque

66. Designated Value for a Field Polygon Based on Imagery Data: A Case Study of Crop Vigor in Agricultural Application for Irrigation

Any irrigation action for a field management zone, which is based on images, requires a transformation into single value. Since data distribution is ab-normal in an image, using a mean value to estimate the crop coefficient (Kc), an overlaid polygon may not represent properly its water demand. Therefore, this project’s aim was to examine to which extent different statistics of potential designated values will affect an estimated Kc, and consequently affect irrigation practices. ... R. Rud, O. Beeri, S. Mey-tal

67. Detecting Basal Stem Rot (BSR) Disease at Oil Palm Tree Using Thermal Imaging Technique

Basal stem rot (BSR), caused by Ganoderma boninense is known as the most damaging disease in oil palm plantations in Southeast Asia. Ganoderma could reduce the productivity of oil palm plantations and potentially reduce the market value of palm oil in Malaysia. Early disease management of Ganoderma could prevent production losses and reduce the cost of plantation management. This study focuses on identifying the thermal properties of healthy and BSR-infected tree using a thermal ima... S. Bejo, G. Abdol lajis, S. Abd aziz, I. Abu seman, T. Ahamed

68. Detecting Variability in Plant Water Potential with Multi-Spectral Satellite Imagery

Irrigation Intelligence is a practice of precise irrigation, with the goal of providing crops with the right amount of water, at the right time, for optimized yield. One of the ways to achieve that, on a global scale, is to utilize Landsat-8 and Sentinel-2 images, providing together frequent revisit cycles of less than a week, and an adequate resolution for detection of 1 ha plots. Yet, in order to benefit from these advantages, it is necessary to examine the information that can be extracted... O. Beeri, S. May-tal, R. Rud, Y. Raz, R. Pelta

69. Detection and Monitoring the Risk Level for Lameness and Lesions in Dairy Herds by Alternative Machine-Learning Algorithms

Machine-learning methods may play an increasing role in the development of precision agriculture tools to provide predictive insights in dairy farming operations and to routinely monitor the status of dairy cows. In the present study, we explored the use of a machine-learning approach to detect and monitor the welfare status of dairy herds in terms of lameness and lesions based on pre-recorded farm-based records. Animal-based measurements such as lameness and lesions are time-consuming, expen... D. Warner, R. Lacroix, E. Vasseur, D. Lefebvre

70. Developing an Integrated Approach for Estimation of Soil Available Nutrient Content Using the Modified WOFOST Model and Time-Series Multispectral UAV Observations

Soil available nutrient (SAN) plays an important role in crop growth, yield formation, and plant-soil-atmosphere system exchange. Nitrogen (N), phosphorus (P) and potassium (K) are recognized as three primary nutrients in crop production. Accurate and timely information on SAN conditions at key crop growth stages is important for developing beneficial management practices. While traditional field sampling can obtain reliable information for limited number of sites, it is infeasible for spatia... Z. Cheng, J. Meng, J. Shang, J. Liu, B. Qian, Q. Jing

71. Development of a Graphical User Interface for Spinner-Disc Spreader Calibration and Spread Uniformity Assessment

Broadcast fertilizer distribution through spinner-disc spreaders remain the most cost-effective, and least time consuming process to apply the needed soil amendments for the next crop. Spreaders currently available to producers enable them to apply a variety of granular products at varying rates, blends, and swath widths. In order to uniformly apply granular fertilizer or lime, the spreader should be calibrated by standard pan testing with any change in spreader settings, application rate, or... R. Colley iii, Y. Lin, J. Fulton, S. Shearer

72. Development of a High Resolution Soil Moisture for Precision Agriculture in India

Soil moisture and temperature are key inputs to several precision agricultural applications such as irrigation scheduling, identifying crop health, pest and disease prediction, yield and acreage estimation, etc.  The existing remote sensing satellites based soil moisture products such as SMAP are of coarse resolution and physics based land surface model such as NLDAS, GLDAS are of coarse resolution as well as not available for real time applications.  Keeping this in focus, we are d... K. Das, J. Singh, J. Hazra

73. Development of a Machine Vision Yield Monitor for Shallot Onion Harvesters

Crop yield estimation and mapping are important tools that can help growers efficiently use their available resources and have access to detailed representations of their farm. Technical advancements in computer vision have improved the detection, quality assessment and yield estimation processes for crops, including apples, citrus, mangoes, maize, figs and many other fruits. However, similar methods capable of exporting a detailed yield map for vegetable crops have not yet been fully develop... A.A. Boatswain jacques, V.I. Adamchuk, G. Cloutier, J.J. Clark, C. Miller

74. Development of a Manual Soil Sensing System for Measuring Multiple Chemical Soil Properties in the Field

Variable Rate Fertilizer Application (VRA) requires the input of soil chemical data. One of the preferred methods for analyzing soil chemical properties in the field is by using Ion Selective Electrodes (ISEs). To accommodate portability in soil measurements, a manual soil sampling system was developed. Nitrate, Phosphate and pH ISEs were integrated to provide a general outlook on the condition of essential soil nutrients. These ISEs were placed on a modified hand-held soil sampler equip... E. Leksono, V. Adamchuk, J. Whalen, R. Buelvas

75. Development of a Small Tracking Device for Cattle Using IoT Technology

The US is the largest producer of beef in the world. Last year alone, it produces nearly 19% of the world’s beef.  This translate to about almost $90 billion in economic impact in the country. Aside from being a producer, the US also consumed more than 26 billion pounds of beef which have a retail value of the entire beef industry to more than $74B. For this level of production and consumption, each rancher in the US must produce a herd size of at least 100 or more to sustain the c... J.M. Maja, A.K. Blocker, E.G. Stuckey, S.G. Sell, G. Tuttle, J. Mueller, J. Andrae

76. Development of a Soil ECa Inversion Algorithm for Topsoil Depth Characterization

Electromagnetic induction (EMI) proximal soil sensor systems can deliver rapid information about soil. One such example is the DUALEM-21S (Dualem, Inc. Milton, Ontario, Canada). EMI sensors measure soil apparent electrical conductivity (ECa) corresponding to different depth of investigation depending on the instrument configuration. The interpretation of the ECa measurements is not straightforward and it is often site-specific. Inversion is required to explore specific depths. This inversion ... E. Leksono, V. Adamchuk, W. Ji, M. Leclerc

77. Development of a Wireless Sensor Network for Passive in situ Measurement of Soil CO2 Gas Emissions in the Agriculture Landscape

Quantification of soil Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions from agricultural fields is essential for understanding the environmental impact of intensive crop and livestock production systems. Current methods of analysis include flux calculations derived from the concentration of gases (CO2, N2O, CH4) exchanged between soil and the atmosphere. Samples of these GHG are obtained manually by closed non-steady state non-flow through,or “static”, chambers and analyzed ex situvia ga... V. Adamchuk, M. Debbagh, C. Madramootoo, J. Whalen

78. Development of an Online Decision-Support Infrastructure for Optimized Fertilizer Management

Determination of an optimum fertilizer application rate involves various influential factors, such as past management, soil characteristics, weather, commodity prices, cost of input materials and risk preference. Spatial and temporal variations in these factors constitute sources of uncertainties in selecting the most profitableapplication rate. Therefore, a decision support system (DSS) that could help to minimize production risks in the context of uncertain crop performance is needed. ... S. Shinde, V. Adamchuk, R. Lacroix, N. Tremblay, Y. Bouroubi

79. Development of an Overhead Optical Yield Monitor for a Sugarcane Harvester in Louisiana

A yield monitor is a device used to measure harvested crop weight per unit area for a specific location within a field.  The device documents yield variability in harvested fields and ultimately can be used to create a geographical-referenced yield map. Yield maps can be used to identify low yielding areas where poor soil fertility, disease, or pests may adversely affect yield.  Management practices can then be adjusted to correct these issues, resulting in an increase in yields and... R.R. Price, R.M. Johnson, R.P. Viator

80. Development of Farmland-Terrain Simulation System for Consistency of Seeding Depth

A farmland-terrain simulation system suitable for rugged topography was designed to study the irregularities of farmland surface morphology led by both topographic fluctuation and terrain tilt. The system consists of terrain simulation mechanism, hydraulic system, control system, etc. The terrain simulation mechanism is connected to the rack through hydraulic cylinder to simulate farmland surface fluctuation. The hydraulic system controls the hydraulic cylinder to drive the terrain simulation... W. Fu, J. Dong, Y. Cong, N. Gao, Y. Li, Z. Meng

81. Digital Transformation of Canadian Agri-Food

Agriculture in Canada is on the cusp of a dramatic revolution as a result of the digital transformation of the industry driven by the emergence of tools such as Precision Agri-Food Technologies and the Internet of Things (IoT, a network of interconnected physical devices capable of connecting to the internet). With the expected exponential growth of data from the application of innovative technologies such as IoT by the Canadian Agri-Food industry, Canada has the potential to gain valuable in... K.J. Hand

82. Draft Privacy Guidelines and Proposal Outline to Create a Field-Scale Trial Data Repository for Data Collected by On-Farm Networks

Implementing better management practices in corn and soybeans that increase profitability and reduce pollution caused by the practices requires large numbers of field-scale, replicated trials. Numerous complex and often unmeasurable interactions among the environment, genetics and management at the field scale require large numbers of trials completed at the field scale in a systematic and uniform manner to enable calculation of probabilities that a practice will be an improvement compared wi... T. Morris, N. Tremblay

83. Dynamic Feeding Intake Monitoring in Growing-Finishing Pigs Reared Under Precision Feeding Strategies

Pigs exposed to challenges with no prior experience change their daily feeding intake pattern. A method identifying deviations from normal feeding patterns could be used to develop a model framework to estimate individual nutrient requirements of challenged pigs fed with precision feeding systems. The objective of this study was to develop a tool for early identification of feed intake deviations in precision fed growing-finishing pigs. Feed intake measurements collected during 84 d in 126 gr... L. Hauschild, A.R. Kristensen, I. Andretta, C. Pomar, A. Remus

84. Ear-Attached Accelerometer as an On-Farm Device to Predict the Onset of Calving in Dairy Cows

The objective of this study on an ear-attached accelerometer in dairy cows was (1) to determine activity, rumination and lying time of the dams prior to calving, and include group level of measured variables (2) use the data to develop an algorithm to predict calving and (3) to test the performance of this algorithm. Video observations (24h/d) were used as reference for these events. Four weeks before expected calving, an ear-tag integrated tri-axial accelerometer (SMARTBOW system) was attach... S. Krieger, M. Oczak, L. Lidauer, F. Kickinger, M. Öhlschuster, W. Auer, M. Drillich, M. Iwersen, A. Berger

85. Economic and Environmental Impacts in Sugarcane Production to Meet the Brazilian Ethanol Demands by 2030: The Role of Precision Agriculture

The agreement signed at COP-21 reaffirms the vital compromise of Brazil with sugarcane and ethanol production. To meet the established targets, the ethanol production should be 54 billion liters in 2030. From the agronomic standpoint, two alternatives are possible; increase the planted area and/or agricultural yield. The present study aimed to evaluate the economic and environmental impacts in sugarcane production meeting the established targets in São Paulo state. In this context, wer... G.M. Sanches, T.F. Cardoso, M.F. Chagas, A.C. Luciano, D.G. Duft, P.S. Magalhães, H.C. Franco, A. Bonomi

86. Economic Evaluation of Automatic Heat Detection Systems in Dairy Farming

Although heat detection makes a relevant contribution to good reproduction performance of dairy cattle, available studies on the economic evaluations of automatic heat detection systems are limited. Therefore, the objective of this article is to provide an economic evaluation of using automatic heat detection. The effect of different heat detection rates on gross margin is modelled with SimHerd (SimHerd A/S, Denmark). The analysis considers all additional investment costs in automatic heat de... J. Pfeiffer, M. Gandorfer, J.F. Ettema

87. Economics of Swarm Bot Profitability for Cotton Harvest

Improved equipment management is one way which producers can increase profits. For cotton, this is especially true due to specialized equipment used for the sole purpose of harvest. Questions are raised regarding a way to either reduce or replace traditional cotton pickers. The main alternative being discussed is an investment in autonomous “swarm bots” to replace traditional equipment. Swarm bots are fully automated robots tasked with the responsibility of picking cotton one row ... J. Cullop, T.W. Griffin, G. Ibendahl, E. Barnes, J. Shockley, J. Devine

88. Effect of Composts Prepared from Municipal Solid Waste in the Agrochemical Properties of Serosem Soils of Uzbekistan

Optimizing soil fertility and agro-chemical soil properties are currently of great importance, since the content of humus and nutrients from year to year decreases. The reason for decline of soil fertility is the lack of organic fertilizers and use of crop rotation involving leguminous perennial herb. On the other hand a source of organic fertilizer can be municipal solid waste. Currently in the cities of Uzbekistan accumulated huge amount of solid waste whose disposal is an environmental nec... S. Kholikulov, S. Pardaev

89. Effect of Irrigation Scheduling Technique and Fertility Level on Corn Yield and Nitrogen Movement

Florida has more first magnitude springs that anywhere in the world. Most of these are located in north Florida where agricultural production is the primary basis for the economy. Irrigated corn has become a popular part of the crop rotation in recent years. This project is a study of a corn and peanut rotation investigating Best Management Practices (BMPs) of nitrogen fertility level (336, 246, 157 kg/ha) and irrigation strategies as follows:  (i) GROW, mimicking grower’s practice... M. Dukes, M. Zamora, D. Rowland

90. Effective Use of a Debris Cleaning Brush for Mechanical Wild Blueberry Harvesting

Wild blueberries are an important horticultural crop native to northeastern North America. Management of wild blueberry fields has improved over the past decade causing increased plant density and leaf foliage. The majority of wild blueberry fields are picked mechanically using tractor mounted harvesters with 16 rotating rakes that gently comb through the plants. The extra foliage has made it more difficult for the cleaning brush to remove unwanted debris (leaf, stems, weeds, etc.) from the p... K. Esau, Q. Zaman, A. Farooque, A. Schumann

91. Effectiveness of UAV-Based Remote Sensing Techniques in Determining Lettuce Nitrogen and Water Stresses

This paper presents the results of the investigation on the effectiveness of UAV-based remote sensing data in determining lettuce nitrogen and water stresses. Multispectral images of the experimental lettuce plot at Cal Poly Pomona’s Spadra farm were collected from a UAV. Different rows of the lettuce plot were subject to different level of water and nitrogen applications. The UAV data were used in the determination of various vegetation indices. Proximal sensors used for ground-truthin... S. Bhandari, A. Raheja, M.R. Chaichi, R.L. Green, D. Do, M. Ansari, J.G. Wolf, A. Espinas, F.H. Pham, T.M. Sherman

92. Efficiency of Microbial Synthesis and the Flow of Nitrogen Compounds in Sheep Receiving Crambe Meal (Crambe Abyssinica Hochst) Replacing the Concentrade Crude Protein

The objective of this study was to evaluate the effect of increasing levels (0, 25, 50, 75%) of crude protein substitution of the concentrate by crude protein of crambe meal on microbial protein synthesis and the flow of microbial nitrogen compounds in sheep. Four rumen fistulated sheep (18 months and initial average body weight of 50 kg) were distributed in a 4 x 4 Latin square design. Diets were balanced to meet the requirements for minimum gains, containing approximately 14% crude protein ... K.K. De azevedo, D.M. Figueiredo, G.M. Dallago, J.A. Vieira, R.R. Silveira, L.D. Da silva, R.A. Santos, L.N. Rennó, G.B. Pacheco

93. eFields – An On-Farm Research Network to Inform Farm Recommendations

On-farm research has been traditionally used to provide local, field-scale information about agronomic practices. Farmers tend to have more confidence in on-farm research results because they are perceived to be more relevant to their farm operations compared to small plot research results. In recent years, more farmers have been conducting on-farm studies to help evaluate practices and input decisions.  Recent advances in precision agriculture technologies have stream-lined the on-... J.P. Fulton, E. Hawkins, R. Colley iii, K. Port, S. Shearer, A. Klopfenstein

94. Elimination of Spatial Variability Using Variable Rate Drip Irrigation (VRDI) in Vineyards

Vineyards worldwide are subjected to spatial variability, which can be exhibited in both low and high yield areas meaning that the vineyard is not achieving his full yield potential. In addition, the grapes quality is not uniformed leading to different wine qualities from the same plot. The assumption is that a variability in available water for the plant due to soil variability leads to the observed yield variability. A variable rate drip irrigation (VRDI) concept was developed to reduce suc... I. Nadav

95. Environmental Impacts of Precision Feeding Programs Applied in Brazilian Pig Production

This study was undertaken to evaluate the effect that switching from conventional to precision feeding systems during the growing-finishing phase would have on the potential environmental impact of Brazilian pig production. Standard life-cycle assessment procedures were used, with a cradle-to-farm gate boundary. The inputs and outputs of each interface of the life cycle were organized in a model. Grain production was independently characterized in the Central-West and South regions of Brazil,... C. Pomar, I. Andretta, L. Hauschild, M. Kipper, P.S. Pires

96. Estimates of Plant Number of Maize Crop at Seedling from High-Throughput UAV Imagery

The acquisition of such agricultural information as crop growth and output is of great significance for the development of modern agriculture. Using the image analysis is important to gain information on plant properties, health and phenotype. This study uses the unmanned aerial vehicle images about Maize breeding material collected in Beijing Xiao Tang mountain town in June 2017. The four color space transformation of RGB, HSV, YCbCr and L*A*B was used to divide the UAV image foreground (cro... S. Liu, G. Yang

97. Estimating Corn Biomass from RGB Images Acquired with an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle

Above-ground biomass, along with chlorophyll content and leaf area index (LAI), is a key biophysical parameter for crop monitoring. Being able to estimate biomass variations within a field is critical to the deployment of precision farming approaches such as variable nitrogen applications. With unprecedented flexibility, Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) allow image acquisition at very high spatial resolution and short revisit time. Accordingly, there has been an increasing interest i... K. Khun, P. Vigneault, E. Fallon, N. Tremblay, C. Codjia, F. Cavayas

98. Estimating Cotton Water Requirements Using Sentinel-2

Crop coefficient (Kc)-based estimation of crop water consumption is one of the most commonly used methods for irrigation management.  Spectral modeling of Kc is possible due to the high correlations between Kc and the crop phenologic development and spectral reflectance.  In this study, cotton evapotranspiration was measured in the field using several methods, including eddy covariance, surface renewal, and heat pulse.  Kc was estimated as the ratio between reference evapotrans... O. Rozenstein, N. Haymann, G. Kaplan , J. Tanny

99. Estimating Litchi Canopy Nitrogen Content Using Simulated Multispectral Remote Sensing Data

This study aims at evaluating the performance of seven highly spatial resolution remote sensing data in litchi canopy nitrogen content estimation. The litchi canopy reflectance were collected by ASD field spectrometer. Then the canopy spectral data were resampled based on the spectral response functions of each satellite sensors (Geo-eye, GF-WFV1, Rapid-eye, WV-2, Landsat 8, WV-3, and Sentinel-2). The spectral indices in literature were derived based on the simulated data. Meanwhile, the succ... D. Li, H. Jiang, S. Chen, C. Wang

100. Evaluating Remote Sensing Based Adaptive Nitrogen Management for Potato Production

Conventional nitrogen (N) management for potato production in the Upper Midwest, USA relies on using split-applications of N fertilizer or a controlled release N product. Using remote sensing to adaptively manage N applications has the potential to improve N use efficiency and reduce losses of nitrate to groundwater, which are important regional concerns. A two-year plot-scale experiment was established to evaluate adaptive N-management using remote sensing compared to conventional practices ... B. Bohman, D. Mulla, C. Rosen

101. Evaluation of a Wireless Pulse Oximeter to Measure Arterial Oxygen Saturation and Pulse Rate in Newborn Holstein Friesian Calves

Pulse oximetry is a well-established technique in nowadays human and veterinarian medicine. Also in the farm animal sector, it could be a useful tool to detect critical conditions of the oxygen supply and the cardiovascular system of the patient. However, its use in ruminant medicine is still limited to experimental application. The objective of this study was to evaluate the accuracy of a Radius-7 Wearable Pulse Oximeter (Masimo Corporation, Irvine, CA) for monitoring the vital parameters of... P. Kanz, S. Krieger, M. Drillich, M. Iwersen

102. Evaluation of an Artificial Neural Network Approach for Prediction of Corn and Soybean Yield

The ability to predict crop yield during the growing season is important for crop income, insurance projections and for evaluating food security. Yet, modeling crop yield is challenging because of the complexity of the relationships between crop growth and the interrelated predictor variables. Artificial neural networks (ANNs) are useful for such complex systems as they can capture non-linear relationships of data without explicitly knowing the underlying processes. In this study, an ANN-base... A. Kross, G. Kaur, E. Znoj, D. Callegari, M. Sunohara, H. Mcnairn, D. Lapen, H. Rudy, L. Van vliet

103. Evaluation of an Ear Tag Based Accelerometer for Monitoring Rumination Time, Chewing Cycles and Rumination Bouts in Dairy Cows

The objective of this study was to evaluate the ear tag based accelerometer SMARTBOW (Smartbow, Weibern, Austria) for detecting rumination time, chewing cycles and rumination bouts in dairy cows. For this, the parameters were determined by analyses of video recordings as reference and compared with the results of the accelerometer system. Additionally, the intra- and inter-observer reliability as well as the agreement of direct cow observations and video recordings was tested. Ten Simmental c... M. Iwersen, S. Reiter, V. Schweinzer, F. Kickinger, M. Öhlschuster, L. Lidauer, W. Auer, M. Drillich, A. Berger

104. Evaluation of HLB-Infected Citrus Rootstocks Using Ground Penetrating Radar

Citrus production in Florida continues to decline steadily, since the arrival of Huanglongbing (HLB or citrus greening). HLB does not kill the tree, but HLB-infected trees become less productive. Since now, there is no cure for this disease. However, several strategies have been developed to manage and control HLB-infected citrus trees. We have developed and evaluated a heat thermotherapy system (short-term solution) for sustaining productivity of HLB-affected trees. This system heats the can... Y. Ampatzidis, M. Derival, S. Kakarla, U. Albrecht, X. Zhang

105. Evaluation of Nutrient Intake in Sheep Fed with Increasing Levels of Crambe Meal (Crambe Abyssinica Hoscht)

The objective of this study was to evaluate the effects of increasing levels of crude protein (CP) substitution of the concentrate by CP of crambe meal (CM) (0, 25, 50 and 75% dry matter basis) on consumption of nutrients. Four rumen fistulated and castrated sheep (18 months old on average and initial body weight of 50 kg) were used distributed in a 4 x 4 Latin square design with 4 treatments and 4 experimental periods (repetitions). Diets were balanced to meet requirements for minimum gains ... K.K. De azevedo, D.M. De figueiredo, M.G. De sousa, G.M. Dallago, R.R. Silveira, L.D. Da silva, R.A. Santos

106. Evaluation of Strip Tillage Systems in Maize Production in Hungary

Strip tillage is a form of conservation tillage system. It combines the benefits of conventional tillage systems with the soil-protecting advantages of no-tillage. The tillage zone is typically 0.25 to 0.3 m wide and 0.25 to 0.30 m deep. The soil surface between these strips is left undisturbed and the residue from the previous crop remain on the soil surface. The residue-covered area reaches 60-70%. Keeping residue on the surface helps prevent soil structure and reduce water loss from the so... T. Rátonyi, P. Ragán, D. Sulyok, J. Nagy, E. Harsányi, A. Vántus, N. Csatári

107. Evaluation of the Ear-Tag Sensor System SMARTBOW for Detecting Estrus Events in Indoor Housed Dairy Cows

Livestock farming technologies have a tremendous potential to improve and support farmers in herd management decisions, in particular in reproductive management. Nowadays, estrus detection in cows is challenging and many detection tools are available. The company Smartbow (Weibern, Austria) developed a novel ear-tag sensor, which consists of a 3D-accelerometer that records head and ear movements of cows as basis for algorithm development and further analyses. Estrus detection by the SMARTBOW ... V. Schweinzer, L. Lidauer, F. Kickinger, M. Öhlschuster, W. Auer, M. Drillich, M. Iwersen, A. Berger

108. Evaluation of the Potential for Precision Agriculture and Soil Conservation at Farm and Watershed Scale: A Case Study

Precision agriculture and soil conservation have the potential to increase crop yield and economic return while reducing environmental impacts. Landform, spatial variability of soil processes, and temporal trends may affect crop N response and should be considered for precision agriculture. The objective of this research was to evaluate the viability of precision agriculture in improving N use efficiency and profitability at the farm and watershed level in western Canada. Two studies are desc... M. Khakbazan, A. Moulin, J. Huang, P. Michiels, R. Xie

109. Examining the Relationship Between SPAD, LAI and NDVI Values in a Maize Long-Term Experiment

In Hungary, the preconditions for the use of precision crop production have undergone enormous development over the last five years. RTK coverage is complete in crop production areas. Consultants are increasingly using the vegetation index maps from Landsat and Sentinel satellite data, but measurements with on-site proximal plant sensors are also needed to exclude the influence of the atmosphere. The aim of our studies was to compare the values measured by proximal plant sensors in ... P. Ragán, E. Harsányi, J. Nagy, T. Ágnes, T. Rátonyi, A. Vántus, N. Csatári

110. Experiences in the Development of Commercial Web-Based Data Engines to Support UK Growers Within an Industry-Academic Partnership

The lifecycle of Precision Agriculture data begins the moment that the measurement is taken, after which it may pass through each multiple data processes until finally arriving as an output employed back in the production system. This flow can be hindered by the fact that many farm datasets have different spatial resolutions. This makes the process to aggregate or analyse multiple Precision Agriculture layers arduous and time consuming.  Precision Decisions Ltd located in Yorks... J. Taylor, Y. Shahar, P. James, C. Blacker, S. Leese, R. Sanderson, R. Kavanagh

111. Experimental Study Using Wind Tunnel for Measuring Variability of Spray Drift Sedimentation

Spray drift is defined as physical movement of pesticides by air action as a particle droplet and is not deposited on the intended target. Evaluation of the parameters affecting on spray drift is difficult. The accurate studies are expensive, as well as, the variability is high under field conditions due to instability in wind speed and turbulence. Wind tunnel experiments are adequate to simulate the results of field measurements for spray drift. A laboratory experiments were carried out to s... M.H. Alheidary, J. Douzals, C. Sinfort

112. Exploring Relationships Between Dairy Herd Improvement Metrics in Minas Gerais – Brazil Dairy Herds

The objective of the present study was to apply principal component analysis (PCA) on Brazilian Dairy Herd Improvement (DHI) data to discover the subset of most meaningful variables to describe complete lactations. The Holstein Livestock Breeders Association of Minas Gerais provided data collected between 2005 and 2016 from 122 dairy farms located in the State of Minas Gerais – Brazil. Twelve numerical variables were selected from the original dataset and four additional variables were ... G.M. Dallago, D. Figueiredo, R. Santos, P. Andrade, D. Santos

113. Exploring Tractor Mounted Hyperspectral System Ability to Detect Sudden Death Syndrome Infection and Assess Yield in Soybean

Pre-visual detection of crop disease is critical for both food and economic security. The sudden death syndrome (SDS) in soybeans, caused by Fusarium virguliforme (Fv), induces 100 million US$ crop loss, per year, in the US alone. Field-based spectroscopic remote sensing offers a method to enable timely detection, but still requires appropriate instrumentation and testing. Soybean plants were measured at canopy level over a course of a growing season to assess the capacity of spectral measure... I. Herrmann, S. Vosberg, P. Ravindran, A. Singh, P. Townsend, S. Conley

114. Exploring Wireless Sensor Network Technology in Sustainable Okra Garden: A Comparative Analysis of Okra Grown in Different Fertilizer Treatments

The goal of this project was to explore commercial agricultural and irrigation sensor kits and to discern if the commercial wireless sensor network (WSN) is a viable tool for providing accurate real-time farm data at the nexus of food energy and water. The smart garden consists of two different varieties of Abelmoschus esculentus (okra) planted in raised beds, each grown under two different fertilizer treatments. Soil watermark sensors were programed to evaluate soil moisture and dictate irri... L. Burton, K. Jayachandran, S. Bhansali, Y. Mekonnen, A. Sarwat

115. Farm Soil Moisture Mapping Using Reflected GNSS SNR Data Onboard Low Level Flying Aircraft

Soil moisture/water content monitoring (spatial and temporal) is a critical component of farm management decision primarily for crop/plant growth and yield improvement, but also for optimization of practice such as tillage and field treatments. Satellite humidity probes do not deliver the relevant resolution for farming purposes. Ground moisture probes only provide punctual measurements and do not reflect the true spatial variability of soil moisture. Previous studies have demonstra... L. Ameglio, J. Darrozes, J. Dreyer

116. Feasibility of Estimating the Leaf Area Index of Maize Traits with Hemispherical Images Captured from Unmanned Aerial Vehicles

Feeding a global population of 9.1 billion in 2050 will require food production to be increased by approximately 60%. In this context, plant breeders are demanding more effective and efficient field-based phenotyping methods to accelerate the development of more productive cultivars under contrasting environmental constraints. The leaf area index (LAI) is a dimensionless biophysical parameter of great interest to maize breeders since it is directly related to crop productivity. The LAI is def... M. Perez-ruiz, E. Apolo-apolo, G. Egea, J. Martinez-guanter, C. Marin-barrero

117. Feature Extraction from Radial Descriptor Lines for Body Condition Scoring of Cows

Body condition score (BCS) is considered as one of the most important indices for managing dairy cows, which is used to evaluate fat cover and changes in body condition. Dairy farmers should be aware of their cows BCS to be able to identify the patient cows on time and manage diets when needed. In this study, we have introduced a new index which uses Radial Descriptor Lines (RDL) for BC scoring. Based on the fact that the fatter the cow the smoother the back surface, we hypothesised that the ... A. Jafari, F. Karimi, A. Werner, S. Ghoreishi, S. Kargar

118. Field Grown Apple Nursery Tree Plant Counting Based on Small UAS Imagery Derived Elevation Maps

In recent years, growers in the state are transitioning to new high yielding, pest and disease resistant cultivars. Such transition has created high demand for new tree fruit cultivars. Nursery growers have committed their incoming production of the next few years to meet such high demands. Though an opportunity, tree fruit nursery growers must grow and keep the pre-sold quantity of plants to supply the amount promised to the customers. Moreover, to keep the production economical amidst risin... M. Martello, J.J. Quirós, L. Khot

119. Field Level Management and Data Verification of Variable Rate Fertilizer Application

Increased cost efficiencies and ease of use make spinner-disc spreaders the primary method of applying fertilizers throughout much of the United States. Recently, advances in spreader systems have enabled multiple fertilizer products to be applied at variable application rates. This provides greater flexibility during site-specific management of in-field fertility. Physical and aerodynamic properties vary for fertilizer granules of different sources and densities, these properties in turn aff... R. Colley iii, J. Fulton, S. Virk, E. Hawkins

120. Field Phenotyping and an Example of Proximal Sensing of Photosynthesis

Field phenotyping conceptually can be divided in five pillars 1) traits of interest 2) sensors to measure these traits 3) positioning systems to allow high throughput measurements by the sensors 4) experimental sites and 5) environmental monitoring. In this paper we will focus on photosynthesis as trait of interest, measured by remote active fluorescence. The sensor presented is the Light Induced Fluorescence Transient (LIFT) instrument. The LIFT instrument is integrated in three positioning ... O. Muller, B. Keller, L. Zimmermanm, C. Jedmowski, V. Pingle, K. Acebron, N. Zendonadi, A. Steier, R. Pieruschka, U. Schurr, U. Rascher, T. Kraska

121. Field Test of a Satellite-Based Model for Irrigation Scheduling in Cotton

Cotton irrigation in Israel began in the mid-1950s. It is based on an irrigation protocol developed over dozens of years of cotton farming in Israel, and proved to provide among the world's best cotton yield results. In this experiment, we examined the use of an irrigation recommendation system that is based on satellite imagery and hyper-local meteorological data, "Manna treatment", compared to the common irrigation protocols in Israel, which use a crop coefficient (Kc) table a... O. Beeri, S. May-tal, J. Raz, R. Rud

122. Flat Payoff Functions and Site-Specific Crop Management

Within the neighbourhood of any economically “optimal” management system, there is a set of alternative systems that are only slightly less attractive than the optimum. Often this set is large; in other words, the payoff function is flat within the vicinity of the optimum. This has major implications for the economics of variable-rate site-specific crop management. The flatter the payoff function, the lower the benefits of precision in the adjustment of input rates spatially withi... D. Pannell, A. Weersink, M. Gandorfer

123. Flourish - A Robotic Approach for Automation in Crop Management

The Flourish project aims to bridge the gap between current and desired capabilities of agricultural robots by developing an adaptable robotic solution for precision farming. Combining the aerial survey capabilities of a small autonomous multi-copter Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) with a multi-purpose agricultural Unmanned Ground Vehicle (UGV), the system will be able to survey a field from the air, perform targeted intervention on the ground, and provide detailed information for decision supp... A. Walter, R. Khanna, P. Lottes, C. Stachniss, R. Siegwart, J. Nieto, F. Liebisch

124. Forecasting Crop Yield Using Multi-Layered, Whole-Farm Data Sets and Machine Learning

The ultimate goal of Precision Agriculture is to improve decision making in the business of farming. Many broadacre farmers now have a number of years of crop yield data for their fields which are often augmented with additional spatial data, such as apparent soil electrical conductivity (ECa), soil gamma radiometrics, terrain attributes and soil sample information. In addition there are now freely available public datasets, such as rainfall, digital soil maps and archives of satellite remote... P. Filippi, E.J. Jones, M. Fajardo, B.M. Whelan, T.F. Bishop

125. Frameworks for Variable Rate Application of Manure

Worldwide, nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P) losses from agriculture are main contributors to eutrophication of water bodies so that forceful agro-technical measures are required to reduce their diffuse discharge to the environment. With view to worldwide finite mineral rock phosphates efficient standards are required to close the agricultural P cycle. In intensive agricultural livestock production manure is often treated as a waste problem rather than an organic fertilizer and source of nutrie... H. Lilienthal, S.H. Haneklaus, E. Schnug

126. From Data to Decisions - Ag Technologies Provide New Opportunities and Challenges with On-Farm Research

U.S. farmers are challenged to increase crop production while achieving greater resource use efficiency.  The Nebraska On-Farm Research Network (NOFRN), enables farmers to answer critical production, profitability, and sustainability questions with their own fields and equipment. The NOFRN is sponsored by the University of Nebraska – Lincoln Extension and derives from two separate on-farm research efforts, the earliest originating in 1990.  Over the course of the last 29 years... L. Thompson, K. Glewen, N. Mueller, J. Luck

127. GIS Web and Mobile Development with Interfaces in QGIS for Variable Rate Fertilization

In this paper we described the implementation of a GIS for Precision Agriculture for sugarcane crop in Colombia. An spatial equation for Variable Rate Fertilization Model was defined using as inputs estimated harvest data, nutrients in soil and fertilizer efficiently. Models for soil and harvest variability are also defined. A personalized plugin for precision agriculture was developed into QGIS software, there is the option of upload maps to a Web and mobile app using the Desktop software an... R. Cuitiva baracaldo, O. Munar vivas, G. Carrillo romero

128. Grazing System and Solar Fences, Innovation and Opportunity in Rangeland of Developing Countries

The future of the development and management of pasture resources depends on increasing the use of scientific innovations. In some countries rangeland livestock production majority relies on natural ecological processes of plant and animal production, despite the progress in all of the infrastructure, rangeland management have a little growth and base on traditional ranching management, grazing livestock is based on a free grazing system. In this study grazing system was applied and electric ... H. Arzani, E. Alizadeh

129. Ground Vehicle Mapping of Fields Using LiDAR to Enable Prediction of Crop Biomass

Mapping field environments into point clouds using a 3D LIDAR has the ability to become a new approach for online estimation of crop biomass in the field. The estimation of crop biomass in agriculture is expected to be closely correlated to canopy heights. The work presented in this paper contributes to the mapping and textual analysis of agricultural fields. Crop and environmental state information can be used to tailor treatments to the specific site. This paper presents the current results... M.P. Christiansen, M.S. Laursen, R.N. Jørgensen, S. Skovsen, R. Gislum

130. Harness the Power of the Internet to Improve Yield

It’s rare to find a fertile farm or ranch that has complete cellular coverage across the entirety of its property. Because networking options like Wi-Fi are limited by restricted infrastructure in these areas, maintaining a reliable flow of connectivity is difficult. Yet, even if consistent cellular coverage is available, it’s frequently cost prohibitive for farm monitoring. Similarly, alternate wireless devices that require batteries aren’t practical because of high mainten... M. Finegan, D. Wallace

131. High Accuracy Path Tracking for Rice Drill Seeder in Uneven Paddy Fields

High accuracy track tracing is a challenging task in paddy fields due to uneven grounds as well as wet soil conditions, thus restricting the development of autonomous rice drill seeder in China. For the purpose of overcoming the obstacles in application of autonomous rice drill seeder in paddy fields, a path tracking algorithm with high accuracy used for steering control during straight traveling in uneven mud paddy fields is introduced in this paper. Combining lateral deviation and heading a... Y. Li, Y. Zhang, X. Liu, C. Liu

132. High Resolution Soil Moisture Monitoring Using Active Heat Pulse Method with Fiber Optic Temperature Sensing at Field Scale

Knowledge of spatial and temporal variability of soil moisture is critical for site specific irrigation management at field scale. However, installation feasibility, cost and between-sensor variability restrict the use of many point–based sensors at field scale. Active heat pulse method with fiber optic temperature sensing (AHFO) has shown a potential to provide soil moisture data at sub-meter intervals along a fiber optic cable to a distance >10000 meters. Despite the limited number... A. Biswas, D.N. Vidana gamage, I.B. Strachan

133. Identifying and Filtering Out Outliers in Spatial Datasets

Outliers present in the dataset is harmful to the information quality contained in the map and may lead to wrong interpretations, even if the number of outliers to the total data collected is small. Thus, before any analysis, it is extremely important to remove these errors. This work proposes a sequential process model capable of identifying outlier data when compared their neighbors using statistical parameters. First, limits are determined based on the median range of the values of all the... L. Maldaner, J. Molin, T. Tavares, L. Mendez, L. Corrêdo, C. Duarte

134. Implementation of a CAN Bus System to Monitor Hydroponic Systems

Controlled Area Network (CAN) bus systems designed for greenhouse monitoring have been proposed to measure soil moisture content, yet they are still absent from hydroponic systems. In this study, irrigation control, monitoring of substrate moisture levels and temperature were achieved using a CAN bus system connected to hydroponic beds. In total, five nodes were mounted on five hydroponic beds and two irrigation methods were compared on lettuce and kale: first, where a pre-set timer activated... P. Tikasz, R.M. Buelvas, M. Lefsrud, V. Adamchuk

135. Improving Active Canopy Sensor-Based In-Season N Recommendation Using Plant Height Information for Rain-Fed Maize in Northeast China

The inefficient utilization of nitrogen (N) fertilizer due to leaching, volatilization and denitrification has resulted in environmental pollution in rain-fed maize production in Northeast China. Active canopy sensor-based in-season N application has been proven effective to meet maize N requirement in space and time. The objective of this research was to evaluate the feasibility of using active canopy sensor for guiding in in-season N fertilizer recommendation for rain-fed maize in Northeast... X. Wang, Y. Miao, T. Xia, R. Dong, G. Mi, D.J. Mulla

136. Improving Corn Nitrogen Rate Recommendations Through Tool Fusion

 Improving corn (Zea maysL,) nitrogen (N) fertilizer rate recommendation tools can improve farmer’s profits and help mitigate N pollution. One way to improve N recommendation methods is to not rely on a single tool, but to employ two or more tools. Thiscould be thoughtof as “tool fusion”.The objective of this analysis was to improve N management by combining N recommendation tools used for guiding rates for an in-seasonN application. This evaluation ... C.J. Ransom, N.R. Kitchen, J.J. Camberato, P.R. Carter, R.B. Ferguson, F.G. Fernandez, D.W. Franzen, C.A. Laboski, E.D. Nafziger, J. Shanahan, J.E. Sawyer

137. Improving the Precision of Maize Nitrogen Management Using Crop Growth Model in Northeast China

The objective of this project was to evaluate the ability of the CERES-Maize crop growth model to simulate grain yield response to plant density and N rate for two soil types in Northeast China, with the long-term goal of using the model to identify the optimum plant density and N fertilizer rate forspecific site-years. Nitrogen experiments with six N rates, three plant densities and two soil types were conducted from 2015 to 2017 in Lishu county, Jilin Province in Northeast China. The CERES-... X. Wang, Y. Miao, W.D. Batchelor, R. Dong, D.J. Mulla

138. Improving the Use of Artificial Neural Networks for 
Site-Specific Nitrogen Fertilization

For the planning of site-specific nitrogen fertilization, adequate decision rules are needed. Prerequisite for site specific nitrogen fertilization is the site specific forecast of yield. For this the use of artificial neural networks (ANN) has proven particularly interesting. Therefore, ANN based small-scale yield forecasts are realized in order to deviate the economic optimum of fertilization. The basis of yield forecasts with ANN are different site-specific input variables that have presum... J.S. Hauser, P. Wagner

139. Improving Yield Prediction Accuracy Using Energy Balance Trial, On-the-Go and Remote Sensing Procedure

 Our long term experience in the ~23.5 ha research field since 2001 shows that decision support requires complex databases from each management zone within that field (eg. soil physical and chemical parameters, technological, phenological and meteorological data). In the absence of PA sustainable biomass production cannot be achieved. The size of management zones will be ever smaller. Consequently, the on the go and remote sensing data collection should be preferred.  ... A. Nyéki , G. Milics, A.J. Kovács, M. Neményi, I. Kulmány, S. Zsebő

140. Increasing Corn (Zea Mays L.) Profitability by Site-Specific Seed and Nutrient Management in Igmand-Kisber Basin, Hungary

Variable Rate Technology (VRT) in seeding and nutrient management has been developed in order to apply crop inputs variably. Farm equipment is widely available to manage in-field variability in Hungary, however, defining management zones, seed rates and amounts of nutrients is still a challenge. An increasing number of growers in Hungary have started adopting precision agriculture technology; however, data on profitability concerning site-specific seeding and nitrogen management is not widely... G. Milics, S. Szabó, K. Bűdi, A. Takács, V. Láng, S. Zsebo

141. Increasing Profitability & Sustainability of Maize Using Site-Specific Crop Management in New Zealand

Precision agriculture (PA) tools and techniques have been used in New Zealand (NZ) since the early 1990's. There has been wide-scale uptake of some PA tools such as autosteer; planter and sprayer section control; and variable-rate irrigation. However, there has been a limited uptake of Site-Specific Crop Management (SSCM) using variable-rate seeding, nutrient and lime applications to different Management Zones (MZ). This paper outlines examples of the use of SSCM on maize crops,... A.W. Holmes, G. Jiang

142. Influence of Planter Downforce Setting and Ground Speed on Seeding Depth and Plant Spacing Uniformity of Corn

Uniform seed placement improves seed-to-soil contact and requires proper selection of downforce control across varying field conditions. At faster ground speeds, downforce changes and it becomes critical to select the level of planter downforce settings to achieve the desired consistency of seed placement during planting. The objective of this study was to assess the effect of ground speed and downforce setting on seeding depth and plant spacing and to evaluate the relationship of ground spee... A. Sharda, S. Badua, I. Ciampitti, R. Strasser, T.W. Griffin

143. Innovative Assessment of Cluster Compactness in Wine Grapes from Automated On-the-Go Proximal Sensing Application

Grape cluster compactness affects berry ripening homogeneity, fungal disease incidence, grape composition and wine quality. Therefore, assessing cluster compactness is crucial for sorting wine grapes for the wine industry. Nowadays, cluster compactness assessing methodology is based either on visual inspection performed by trained evaluators (OIV method) or on morphological features of clusters. The goal of this work was to develop an innovative and automated, non-destructive method to assess... J. Tardaguila, F. Palacios, M. Diago, E.A. Moreda

144. Integration of Proximal and Remote Sensing Data for Site-Specific Management of Wild Blueberry

In Saguenay-Lac-St-Jean, there are nearly 27,000 ha of wild blueberries (Vaccinium angustifolium Ait.). This production is carried out in fields with heterogeneous growing conditions due to the local changes in topography, key soil properties, and crop density. The main objective of this study was to develop a regression-based approach to site-specific management (SSM) by integrating proximally and remotely sensed data layers, namely, apparent soil electrical conductivity (ECa), field elevati... A. Johnston, V. Adamchuk, A. Biswas, A. Cambouris, J. Lafond, I. Perron

145. Introducing Precision Ag Tools to Over-100 Year Old Historical Experiment

The historic Knorr-Holden experimental site near Scottsbluff, Nebraska, US, established in 1912 is the oldest irrigated maize plot in North America. Over years, the treatment has been revised a few times to reflect and address contemporary practices. The N fertilization is found to be capable of restoring most of production capacity of the soil. After a full century of the experiment, in 2014, N treatments were revised again. Now, the experiment is a split-plot randomized complete block desig... B. Maharjan

146. Invasive and Non-Invasive Technology for Measuring Water Content of Crop Leaves in Greenhouse Horticulture

Moisture status in the crop is closely related to various physiological activities of the crop. If we can measure the moisture status in the crop in real time, we can understand the photosynthetic activity, which is an important physiological activity for growing crops, and the movement of the product from photosynthesis. Therefore, we verified it is possible to measure water content of crop leaves nondestructively using invasive method and non-invasive method. As a non-invasive measurement m... H. Umeda, K. Muramatsu, Y. Kawagoe, T. Sugihara, S. Shibusawa, Y. Iwasaki

147. Investigate the Optimal Plot Length in On-Farm Trials

Agronomic researchers have recently begun running large-scale, on-farm field trials that employ new technologies that enable us to conduct hundreds of farm trials all over the world and, by extension, rigorous quantitative and data-centered analysis.  The large-scale, on-farm trials follow traditional small-plot trials where the fields are divided into plots, and different treatments are randomly assigned to each plot. Over the past two years, researchers have been designing trials with ... A. Gong

148. Joint Structure and Colour Based Parametric Classification of Grapevine Organs from Proximal Images Through Several Critical Phenological Stages

Proximal colour imaging is the most time and cost-effective automated technology to acquire high-resolution data describing accurately the trellising plane of grapevine. The available textural information is meaningful enough to provide altogether the assessment of additional agronomic parameters that are still estimated either manually or with dedicated and expensive instrumentations. This paper proposes a new framework for the classification of the different organs visible in the trellising... F.Y. Abdelghafour, R. Rosu, B. Keresztes, C. Germain, J. Da costa

149. Laser Triangulation for Crop Canopy Measurements

From a Precision Agriculture perspective, it is important to detect field areas where variabilities in the soil are significant or where there are different levels of crop yield or biomass. Information describing the behavior of the crop at any specific point in the growing season typically leads to improvements in the manner the local variabilities are addressed. The proper use of dense, in-season sensor data allows farm managers to optimize harvest plans and shipment schedules under variabl... R.M. Buelvas, V.I. Adamchuk

150. Late Season Imagery for Harvest Management

The overall objective of this project was to preliminarily assess the use of UAV-based thermal imagery to sense harvest-related factors.  Results suggested that thermal imagery can be used to detect areas of high grain moisture content late in the harvest season.  Time periods closer to physiological maturity were less likely to show significant differences in thermal imagery data.  Additional research is needed to determine if moisture content trends with other measurable quan... J. Ward, G. Roberson, R. Phillips

151. Learn, Share, Connect and Be Inspired: How One Farming Group in Australia is Driving PA Adoption

The use of Precision Agriculture (PA) technologies and techniques continues to expand in Australia. The Society of Precision Agriculture Australia (SPAA) has been instrumental in driving the adoption and development of these techniques to support industry and Australian farming communities. SPAA supports innovation, and innovation includes people. Founded in 2002, SPAA, a not for profit extension body, is Australia’s only dedicated farming group communicating and advocating fo... N.F. Dimos, J.K. Koch

152. Levels of Inclusion of Crambe Meal (Crambe Abyssinica Hochst) in Sheep Diet on the Balance of Nitrogen and Ureic Nitrogen in the Blood Serum

Crambe meal, which is a co-product of biodiesel production, is a potential substitute for conventional protein sources in ruminant diets. The objective of this study was to evaluate the effect of the substitution of crude protein of the concentrate by crude protein of crambe meal with increasing levels (0, 25, 50, and 75%) on nitrogen balance and blood plasma urea nitrogen concentration in sheep. Four male sheep, rumen fistulated, were placed in metabolic crates and distributed in a 4 x 4 Lat... K.K. De azevedo, D.M. Figueiredo, M.G. De sousa, G.M. Dallago, R.R. Silveira, L.D. Da silva, L.N. Rennó, R.A. Santos

153. Machine Monitoring As a Smartfarming Concept Tool

Current development trends are associated with the digitization of production processes and the interconnection of individual information layers from multiple sources into common databases, contexts and functionalities. In order to automatic data collection  of machine operating data, the farm tractors were equipped with monitoring units ITineris for continuous collection and transmission of information from tractors CAN Bus. All data sets are completed with GPS location data. Acrea... M. Kroulik, V. Brant, P. Zabransky, J. Chyba, V. Krcek, M. Skerikova

154. Main Stream Precision Farming - 7.000 VRA Maps for Winter Rapeseed

SEGES is owned by the Danish farmers and is an agricultural advisory centre advising landowners with a total of 2.1 mill hectare. One of SEGES’s goals is to make precision farming mainstream. One step in the process of making precision farming mainstream was in 2016 to give all farmers access to the free internet application CropSAT.dk. Here farmers can make variable rate application (VRA) maps based on satellite data from Sentinel-2. But this is not enough to m... R. Hoerfarter

155. Management Zone Delineation for Irrigation Based on Sentinel-2 Satellite Images and Field Properties

This paper presents a case study of the first application of the dynamic Variable Rate Irrigation (VRI) System developed by the University of Georgia to cotton. The system consists of the EZZone management zone software, the University of Georgia Smart Sensor Array (UGA SSA) and an irrigation scheduling decision support tool. An experiment was conducted in 2017 in a cotton field to evaluate the performance of the system in cotton. The field was divided into four parallel strips. All four stri... V. Liakos, G. Vellidis, L. Lacerda, W. Porter, M. Tucker, C. Cox

156. Managing the Kansas Mesonet for Site Specific Weather Information

Weather data has become one of the most widely discussed layers in precision agriculture especially in terms of agricultural ‘big data’. However, most farmers (and even other researchers outside of meteorology) are not likely aware of the complexities required to maintain weather stations that provide data. These stations are exposed to the elements 24/7 and provide unique challenges for sustainment during extreme weather conditions. Based upon decades of experience, this paper di... T. Griffin, C. Redmond, M. Knapp

157. Mapping Cotton Plant Height Using Digital Surface Models Derived from Overlapped Airborne Imagery

High resolution aerial images captured from unmanned aircraft systems (UASs) are recently being used to measure plant height over small test plots for phenotyping, but airborne images from manned aircraft have the potential for mapping plant height more practically over large fields. The objectives of this study were to evaluate the feasibility to measure cotton plant height from digital surface models (DSMs) derived from overlapped airborne imagery and compare the image-based estimates with ... C. Yang

158. Mapping Leaf Area Index of Maize in Tasseling Stage Based on Beer-Lambert Law and Landsat-8 Image

Leaf area index (LAI) is one of the important structural parameters of crop population, which could be used to monitor the variety of crop canopy structure and analyze photosynthesis rate. Mapping leaf area index of maize in a large scale by using remote sensing technology is very important for management of fertilizer and water, monitoring growth change and predicting yield. The Beer-Lambert law has been preliminarily applied to develop inversion model of crop LAI, and has achieved good appl... X. Gu, S. Wang, G. Yang, X. Xu

159. Modelling 'Concord' Berry Weight Dynamics

The growth and development of Concord (Vitis labruscana Bailey) depends on internal and external factors. As a result, both vegetative and reproductive cycles of Concord vary based on growing season and vine status. Fresh berry weight also fluctuates depending on the growing season and location of the vineyard. Knowledge of berry weight dynamics across growing season is essential to accurately predict final yield at harvest based on early season crop estimates. The main objective of this stud... G. Badr, T.R. Bates

160. Modifying Agro-Economic Models to Predict Effects of Spatially Varying Nitrogen on Wheat Yields for a Farm in Western Australia

Agricultural research in broadacre farming in Western Australia has a strong history, resulting in a significant public resource of knowledge about biophysical processes affecting crop performance. However, translation of this knowledge into improved on-farm decision making remains a challenge to the industry. Online and mobile decision support tools to assist tactical farm management decisions are not widely adopted, for reasons including: (1) they take too much time and training to learn; a... F.H. Evans, J. Andrew, C. Scanlan, S. Cook

161. Monitoring Potassium Levels in Peat-Grown Pineapple Using Selected Spectral Ratios

In this study, we assessed the biophysical changes within pineapple (var. MD2) in response to different potassium (K) rates using a hyperspectral approach. K deficiency was detected at 171 days after planting. Shortage of K also exhibited a shift in red edge towards shorter wavelengths between 500-700 nm. In addition, spectral ranges of 430 nm and 680 nm, as well as 680-752 nm were found to be most effective in differentiating spectral response to varying K rates. Three vegetation indices, i.... S.K. Balasundram, Y. Chong, A. Mohd hanif

162. Monitoring Soybean Growth and Yield Due to Topographic Variation Using UAV-Based Remote Sensing

Remote sensing has been used as an important tool in precision agriculture. With the development of unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) technology, collection of high-resolution site-specific field data becomes promising. Field topography affects spatial variation in soil organic carbon, nitrogen and water content, which ultimately affect crop performance. To improve crop production and reduce inputs to the field, it is critical to collect site-specific information in a real-time manner and at a la... J. Zhou, K.A. Sudduth, A. Feng

163. Multi-Temporal Yield Pattern Analysis - Adaption of Pattern Recognition to Agronomic Data

In precision agriculture, the understanding of yield variability, both spatial and temporal, can deliver essential information for the decision making of site-specific crop management. Since commercial yield mapping started in the early 1990s, most research studies have focused on spatial variance or short-term temporal variance analyzed statistically in order to produce trend maps. Nowadays, longer records of high-quality yield data are available offering a new potential to evaluate yield va... G. Blasch, J.A. Taylor

164. Nitrogen Sensing by Using Spectral Reflectance Measurements in Cereal Rye Canopy

Cereal rye (cereale secale L.) is a winter crop well suited for cultivation especially besides high yield areas because of its relatively low demands on the soil and on the climate as well. In 2016 about 4.9% of arable land in Germany was cultivated with cereal rye (Statistisches Bundesamt, 2017). Unlike other crops such as wheat, there is little research on cereal rye for site specific farming. Furthermore, also in a cereal rye cultivation it is necessary to minimize nitrogen loss.... M. Strenner, F.X. Maidl, K.J. Hülsbergen

165. Observational Studies in Agriculture: Paradigm Shift Required

There is a knowledge gap in agriculture. For instance, there is no way to tell with precision what is the outcome of cutting N fertilizer by a quarter on important outcomes such as yield, net return, greenhouse gas emissions or groundwater pollution. Traditionally, the way to generate knowledge in agriculture has been to conduct research with the experimental method where experiments are conducted in a controlled environment with trials replicated in space a... L. Longchamps, B. Panneton, N. Tremblay

166. On-Farm Digital Solutions and Their Associated Value to North American Farmers

Digital tools and data collection have become standard in a wide variety of present day agricultural operations. An array of digital tools, such as high resolution operational mapping, remote sensing, and farm management software offer solutions to many of the problems in modern agriculture. These technologies and services can, if implemented correctly, provide both immediate and long term agronomic value. A growing number of producers in Ohio and around North America question the proper meth... R. Colley iii, J. Fulton, N. Douridas, K. Port

167. On-Farm Experimentation and Decision-Support Workshop

This 3-hour workshop discusses the requirements, methods and theories that may be used to assist in making optimal crop management decisions. The first part will focus on on-farm experimentation (OFE): 1) organization and benefits of OFE; 2) social processes and engagement; 3) designs, data and statistics. The second part will demonstrate how to generate insights applicable at the individual farm level using results from research trials collected in a diversity of contexts. Data sharing, meta... S. Cook, M. Lacoste, F. Evans, N. Tremblay, V. Adamchuk

168. On-the-Go Nir Spectroscopy and Thermal Imaging for Assessing and Mapping Vineyard Water Status in Precision Viticulture

New proximal sensing technologies are desirable in viticulture to assess and map vineyard spatial variability. Towards this end, high-spatial resolution information can be obtained using novel, non-invasive sensors on-the-go. In order to improve yield, grape quality and water management, the vineyard water status should be determined. The goal of this work was to assess and map vineyard water status using two different proximal sensing technologies on-the-go: near infrared (NIR) reflectance s... J. Tardaguila, M. Diago, S. Gutierrez, J. Fernandez-novales, E.A. Moreda

169. Opportunities for Precision Agriculture in Serbia

The aim of this paper is to analyze the factors leading to low adoption rate of precision farming in Serbia and to describe steps being taken by BioSense institute to increase it. The majority of the arable land in Serbia is grown by small family owned and operated farms most of which are in the range of 2 to 5 ha making them highly unsustainable. Only 16% of the arable land is managed by agricultural companies and cooperatives. We believe that the adoption of advanced technologies with the c... A.C. Tagarakis, F. Van evert, D. Milic, V. Crnojevic, V. Crnojevic-bengin, C. Kempenaar, N. Ljubicic

170. Optical High-Resolution Camera System with Computer Vision Software for Recognizing Insects, Fruit on Trees, Growth of Crops

With the inspiration of helping the farmer to grow his crop in the optimal way, Pessl Instruments GmbH, from Weiz, Austria, developed optical high-resolution camera system, together with a computer vision software which is able to recognize insects, fruits on trees and growth of crop. Pessl Instruments develops decision support system which is consisting from remote monitoring of insect traps and remote monitoring of fields and crops. Optical high-resolution camera system can be installed on ... J. Potrpin, G. Pessl, D. Najvirt, C. Pilz

171. Optimal Placement of Proximal Sensors for Precision Irrigation in Tree Crops

In agriculture, use of sensors and controllers to apply only the quantity of water required, where and when it is needed (i.e., precision irrigation), is growing in importance. The goal of this study was to generate relatively homogeneous management zones and determine optimal placement of just a few sensors within each management zone so that reliable estimation of plant water status could be obtained to implement precision irrigation in a 2.0 ha almond orchard located in California, USA. Fi... C.L. Bazzi, K. Schenatto, S. Upadhyaya, F. Rojo

172. Optimal Sensor Placement for Field-Wide Estimation of Soil Moisture

Soil moisture is one of the most important parameters in precision agriculture. While techniques such as remote sensing seems appropriate for moisture monitoring over large areas, they generally do not offer sufficiently fine resolution for precision work, and there are time restrictions on when the data is available. Moreover, while it is possible to get high resolution-on demand data, but the costs are often prohibitive for most developing countries. Direct ground level measuremen... H. Pourshamsaei, A. Nobakhti

173. Optimising Nitrogen Use in Cereal Crops Using Site-Specific Management Classes and Crop Reflectance Sensors

The relative cost of Nitrogen (N) fertilisers in a cropping input budget, the 33% Nitrogen use efficiency (NUE) seen in global cereal grain production and the potential environmental costs of over-application are leading to changes in the application rates and timing of N fertiliser. Precision agriculture (PA) provides tools for producers to achieve greater synchrony between N supply and crop N demand. To help achieve these goals this research has explored the use of management classes derive... B. Whelan, M. Fajardo

174. Optimized Soil Sampling Location in Management Zones Based on Apparent Electrical Conductivity and Landscape Attributes

One of the limiting factors to characterize the soil spatial variability is the need for a dense soil sampling, which prevents the mapping due to the high demand of time and costs. A technique that minimizes the number of samples needed is the use of maps that have prior information on the spatial variability of the soil, allowing the identification of representative sampling points in the field. Management Zones (MZs), a sub-area delineated in the field, where there is relative homogeneity i... G.K. Michelon, G.M. Sanches, I.Q. Valente, C.L. Bazzi, P.L. De menezes, L.R. Amaral, P.G. Magalhaes

175. Optimizing Corn Seeding Depth by Soil Texture to Achieve Uniform Stand

Corn (Zea mays L.) yield potential can be affected by uneven emergence. Corn emergence is influenced by both management and environmental conditions. Varying planting depth and rate as determined by soil characteristics could help improve emergence uniformity and grain yield. This study was conducted to assess varying corn seeding depths on plant emergence uniformity and yield on fine- and coarse-textured soils. Research was conducted on alluvial soil adjacent to the Missouri river with contr... S. Stewart, N. Kitcken, M. Yost, L. Conway

176. Optimum Spatial Resolution for Precision Weed Management

The occurrence and number of herbicide-resistant weeds in the world has increased in recent years. Controlling these weeds becomes more difficult and raises production costs. Precision spraying technologies have been developed to overcome this challenge. However, these systems still have relatively high acquisition cost, requiring studies of the relation between the spatial distribution of weeds and the economically optimum spatial resolution of the control method. In this context, the object... R.G. Trevisan, M.T. Eitelwein, M.N. Ferraz, T.R. Tavares, J.P. Molin, D.C. Neves

177. Organic Nitrogen Uptake: A Novel Pathway to Improve Nitrogen Use Efficiency and Crop Productivity

Formulation of amino acid N fertilizer and uptake of organic N by plants has the ability not only to ensure N availability to plants particularly in N-limiting environments but also can manipulate the environmental hazards associated with over inorganic N fertilization. To support this view, clear experimental evidence is still lacking. In addition, the current experiments aimed to evaluate the uptake of organic N (Amino acid based N fertilizer) by plants in comparison with inorganic fertiliz... K. Ali, D.L. Jones, M. Arif

178. Overview and Value of Digital Technologies for North American Soybean Producers

In the current state of digital agriculture, many digital technologies and services are offered to assist North American soybean producers.  Opportunities for capturing and analyzing information related to soybean production methods are made available through the adoption of these technologies.  However, often it is difficult for producers to know which digital tools and services are available to them or understand the value they can provide.  The objective of th... J. Lee, J. Fulton, K. Port, R. Colley iii

179. Pest Detection on UAV Imagery Using a Deep Convolutional Neural Network

Presently, precision agriculture uses remote sensing for the mapping of crop biophysical parameters with vegetation indices in order to detect problematic areas, and then send a human specialist for a targeted field investigation. The same principle is applied for the use of UAVs in precision agriculture, but with finer spatial resolutions. Vegetation mapping with UAVs requires the mosaicking of several images, which results in significant geometric and radiometric problems. Furthermore, even... Y. Bouroubi, P. Bugnet, T. Nguyen-xuan, C. Bélec, L. Longchamps, P. Vigneault, C. Gosselin

180. Potential of Apparent Soil Electrical Conductivity to Describe Soil Spatial Variability in Brazilian Sugarcane Fields

The soil apparent electrical conductivity (ECa) has been highlighted in the literature as a tool with high potential to map the soil fertility of fields. However, sugarcane fields still lack results that show the applicability of this information to define the soil spatial variability and its fertility conditions. The objective of the present paper was to provide a comprehensive assessment of the relationship between ECa, evaluated by electromagnetic induction (EMI) sensor, and the spatial va... G.M. Sanches, P.S. Magalhães, H.C. Franco, A.Z. Remacre

181. Practical and Affordable Technologies for Precision Agriculture in Small Fields: Present Status and Scope in India

The objective of this review paper is to find out practical and affordable precision agriculture(PA) technologies present status and scope in India that are suitable for small fields. The judicious use of inputs like water, fertilizers, herbicides, pesticides and better management of farm equipments will increase the net profit for farmers. The important components of PA in India which are being used for small lands are Geographic Information System(GIS), laser land leveler, leaf color chart,... S. Kumar, M. Singh, H. Mirzakhaninafchi, R.U. Modi, M. Ali, M. Bhardwaj, R. Soni

182. Practical Prescription of Variable Rate Fertilization Maps Using Remote Sensing Based Yield Potential

This paper describes a practical approach for the prescription of variable rate fertilization maps using remote sensing data (RS) based on satellite platforms, Landsat 8 and Sentinel-2 constellation. The methodology has been developed and evaluated in Albacete, Spain, in the framework of the project FATIMA (http://fatima-h2020.eu/). The global approach considers the prescription of N management prior to the growing season, based on a spatially distributed N balance. Although the diagnosis of ... A. Osann, I. Campos, M. Calera, C. Plaza, V. Bodas, A. Calera, J. Villodre, J. Campoy, S. Sanchez, N. Jimenez, H. Lopez

183. Precision Agriculture for Small Farm Holders

Precision Agriculture is a data-based decision making farming process taking in-field variability into consideration. It uses multiple advance tools and technologies like GPS, GIS, VRT and provides substantial value in terms of minimizing input and maximizing profit to farmers in regions like Canada, North America who have larger land holding capacity. Precision agriculture technologies require significant investment in terms of capital which is most of the time not feasible for farmers with ... P. Bharatiya, M. Kale

184. Precision Agriculture Research Infrastructure for Sustainable Farming

Precision agriculture is an emerging area at the intersection of engineering and agriculture, with the goal of intelligently managing crops at a microscale to maximize yield while minimizing necessary resource. Achieving these goals requires sensors and systems with predictive models to constantly monitor crop and environment status. Large datasets from various sensors are critical in developing predictive models which can optimally manage necessary resources. Initial experiments at Universit... C. Lai, C. Min, R. Chiang, A. Hafferman, S. Morgan

185. Precision Agriculture: A Paradigm Shift for Espousal of Advanced Farming Practices Among Progressive Farmers in Punjab –Pakistan

Precision agriculture provides innovative farm information tools for improved decision making regarding crop growth and yield. Creating awareness for future applications of precision agriculture among progressive farmers in Pakistan was an instrumental force to conduct this study. The purpose was to appraise the awareness level of the respondents for applications of precision agriculture in the field. The objectives such as assessing the awareness level, available information sources, future ... E. Ashraf, H.K. Shurjeel, R. Rasheed

186. Precision Fall Urea Fertilizer Applications: Timing Impact on Carbon Dioxide, Ammonia Volatilization and Nitrous Oxide Emissions

To minimize ammonia (NH3) volatilization and nitrous oxide (N2O) emissions from fall applied fertilizer, it is generally recommended to not apply the fertilizer until the soil temperature decreases below 10 C. However, this recommendation is not based on detailed measurements of NH3and N2O emissions. The objective of this study was to determine the influence of fertilizer application timing on nitrous oxide, carbon dioxide, and ammonia volatilization emissions.  Nitrogen fertilizer ... S. Thies, D.E. Clay, S. Bruggeman, D. Joshi, S. Clay, J. Miller

187. Precision Feeding Can Significantly Reduce Lysine Intake and Nitrogen Excretion Without Compromising the Performance of Growing Pigs

The impact of using a mathematical model estimating real-time daily lysine requirements in a sustainable precision feeding program for growing pigs was investigated in two performance trials. Three treatments were tested in the first trial (60 pigs of 41.2±0.5 kg): a three-phase feeding program (3P) obtained by blending fixed proportions of feeds A (high nutrient concentration) and B (low nutrient concentration); and two daily-phase feeding programs in which the blended proportions of ... C. Pomar, I. Andretta, J. Rivest, L. Hauschild, J. Pomar

188. Precision Irrigation Management Through Conjunctive Use of Treated Wastewater and Groundwater in Oman

Agriculture under arid environment is always become a challenge due to water scarcity and salinity problems.  With average rainfall of 100 mm, agriculture in Oman is limited due to the arid climate and limited arable lands. More than 50 percent of the arable lands are located in the 300 km northern coastal belt of Al-Batinah region. In addition, country is facing severe problem of sea water intrusion into the groundwater aquifers due to undisciplined excessive groundwater (GW) abstractio... H. Jayasuriya, A. Al-busaidi, M. Ahmed

189. Precision Nitrogen and Water Management for Enhancing Efficiency and Productivity in Irrigated Maize

Nitrogen and water continue to be the most limiting factors for profitable maize production in the western Great Plains. The objective of this research was to determine the most productive and efficient nitrogen and water management strategies for irrigated maize.  This study was conducted in 2016 at Colorado State University’s Agricultural Research Development and Educational Center, in Fort Collins, Colorado. The experiment included a completely randomized block design with ... E. Phillippi, R. Khosla, L. Longchamps, P. Turk

190. Predicted Nitrate-N Loads for Fall, Spring, and VRN Fertilizer Application in Southern Minnesota

Nitrate-N from agricultural fields is a source of pollution to fresh and marine waters via subsurface tile drainage.  Sensor-based technologies that allow for in-season monitoring of crop nitrogen requirements may represent a way to reduce nitrate-N loadings to surface waters by allowing for fertilizer application on a more precise spatial and temporal resolution.  However, little research has been done to determine its effectiveness in reducing nitrate-N losses.  In this study... G.L. Wilson, D.J. Mulla, J. Galzki, A. Laacouri, J. Vetsch

191. Predicting Dry Matter Composition of Grass Clover Leys Using Data Simulation and Camera-Based Segmentation of Field Canopies into White Clover, Red Clover, Grass and Weeds

Targeted fertilization of grass clover leys shows high financial and environmental potentials leading to higher yields of increased quality, while reducing nitrate leaching. To realize the gains, an accurate fertilization map is required, which is closely related to the local composition of plant species in the biomass. In our setup, we utilize a top-down canopy view of the grass clover ley to estimate the composition of the vegetation, and predict the composition of the dry matter of the for... S. Skovsen, M. Dyrmann, J. Eriksen, R. Gislum, H. Karstoft, R.N. Jørgensen

192. Prediction of Corn Economic Optimum Nitrogen Rate in Argentina

Static (i.e. texture and soil depth) and dynamic (i.e. soil water, temperature) factors play a role in determining field or subfield economically optimal N rates (EONR). We used 50 nitrogen (N) trials from Argentina at contrasting landscape positions and soil types, various soil-crop measurements from 2012 to 2017, and statistical techniques to address the following objectives: a) characterize corn yield and EONR variability across a multi-landscape-year study in central west Buenos Aire... L. Puntel, A. Pagani, S. Archontoulis

193. Prospects and Challeges to Precision Agriculture Technologies Development in Ghana: Scientists' and Extension Agents' Perspectives.

The main objective of the research was to examine the prospects and challenges of developing and implementing precision agriculture (PA) in cocoa production in Ghana. A census of cocoa research scientists and a survey of cocoa extension agents (CEAs) in Ghana were taken. Five major challenges they perceived to pose serious challenges to the development and implementation of future Precision Agriculture Technologies (PATs), in their decreasing order of importance, were (a) farmer-demograp... M. Bosompem

194. Prototype Unmanned Aerial Sprayer for Plant Protection in Agricultural and Horticultural Crops

Aerial application of pesticides has the potential to reduce the amount of pesticides required as chemicals are applied where needed. A prototype Unmanned Aerial Sprayer with a payload of 20 kg; a spraying rate of 6 liters per minute; a spraying swathe of 3 meters, coverage rate of 2 to 4 meters per second and 10 minutes of flight time was built using state of the art technologies. The project is a joint development by University of Agricultural Sciences, Dharwad, KLE Technological University... S. G, D.P. Biradar, B.L. Desai, V.C. Patil, P. Patil, V.B. Nargund, V. Desai, W. John, S.M. Channangi, V. Tulasigeri

195. Prototype Unmanned Aerial Sprayer for Plant Protection in Agricultural and Horticultural Crops

Aerial application of pesticides has the potential to reduce the amount of pesticides required as chemicals are applied where needed. A prototype Unmanned Aerial Sprayer with a payload of 20 kg; a spraying rate of 6 liters per minute; a spraying swathe of 3 meters, coverage rate of 2 to 4 meters per second and 10 minutes of flight time was built using state of the art technologies. The project is a joint development by University of Agricultural Sciences, Dharwad, KLE Technological University... S. Reddy, D.P. Biradar, V.C. Patil, B.L. Desai, V.B. Nargund, P. Patil, V. Desai, V. Tulasigeri, S.M. Channangi, W. John

196. Proximal Soil Sensing-Led Management Zone Delineation for Potato Fields

A fundamental aspect of precision agriculture or site-specific crop management is the ability to recognize and address local changes in the crop production environment (e.g. soil) within the boundaries of a traditional management unit. However, the status quo approach to define local fertilizer need relies on systematic soil sampling followed by time and labour-intensive laboratory analysis. Proximal soil sensing offers numerous advantages over conventional soil characterization and has shown... A. Biswas, W. Ji, I. Perron, A. Cambouris, B. Zebarth, V. Adamchuk

197. Quantification of Seed Performance: Non-Invasive Determination of Internal Traits Using Computed Tomography

The application of the 3D mean-shift filter to 3D Computed Tomography Data enables the segmentation of internal traits. Specifically in maize seeds this approach gives the opportunity to separate the internal structure, for example the volume of the embryo, the cavities and the low and high dense parts of the starch body. To evaluate the mean-shift filter, the results were compared to the usage of a median-smoothing filter. To show the relevance of the mean-shift extended image pipeline an au... J. Claussen, N. Wörlein, N. Uhlmann, S. Gerth

198. Rape Plant NDVI Spatial Distribution Model Based on 3D Reconstruction

Plants’ morphology changes in their growing process. The 3D reconstruction of plant is of great significance for studying the impacts of plant morphology on biomass estimation, illness and insect infestation, genetic expression, etc. At present, the 3D point cloud reconstructed through 3D reconstruction mainly includes the morphology, color and other features of the plant, but cannot reflect the change in spatial 3D distribution of organic matters caused by the nutritional status (e.g. ... Y. Chen, Y. He

199. Rapid Acquisition of Site Specific Lime Requirement with Mid-Infrared Spectroscopy

In Germany, the lime requirement of arable topsoils is derived from the organic matter content, clay content, and pH(CaCl2). For this purpose, it is common practice to determine the lime requirement of a field size up to three hectares from only one composite soil sample, whereby site heterogeneity is regularly not taken into account. To consider site heterogeneity, a measurement technique is required which allows a rapid and high resolution data acquisition. Mid-infrared... M. Leenen, S. Pätzold, T. Heggemann, G. Welp

200. Rapid Identification of Mulberry Leaf Pests Based on Near Infrared Hyperspectral Imaging

As one of the most common mulberry pests, Diaphania pyloalis Walker (Lepidoptera: Pyralididae) has occurred and damaged in the main sericulture areas of China. Naked eye observation, the most dominating method identifying the damage of Diaphania pyloalis, is time-wasting and labor consuming. In order to improve the identification and diagnosis efficiency and avoid the massive outbreak of Diaphania pyloalis, near infrared (NIR) hyperspectral imaging technology combined with partial least discr... L. Yang, L. Huang, L. Meng, J. Wang, D. Wu, X. Fu, S. Li

201. Real Time Precision Irrigation with Variable Setpoint for Strawberry to Generate Water Savings

Water is a precious resource that is becoming increasingly scarce as the population grows and water resources are depleted in some locations or under increased control elsewhere, due to local availability or groundwater contamination issues. It obviously affects strawberry (Fragaria x ananassa Duch.) production in populated areas and water cuts are being imposed to many strawberry growers to save water, with limited information on the impact on crop yield. Precision irrigation technologies ar... J. Caron, L. Anderson, G. Sauvageau, L. Gendron

202. Real-Time Control of Spray Drop Application

Electrostatic application of spray drops provides unique opportunities to precisely control the application of pesticides due to the additional electrostatic force on the spray drops, in addition to the normally seen forces of aerodynamic drag, gravity, and inertia. In this work, we develop a computational model to predict the spray drop trajectories. The model is validated through experiments with high speed photography of spray drop trajectories, and quantification of which trajectories lea... S. Post, M. Jermy, P. Gaynor, N. Kabaliuk, A. Werner

203. Real-Time Fruit Detection Using Deep Neural Networks

Proximal imaging using tractor-mounted cameras is a simple and cost-effective method to acquire large quantities of data in orchards and vineyards. It can be used for the monitoring of vegetation and for the management of field operations such as the guidance of smart spraying systems for instance. One of the most prolific research subjects in arboriculture is fruit detection during the growing season. Estimations of fruit-load can be used for early yield assessments and for the monitoring of... B. Keresztes, J. Da costa, D. Randriamanga, C. Germain, F. Abdelghafour

204. Realising the Full Potential of Precision Agriculture: Encouraging Farmer 'Buy-in' by Building Trust in Data Sharing

Uncertainty around the ownership, privacy and security of farm data are most commonly the reasons cited for farmer’s reluctance to “buy-in” to big data in agriculture. Evidence provided to the recent US Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation Subcommittee on Consumer Protections, Product Safety, Insurance, and Data Security, United States Senate Technology in Agriculture: Data Driven Farming (Nov 2017) highlighted that “data ownership, and rel... L. Wiseman, J. Sanderson

205. Refractive Index Based Brix Measurement System for Sugar and Allied Industries

An attempt has been made to design optimization of Refractormetric based method for the measurement of Brix.  Optimization of various constructional parameters including selection and location of source, prism and detector, position of source, angular position and height of source from prism plane, divergent angle of source, refractive index of prism, size of prism, the location of detector to pick up the optimum reflected light, refractive index of sample, critical angle, choice of suit... M.L. Dongare, B.T. Jadhav, A.D. Shaligram

206. Relationships Between First Test Day Metrics of First Lactation Cows to Evaluate Transition Period

The objective of this study was to apply principal component analysis (PCA) and multiple correspondence analysis (MCA) on Dairy Herd Improvement (DHI) data of animals on their first lactation to discover the most meaningful set of variables that describe the outcome on the first test day. Data collected over 4 years were obtained from 13 dairy herds located in Québec – Canada. The data set was filtered to contain only information from first test day of animals on their first lact... G.M. Dallago, D. Figueiredo, R. Santos, P. Andrade, D.E. Santschi, R. Lacroix, D.M. Lefebvre

207. Reverse Modelling of Yield-Influencing Soil Variables in Case of Few Soil Data

Our hypothesis was that simple models can be applied to predict yield by using only those yield data which spatially coincide with the soil data and the remaining yield data and the models can be used to test different sampling and interpolation approaches commonly applied in precision agriculture and to better predict soil variables at not observed locations. Three strategies for composite sample collection were compared in our study. Point samples were taken 1.) along lines within homogenou... I. Sisák, A. Benő, K. Szabó, M. Kocsis, J. Abonyi

208. Review of Developments in Airborne Geophysics and Geomatics to Map Variability of Soil Properties

Over the past 40 years, airborne geophysics and geomatics has become an effective and accepted technology for mapping various signatures on the Earth’s surface and sub-surface. But so far, its airborne application in agriculture is perceived as sub-practical and/or its real value unknown to most stakeholders. In this paper, we are reviewing major technical and commercial achievements and latest developments to date, but also potentials for new developments and applications, of airb... L. Ameglio

209. Risk Efficiency of Site-Specific Nitrogen Management with Respect to Grain Quality

Profitability analyses of site-specific nitrogen management strategies have often failed to provide reasons for adoption of precision farming implements. However, often effects of precision farming on product quality and price premiums were not taken into account. This study aims to evaluate comparative advantages of site-specific nitrogen management over uniform nitrogen management with respect to aspects of risk, considering fertilizer effects on grain quality and price premiums. We develop... A. Meyer-aurich, Y. Karatay, M. Gandorfer

210. Rumex and Urtica Detection in Grassland by UAV

Previous work (Binch & Fox, 2017) used autonomous ground robotic platforms to successfully detect Urtica (nettle) and Rumex (dock) weeds in grassland, to improve farm productivity and the environment through precision herbicide spraying. It assumed that ground robots swathe entire fields to both detect and spray weeds, but this is a slow process as the slow ground platform must drive over every square meter of the field even where there are no weeds. The present study examines a complimen... A. Binch, N. Cooke, C.W. Fox

211. Salinity Stress Assessment on Vegetation Cover in Arid Regions Using Visible Range Indices of True Color Aerial UAV/Drone Images

Date palm (Phoenix dactylifera L.) is one of the most important plant growing in arid and semi-arid regions, where it has a social, cultural, economic and nutritious importance. Although date palm can be ranked as the highest salt tolerance plant among fruit crop, extreme salinity can negatively affect its growth, yield and fruit quality. Inadequate annual rainfall of arid regions has stressed and rapidly decreased date palm plantation due to salinity and drought. In this study unmanned ... Y.A. Al-mulla, S. Al-rahbi

212. Sensor Comparison for Yield Monitoring Systems of Small-Sized Potato Harvesters

Yield monitoring of potato in real time during harvesting would be useful for farmers, providing instant yield and income information. In the study, potentials of candidate sensors were evaluated with different yield measurement techniques for yield monitoring system of small-sized potato harvesters. Mass-based (i.e., load cell) and volume-based (i.e., CCD camera) sensors were selected and tested under laboratory conditions. For mass-based sensing, an impact plate instrumented with load cells... K.M. Swe, Y. Kim, D. Jeong, S. Lee, S. Chung, M.S. Kabir

213. Shared Protocols and Data Template in Agronomic Trials

Due to the overlap of many disciplines and the availability of novel technologies, modern agriculture has become a wide, interdisciplinary endeavor, especially in Precision Agriculture. The adoption of a standard format for reporting field experiments can help researchers to focus on the data rather than on re-formatting and understanding the structure of the data. This paper describes how a European consortium plans to: i) create a “handbook” of protocols for reporting definition... D. Cammarano, D. Drexler, P. Hinsinger, P. Martre, X. Draye, A. Sessitsch, N. Pecchioni, J. Cooper, W. Helga, A. Voicu

214. Site-Specific Management Zones Delineation Using Drone-Based Hyperspectral Imagery

Conventional techniques (e.g., intensive soil sampling) for site-specific management zones (MZ) delineation are often laborious and time-consuming. Using drones equipped with hyperspectral system can overcome some of the disadvantages of these techniques. The present work aimed to develop a drone-based hyperspectral imagery method to characterize the spatial variability of soil physical properties in order to delineate site-specific MZ. Canonical correlation analysis (CCA) was used to extract... H. Agili, K. Chokmani, A. Cambouris, I. Perron, J. Poulin

215. Snap Bean Flowering Detection from UAS Imaging Spectroscopy

Sclerotinia sclerotiorum (white mold) is a fungus that infects the flowers of snap beans and causes a reduction in the number of pods, and subsequent yields, due to premature pod abscission. Snap bean fields typically are treated with prophylactic fungicide applications to control white mold, once 10% of the plants have at least one flower. The holistic goal of this research is to develop spatially-explicit white mold risk models, based on inputs from remote sensing systems aboard unmann... E.W. Hughes, S.J. Pethybridge, C. Salvaggio, J. Van aardt, J.R. Kikkert

216. Soil Microbial Communities Have Distinct Spatial Patterns in Agricultural Fields

Soil microbial communities mediate many important soil processes in agricultural fields, however their spatial distribution at distances relevant to precision agriculture is poorly understood. This study examined the soil physico-chemical properties and topographic features controlling the spatial distribution of soil microbial communities in a commercial potato field in eastern Canada using next generation sequencing. Soil was collected from a transect (1100 m) with 83 sampling points in a l... B. Zebarth, C. Goyer, S. Neupane, S. Li, A. Mills, S. Whitney, A. Cambouris, I. Perron

217. Soil Spatial Variability Assessment and Precision Nutrient Management in Maize (Zea Mays L.)

Investigations on soil spatial variability and precision nutrient management based targeted yield approach in maize was carried out at Agricultural research station (ARS), Mudhol (Karnataka), India under irrigated condition during 2013-14, 2014-15 and 2015-16. ARS, Mudhol is located in northern dry zone of Karnataka at 160 20! N latitude, 750 15! E longitude and at an altitude of 577.6 meter above mean sea level. To assess the spatial variability, the study area was divided into 20 x20 m size... M.P. Potdar, G.B. Balol, S.A. Satyareddi, B.T. Nadagouda , C.P. Chandrashekar

218. soil2data: Concept for a Mobile Field Laboratory for Nutrient Analysis

Knowledge of the small-scale nutrient status of arable land is an important basis for optimizing fertilizer use in crop production. A mobile field laboratory opens up the possibility of carrying out soil sampling and nutrient analysis directly on the field. In addition to the benefits of fast data availability and the avoidance of soil material transport to the laboratory, it provides a future foundation for advanced application options, e.g. a high sampling density, sampling of small sub-fie... V. Tsukor, C. Scholz, W. Nietfeld, T. Heinrich, T. Mosler , F. Lorenz, E. Najdenko, A. Möller, D. Mentrup, A. Ruckelshausen, S. Hinck

219. Soybean Maturity Stage Estimation with Unmanned Aerial Systems

Many agronomic decisions in soybean production systems revolve around crop maturity. The primary objective of this research was to evaluate the ability of UAS to determine when soybeans have reached maturity stage sufficient for harvest aid application. A producer typically applies harvest aid chemicals when he or she perceives the crop has reached a critical level of maturity (R6.5) based on a subjective assessment. A convention is to apply harvest aids when 65% of soybean pods reach a matur... J.M. Prince czarnecki, L.L. Wasson, J.T. Irby, A.B. Scholtes, S.M. Carver

220. Soybean Plant Phenotyping Using Low-Cost Sensors

Plant phenotyping techniques are important to present the performance of a crop and it interaction with the environment. The phenotype information is important for plant breeders to analyze and understand the plant responses from the ambient conditions and the inputs offered for it. However, for conclusive analysis it is necessary a large number of individuals. Thus, phenotyping is the bottleneck of plant breeding, a consequence of the labor intensive and costly nature of the classical phenot... M.N. Ferraz, R.G. Trevisan, M.T. Eitelwein, J. Molin, F.H. Karp

221. Spatial Decision Support System: Controlled Tile Drainage – Calculate Your Benefits

Climate projection studies suggest that extreme heat waves and floods will become more frequent, affecting future crop yields by 20%-30%, globally. Managing vulnerability and risk begins at the farm level where best management practices can reduce the impacts associated with extreme weather events. A practice that can assist in mitigating the impact of some extreme events is controlled tile drainage (CTD). With CTD, producers use water flow control structures to manage the drainage of water f... A. Kross, G. Kaur, D. Callegari, D. Lapen, M. Sunohara, H. Mcnairn, H. Rudy, L. Van vliet

222. Spatial Variability of Canola Yield Related to Terrain Attributes Within Producer's Fields

Canola production in the Canadian Prairies varies considerably within and between producer's fields.  This study describes the variability of crop yield in producer's fields in the context of terrain attributes, and in relation to fertilizer rates in management zones determined from historical yield.  Canola yield data were collected for 27 fields in Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba Canada in 2014, 2015, 2016 and 2017.  Several terrain attributes accounted for a consi... A. Moulin, M. Khakbazan

223. Spatial Variability of Optimized Herbicide Mixtures and Dosages

Driven by 25 years of Danish, political 'pesticide action plans', aiming at reducing the use of pesticides, a Danish Decision Support System (DSS) for Integrated Weed Management (IWM) has been constructed. This online tool, called ‘IPMwise’ is now in its 4th generation. It integrates the 8 general IPM-principles as defined by the EU. In Denmark, this DSS includes 30 crops, 105 weeds and full assortments of herbicides. Due to generic qualities in both the integrat... P. Rydahl, R.N. Jorgensen, M. Dyrmann, N. Jensen, M.D. Sorensen, O.M. Bojer, P. Andersen

224. Supporting and Analysing On-Farm Nitrogen Tramline Trials So Farmers, Industry, Agronomists and Scientists Can LearN Together

Nitrogen fertilizer decisions are considered important for the agronomic, economic and environmental performance of cereal crop production. Despite good recommendation systems large unpredicted variation exists in measured N requirements. There may be fields and farms that are consistently receiving too much or too little N fertilizer, therefore losing substantial profit from wasted fertilizer or lost yield. Precision farming technologies can enable farmers (& researchers) to test appropr... D. Kindred, R. Sylvester-bradley, S. Clarke, S. Roques, D. Hatley, B. Marchant

225. Temporal Analysis of Correlation of NDVI with Growth and Yield Features of Rice Plants

In this paper we present a temporal correlation analysis of NDVI with with Growth and Yield Features of Rice Plants.  A half ha experimental rice field was established south-west of Ibagué, Tolima, Colombia (4°22'54.192"N, 75°09'17.222"W.  For the experimental design in the plot, four rows were established for nitrogen, three for phosphorous and three for potassium. For nitrogen, each row contained five treatments allocated randomly.&n... O. Barrero, L.A. Castilla

226. The Animal Welfare of Dairy Cows Housed in Free-Stall Barn According to the Welfare Quality® Protocol: Good Feeding and Good Housing Principles

The objective of the present study was to evaluate the animal welfare of dairy cows according to good feeding and good housing principles of the Welfare Quality® protocol. The protocol was applied to animals kept confined in a free-stall barn during their lactation. The farm was located in São João Batista do Glória, Minas Gerais state - Brazil. One hundred and one animals were evaluated (47 primiparous and 54 multiparous). The welfare measures were collected mostly t... G.M. Dallago, M. Guimarães, R. Godinho, R. Carvalho, A. Lobo júnior

227. The Correlation Between Criteria from Welfare Quality® Protocol Applied to Dairy Cows Housed in Free-Stall Barn

The objective of this study was to evaluate correlations between animal welfare criteria from the Welfare Quality® protocol applied to dairy cows. The protocol was applied on 47 primiparous and 54 multiparous dairy cows housed in a free-stall barn located in São João Batista do Glória, Minas Gerais - Brazil. Twelve welfare criteria were obtained from mostly animal-based welfare measures as proposed by the protocol. Pearson correlation coefficients (r) were calculated ... G.M. Dallago, M. Guimarães, R. Godinho, R. Carvalho, A. Lobo júnior

228. The Guelph Plot Analyzer: Semi-Automatic Extraction of Small-Plot Research Data from Aerial Imagery

Small-plot trials are the foundation of open-field agricultural research because they strike a balance between the control of an artificial environment and the realism of field-scale production. However, the size and scope of this research field is often limited by the ability to collect data, which is limited by access to labour. Remote sensing has long been investigated to allocate labour more efficiently, therefore enabling the rapid collection of data. Imagery collected by unmanned aerial... J. Nederend, D. Drover, B. Reiche, B. Deen, L. Lee, G.W. Taylor

229. The Impact of Precision Agriculture Technologies on Farm Profitability in Kansas

Even with more than a decade long adoption of the precision agriculture (PA) technologies in the United States, its impact on farm profitability is still not clear. This paper uses farm level data from Kansas Farm Management Association (KFMA) to conduct the ex-post evaluation of PA technologies on farm profitability in Kansas. The analysis of the data using propensity score matching method indicates that there is on an average $60,000 difference in net returns of the farm with at least one P... S. Dhoubhadel, T.W. Griffin

230. The Influence of Calf’s Sex on Total Milk Yield and Its Constituents of Dairy Cows

The objective of the present work was to evaluate the influence of the sex of the calf on total milk yield and its constituents of Holstein-Friesian dairy cows. The Holstein Livestock Breeders Association of Minas Gerais provided data collected over the years from 2000 to 2016 from 127 dairy farms located in the state of Minas Gerais – Brazil. The data set analyzed contained 61747 observations of Holstein-Friesian animals that calved female (n = 28903) or male (n = 32844) calf. Fat, pro... G.M. Dallago, D. Figueiredo, R. Santos, D. Santos, L. Barroso, G. Alves, J. Vieira, L. Guimarães, C. Santos , L. Maciel

231. The Profitability of Variable Rate Lime in Wheat

Grid sampling allows a variable rate of lime to be applied and has been marketed as a cost saver to producers. However, there is little research that shows if this precision application is profitable or not. Previous research on variable-rate lime has considered only a small number of fields. This paper uses soil sampling data from 170 fields provided by producers in Oklahoma and Kansas. We compare net returns of variable rate to uniform rate lime for grain only wheat production, dual-purpose... B. Mills, B. Brorsen, D. Arnall

232. The Spread of Precision Livestock Farming Technology at Dairy Farms in East Hungary

During the survey, 25 dairy farms were examined in East Hungary in Hajdú-Bihar (H-B) County between 2017 and 2018 by methodical observation and oral interviews with the farm managers, about the spread of Precision Livestock Farming (PLF) technologies. Among Holstein Friesian dairy farms in the County 60% were questioned, and the representativity was above 47 percent ins each size category. Nine precision farming equipment were examined on the farms: milking robot or robotic carousel mi... C. Nándor, T. Rátonyi, E. Harsányi, P. Ragán, Z. Hagymássy, J. Nagy, A. Vántus

233. Three Years of On-Farm Evaluation of Dynamic Variable Rate Irrigation: What Have We Learned?

This paper will present a dynamic Variable Rate Irrigation System developed by the University of Georgia. The system consists of the EZZone management zone delineation tool, the UGA Smart Sensor Array (UGA SSA) and an irrigation scheduling decision support tool. An experiment was conducted in 2015, 2016 and 2017 in two different peanut fields to evaluate the performance of using the UGA SSA to dynamically schedule Variable Rate Irrigation (VRI). For comparison reasons strips were designed wit... V. Liakos, W. Porter, X. Liang, M. Tucker, A. Mclendon, C. Perry, G. Vellidis

234. Through the Grass Ceiling: Using Multiple Data Sources on Intra-Field Variability to Reset Expectations of Pasture Production and Farm Profitability

Intra-field variability has received much attention in arable and horticultural contexts. It has resulted in increased profitability as well as reduced environmental footprint. However, in a pastoral context, the value of understanding intra-field variability has not been widely appreciated. In this programme, we used available technologies to develop multiple data layers on multiple fields within a dairy farm. This farm was selected as it was already performing at a high level, with well-dev... W. King, R. Dynes, S. Laurenson, S. Zydenbos, R. Macauliffe, A. Taylor, M. Manning, A. Roberts, M. White

235. Time Series Analysis of Somatic Cell Count from Dairy Herds in Minas Gerais - Brazil

The objective of this study was to analyze the temporal variation of somatic cell count (SCC) in milk of dairy cows from the state of Minas Gerais, Brazil. The Holstein Livestock Breeders Association of Minas Gerais provided data collected from 128 dairy farms located in the state of Minas Gerais between the years of 2000 and 2016. The database contains the SCC average of a total of 91,851 305-day lactations of Holstein animals. The annual SCC average was calculated as well as the percentage ... G.M. Dallago, D. Figueiredo, R. Santos, D. Santos, L. Guimarães, C. Santos, T. Castro, A. Santos, L. Otoni, J. Andrade

236. Toward a Precision Agricultural Implementation for Sugar Cane Plantations in Southwestern Region of Colombia, South America

The Colombian Sugar Cane Research Center, CENICAÑA, has initiated an ambitious project for the implementation of Precision Agriculture (PA) technologies in the Cauca river valley region, where one of its main objectives is to have the ability to collect large volumes of geospatial data. The main sugarcane growers in the country perform their work in the selected work area, which covers an area of ​​approximately 242,000 ha, characterized by diverse topographic and edaphic condition... J.A. Celades, J.H. Caicedo, C.E. García, H. Mora

237. Towards Universal Applicability of On-the-Go Gamma-Spectrometry for Soil Texture Estimation in Precision Farming by Using Machine Learning Applications

High resolution soil data are an essential prerequisite for the application of precision farming techniques. Sensor-based evaluation of soil properties may replace or at least reduce laborious, time-consuming and expensive soil sampling with subsequent measurements in the lab. Gamma spectrometry usually provides information that can be translated into topsoil texture data after calibration. This is because the natural content of the radioactive isotopes 40-K, 232-Th, and 238-U as we... S. Pätzold, T. heggemann, M. Leenen, S. Koszinski, K. Schmidt, G. Welp

238. Tracking Two Decades of Precision Agriculture Through the Croplife Purdue Survey

The CropLife/Purdue University precision dealer survey is the longest-running continuous survey of precision farming adoption.  The 2017 survey is the 18th, conducted every year from 1997 to 2009, and then every other year following.  For individuals working in agriculture there is great value in knowing who is doing what and why, to get a better understanding of the utilities and applications, and to guide investments.  A major revision in survey questions was m... B. Erickson, J. Lowenberg-deboer, J. Bradford

239. Two-Layer Multiple Soil-Property Mapping Measured with a Real-Time Soil Sensor

We obtained calibration models for 32 soil properties based on Vis-NIR (350 - 1700 nm) underground soil diffuse reflectance spectra collected using a real-time soil sensor (SAS3000) with a DGPS system, in order to generate soil property maps. We have previously demonstrated one-layer soil maps for soil management decision making by growers; however, for effective crop management, growers often wish to obtain complex layer information for their fields. Thus, in the present study, we measured t... M. Kodaira, S. Shibusawa

240. UAV Images As a Source for Retrieval of Machine Tracks and Vegetation Gaps Along Crop Rows

The trend of acquiring equipment and obtaining high resolution remote sensed images by Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV) have been followed by sugarcane producers in Brazil, given its low cost. The images taken from fields have been used for retrieval of information like Digital Terrain Models (DTMs) from stereoscopy of overlapping images and spatial variance of biomass. In sugarcane production, driving deviations occur during planting because of manual steering inaccuracy, sliding of machines s... M. Spekken, J.P. Molin

241. Understanding Temporal and Spatial Variation of Soil Available Nutrients with Satellite Remote Sensing

Soil available nutrients are the key determinants in crop growth, field stable output and ecological balance. The soil nutrients loss and surplus can strongly influence the stability of field ecological environment and cause unnecessary pollution. Hence, optimizing the status of soil available nutrients status has significant ecological and economic significance. With the advancement of mechanized farming and control technologies, soil available nutrients can be optimize by variable rate fert... J. Meng, H. Fang, Z. Cheng

242. Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS) for Mitigating Bird Damage in Wine Grapes

Bird predation is a significant problem in high-value fruit crops, such as apples, cherries, blueberries, and wine grapes. Conventional methods such as netting, falconry, auditory scaring devices, lethal shooting, and visual scare devices are reported to be ineffective, costly, and/or difficult to manage. Therefore, farmers are in need of more effective and affordable bird control methods. In this study, two UAS wasused as a bird-deterring agent in a commercial vineyard. The experimental... S. Bhusal, K. Khanal, M. Karkee, K.M. Steensma, M.E. Taylor

243. Unmanned Aerial Systems and Remote Sensing for Cranberry Production

Wisconsin is the largest producer of Cranberries in the United States with 5.6 million barrels produced in 2017. To date, Precision Agriculture technologies adapted to cranberry production have been limited. The objective of this research was to assess the feasibility of the use of commercial remote sensing devices and Unmanned Aerial Systems in cranberry production. Two commercially available sensors were assessed for use in cranberry production: 1) MicaSense Red Edge and 2) Zenmuse XT. Init... B. Luck, J. Drewry, E. Chassen, S. Steffan

244. Usage of Milk Revenue Per Minute of Boxtime to Assess Cows Selection and Farm Profitability in Automatic Milking Systems

The number of farms implementing robotic milking systems, usually referred as automatic milking systems (AMS), is increasing rapidly. AMS efficiency is a priority to achieve high milk production and higher incomes from dairy herds. Recent studies suggested that milkability (i.e., amount of milk produced per total time spent in the AMS [kg milk/ minute of boxtime]) could be used for as a criteria for genetic evaluations. Therefore, an indicator of milkability was developed, which combines econ... L. Fadul-pacheco, G. Bisson, R. Lacroix, M. Séguin, R. Roy, E. Vasseur, D. Lefebvre

245. Use Cases for Real Time Data in Agriculture

Agricultural data of many types (yield, weather, soil moisture, field operations, topography, etc.) comes in varied geospatial aggregation levels and time increments. For much of this data, consumption and utilization is not time sensitive. For other data elements, time is of the essence. We hypothesize that better quality data (for those later analyses) will also follow from real-time presentation and application of data for it is during the time that data is being collected that errors can ... J. Krogmeier, D. Buckmaster, A. Ault, Y. Wang, Y. Zhang, A. Layton, S. Noel, A. Balmos

246. Use of Farmer’s Experience for Management Zones Delineation

In the management of spatial variability of the fields, the management zone approach (MZs) divides the area into sub-regions of minimal soil and plant variability, which have maximum homogeneity of topography and soil conditions, so that these MZs must lead to the same potential yield. Farmers have experience of which areas of a field have high and low yields, and the use of this knowledge base can allow the identification of MZs in a field based on production history. The objective of this s... K. Schenatto, E.G. Souza, C.L. Bazzi, A. Gavioli, N.M. Betzek, P.S. Magalhães

247. Use of Field Diagnostic Tools for Top Dressing Nitrogen Recommendation When Organic Manures Are Applied in Humid Mediterranean Conditions

Nitrogen is often applied in excessive quantities, causing nitrogen losses. In recent years, the management of large quantities of manure and slurry compounds has become a challenge. The aim of this study was to assess the usefulness of the proxy tools Yara N-testerTMand RapidScan CS-45 for diagnosing the N nutritional status of wheat crops when farmyard manures were applied. Our second objective was to start designing a N fertilization strategy based on these measurements. To achieve these o... A. Castellón, A. Aizpurua, M. Aranguren

248. Use of Proximal Soil Sensing to Delineate Management Zones in a Commercial Potato Field in Prince Edward Island, Canada

Management zones (MZs) are delineated areas within an agricultural field with relatively homogenous soil properties. Such MZs can often be used for site-specific management of crop production inputs. The purpose of this study was to determine the efficiency of two proximal soil sensors for delineating MZs in an 8.1-ha commercial potato (Solanum tuberosum L.) field in Prince Edward Island (PEI), Canada. A galvanic contact resistivity sensor (Veris-3100 [Veris]) and electromagnetic induction se... A. Cambouris, A. Lajili, K. Chokmani , I. Perron, V. Adamchuk, A. Biswas , B. Zebrath

249. Use of UAV Acquired Imagery As a Precision Agriculture Method for Measuring Crop Residue in Southwestern Ontario, Canada

Residue management on agriculture land is a practice of great importance in southwestern Ontario, where soil management practices have an important effect on Great Lakes water quality. The ability of tillage or planting system to maintain soil residue cover is currently measured by using one or more of the common methods, line transect (e.g. knotted rope, Meter stick) and photographic (grid, script, and image analysis) methods. Each of these techniques has various advantages and disadvantages... A. Laamrani, A. Berg, M. March, A. Mclaren, R. Martin

250. Using a Fully Convolutional Neural Network for Detecting Locations of Weeds in Images from Cereal Fields

Information about the presence of weeds in fields is important to decide on a weed control strategy. This is especially crucial in precision weed management, where the position of each plant is essential for conducting mechanical weed control or patch spraying. For detecting weeds, this study proposes a fully convolutional neural network, which detects weeds in images and classifies each one as either a monocot or dicot. The network has been trained on over 13 000 weed annota... M. Dyrmann, S. Skovsen, R.N. Jørgensen, M.S. Laursen

251. Using a UAV-Based Active Canopy Sensor to Estimate Rice Nitrogen Status

Active canopy sensors have been widely used in the studies of crop nitrogen (N) estimation as its suitability for different environmental conditions. Unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) is a low-cost remote sensing platform for its great flexibility compared to traditional ways of remote sensing. UAV-based active canopy sensor is expected to take the advantages of both sides. The objective of this study is to determine whether UAV-based active canopy sensor has potential for monitoring rice N statu... S. Li, Q. Cao, X. Liu, Y. Tian, Y. Zhu

252. Using an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle with Multispectral with RGB Sensors to Analyze Canola Yield in the Canadian Prairies

In 2017 canola was planted on 9 million hectares in Canada surpassing wheat as the most widely planted crop in Canada.  Saskatchewan is the dominant producer with nearly 5 million hectares planted in 2017.  This crop, seen both as one of the highest-yielding and most profitable, is also one of most expensive and input-intensive for producers on the Canadian Prairies.   In this study, the effect of natural and planted shelterbelts on canola yield was compared with canola yi... K. Hodge, L. Bainard, A. Smith, F. Akhter

253. Using Canopy Hyperspectral Measurements to Evaluate Nitrogen Status in Different Leaf Layers of Winter Wheat

Nitrogen (N) is one of the most important nutrient matters for crop growth and has the marked influence on the ultimate formation of yield and quality in crop production. As the most mobile nutrient constituent, N always transfers from the bottom to top leaves under N stress condition. Vertical gradient changes of leaf N concentration are a general feature in canopies of crops. Hence, it is significant to effectively acquire vertical N information for optimizing N fertilization mana... X. Xu, Z. Li, G. Yang, X. Gu, X. Song, X. Yang, H. Feng

254. Using Deep Learning - Convolutional Naural Networks (CNNS) for Real-Time Fruit Detection in the Tree

Image/video processing for fruit detection in the tree using hard-coded feature extraction algorithms have shown high accuracy on fruit detection during recent years. While accurate, these approaches even with high-end hardware are still computationally intensive and too slow for real-time systems. This paper details the use of deep convolution neural networks architecture based on single-stage detectors. Using deep-learning techniques eliminates the need for hard-code specific features for s... K. Bresilla, L. Manfrini, A. Boini, G. Perulli, B. Morandi, L.C. Grappadelli

255. Using Deep Learning in Yield and Protein Prediction of Winter Wheat Based on Fertilization Prescriptions in Precision Agriculture

Precision Agriculture has been gaining interest due to the significant growth in the fields of engineering and computer science, hence leading to more sophisticated methods and tools to improve agricultural techniques. One approach to Precision Agriculture involves the application of mathematical models and machine learning to fertilization optimization and yield prediction, which is what this research focuses on. Specifically, in this work we report the results of predicting yield and protei... J. Sheppard, A. Peerlinck, B. Maxwell

256. Using Drone Based Sensors to Direct Variable-Rate, In-Season, Aerial Nitrogen Application on Corn

Improving nutrient management on farms is a critical issue nationwide. Applying a portion of N fertilizer during the growing season, alongside the growing corn crop is one way to improve nitrogen management. Sidedress N applications allow the availability of N fertilizer to more closely match the time when the crop is rapidly uptaking N. Additionally, waiting to apply a portion of the N during the growing season allows for management which is responsive to current growing season conditions.... L.J. Thompson

257. Using Geospatial Data to Assess How Climate Change May Affect Land Suitability for Agriculture Production

Finding solutions to the challenge of sustainably feeding the world’s growing population is a pressing research need that cuts across many disciplines including using geospatial data. One possible area could be developing agricultural frontiers. Frontiers are defined as land that is currently not cultivated but that may become suitable for agriculture under climate change. Climate change may drive large-scale geographic shifts in agriculture, including expansion in cultivation at the th... K. Kc, L. Hannah, P. Roehrdanz, C. Donatti, E. Fraser, A. Berg, L. Saenz, T.M. Wright, R.J. Hijmans, M. Mulligan

258. Using Precision Agriculture Tools and Improved Data Analysis for Evaluating Effects of Integrated Nutrient Management Programs

Integrated nutrient management (INM) practices are becoming common under intensive agricultural systems in Chile. Practices include, the use of organic matter, in different sources, soil microbial inoculants, and the application of biostimulants, of different origin. Compared to the application of macronutrients, for example, the effects of these products on crops are rather modest and require lower experimental errors to be proven; besides, trials made at the field level, many times do not h... R. Ortega

259. Using Profitability Map to Make Precision Farming Decisions: A Case Study in Mississippi

Recent development in precision agriculture technologies have generated massive amount of geospatial data of farming, such as yield mapping, seeding rates, input applications, and so on. However, producers are still struggling to convert those precision data into farm management decisions to improve productivity and profitability of farming.  Indeed, deriving accurate decisions at each site of the field requires complex and comprehensive modeling of crop yield responses to vari... X. Li, K. Coble

260. Using UAV Imagery for Crop Analytics

UAV imagery was collected in April and July of 2017 over a grape vineyard in California’s San Joaquin Valley. Using spectral signatures, a landcover classification was performed to isolate table grapes from the background vegetation and soil. A novel vegetation index was developed based off the unique spectral characteristics of the yellowing effects of chlorosis within the table grape vines. Spatial statistics were run only on the pixels containing grape plants, and a relative vegetati... C. Adams, A. Coates

261. Using Unmanned Aerial Vehicle and Active-Optical Sensor to Monitor Growth Indices and Nitrogen Nutrition of Winter Wheat

Using unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) remote sensing monitoring system can rapidly and cost-effectively provide crop canopy information for growth diagnosis and precision fertilizer regulation. RapidScan CS-45 (Holland, Lincoln, NE, USA) is a portable active-optical sensor designed for timely, non-destructive obtaining plant canopy information without being affected by weather condition. UAV equipped with RapidScan, is of great significant for rapidly monitoring crop growth and nitrogen (N) sta... X. Liu, Q. Cao, Y. Tian, Y. Zhu, Z. Zhang, W. Cao

262. Utilization of Spatially Precise Measurements to Autocalibrate the EPIC Agroecosystem Model

Corn nitrogen recommendations for individual fields must improve to minimize the negative influence that agriculture has on the environment and society. Two adaptive N management approaches for making in-season N fertilizer recommendations are remote sensing and crop systems modeling. Remote sensing has the advantage of characterizing the spatial variability at a high spatial resolution, and crop models are prognostic and can assess expected additions and losses that are not yet reflected by ... T. Nigon, D. Mulla, C. Yang

263. Utilizing GPS Technology and Science to Improve Digital Literacy Among Students in Australia and the United States of America

A key issue facing regional, rural and remote communities, in both Australia and the United States of America (USA), is the low level of digital literacy among some cohorts of students. This is particularly the case for students involved in agricultural studies where it is commonly perceived that digital literacy is not relevant to their future occupation. However, this perception is far from the truth, as the reality of farming today means students who intend on entering the agricultural wor... C.W. Knight, A. Cosby, M. Trotter

264. Utilizing Weather, Soil, and Plant Condition for Predicting Corn Yield and Nitrogen Fertilizer Response

Improving corn (Zea mays L.) nitrogen (N) fertilizer rate recommendation tools should increase farmer’s profits and help mitigate N pollution. Weather and soil properties have repeatedly been shown to influence crop N need. The objective of this research was to improve publicly-available N recommendation tools by adjusting them with additional soil and weather information. Four N recommendation tools were evaluated across 49 N response trials conducted in eight U.S. states over three gr... N.R. Kitchen, M.A. Yost, C.J. Ransom, G. Bean, J. Camberato, P. Carter, R. Ferguson, F. Fernandez, D. Franzen, C. Laboski, E. Nafziger, J. Sawyer

265. Variability Analysis of Temperature and Humidity for Control Optimization of a Hybrid Dehumidifier with a Heating Module for Greenhouses

Protected horticulture using greenhouses and also recently plant factories is becoming more popular, especially for high-value crops such as paprika, tomato, strawberry, due to year-round production of high yield and better quality crops under controlled environment. Temperature and humidity are most important ambient environmental factors for not only optimum crop growth but also disease control. This study was conducted to analyze vertical and spatial variability of temperature and humidity... Y. Seo, W. Lee, Y. Kim, S. Chung, S. Jang, I. Bae

266. Variability in Corn Yield Response to Nitrogen Fertilizer in Quebec

Optimizing nitrogen (N) fertilization is important to improve corn yield and to reduce N losses to the environment. The economic optimum nitrogen rate  (EONR) is variable and depends on many factors, including weather conditions and crop management.  The main objective of this study was to examine how grain corn yield response to N varies with planting date, soil texture and spring weather across sites and years in Monteregie, which is the most important with 64% of total area and 6... L. Kablan, V. Chabot, A. Mailloux, M. Bouchard, D. Fontaine, T. Bruulsema

267. Variable Rate Irrigation Management Using NDVI

Center pivot irrigation systems are commonly used for corn and cotton production in the southeast USA. Technology for variable rate water application with center pivots is available; however, it is not widely used due to increased management requirements. Methods to develop dynamic in-season prescriptions in response to changing crop conditions are needed to move this technology forward. The objective of this research was to evaluate the potential of using normalized difference vegetative ind... K.C. Stone, P.J. Bauer

268. Variable Selection and Data Clustering Methods for Agricultural Management Zones Delineation

Delineation of agricultural management zones (MZs) is the delimitation, within a field, of a number of sub-areas with high internal similarity in the topographic, soil and/or crop characteristics. This approach can contribute significantly to enable precision agriculture (PA) benefits for a larger number of producers, mainly due to the possibility of reducing costs related to the field management. Two fundamental tasks for the delineation of MZs are the variable selection and the cluster anal... A. Gavioli, E.G. Souza, C.L. Bazzi, N.M. Betzek, K. Schenatto

269. Variable-Rate-Fertilization of Phosphorus and Lime – Economic Effects and Maximum Allowed Costs for Small-Scale Soil Analysis

The pH values and macro nutrient contents are characterised by considerable variance within a field. A constant-rate-fertilization, which is practiced at most farms, does not reduce this effect, it may even boost variance. Besides the suboptimal nutrient supply, the site-specific yield potential is not exploited. Constant-rate-fertilization and liming results in an inefficient utilisation by over- and undersupply of most of the areas within a field. Fertilization with lime and phosphorus caus... S. Schulte-ostermann, P. Wagner

270. Variety Effects on Cotton Yield Monitor Calibration

While modern grain yield monitors are able to harvest variety and hybrid trials without imposing bias, cotton yield monitors are affected by varietal properties. With planters capable of site-specific planting of multiple varieties, it is essential to better understand cotton yield monitor calibration. Large-plot field experiments were conducted with two southeast Missouri cotton producers to compare yield monitor-estimated weights and observed weights in replicated variety trials. Two replic... E. Vories, A. Jones, G. Stevens, C. Meeks

271. Water Use Efficiency of Precision Irrigation System Under Critical Water-Saving Condition

Non-transpiration water loss is often neglected when evaluating water use efficiency (WUE) of precision irrigation system, due to the difficulties in determining water loss from the root zone. The objective of this study is to investigate the feasibility of a new water saving approach by controlling soil water retention around root zone during the plant growth. We grew two tomato cultivars (Anemo, Japanese variety) in an environmental controlled growth chamber, with previously oven dried and ... Q. Li, T. Sugihara, M. Kodaira, S. Shibusawa

272. Weed Detection Among Crops by Convolutional Neural Networks with Sliding Windows

One of the primary objectives in the field of precision agriculture is weed detection. Detecting and expunging weeds in the initial stages of crop growth with deep learning technique can minimize the usage of herbicides and maximize the crop yield for the farmers. This paper proposes a sliding window approach for the detection of weed regions using convolutional neural networks. The proposed approach involves two processes: (1) Image extraction and labelling, (2) building and training our neu... K. Kantipudi, C. Lai, C. Min, R.C. Chiang

273. Wheat Biomass Estimation Using Visible Aerial Images and Artificial Neural Network

In this study, visible RGB-based vegetation indices (VIs) from UAV high spatial resolution (1.9 cm) remote sensing images were used for modeling shoot biomass of two Brazilian wheat varieties (TBIO Toruk and BRS Parrudo). The approach consists of a combination of Artificial Neural Network (ANN) with several Vegetation Indices to model the measured crop biomass at different growth stages. Several vegetation indices were implemented: NGRDI (Normalized Green-Red Difference Index), CIVE (Color In... M.R. De souza, T.D. Bertani, A. Parraga, C. Bredemeier, C. Trentin, D. Doering, A. Susin, M. Negreiros

274. Wireless Sensor System for Variable Rate Irrigation

Variable rate irrigation (VRI) systems use intelligent electronic devices to control individual sprinklers or groups of sprinklers to deliver the desired amount irrigation water at each specific location within a field according to VRI prescriptions. Currently VRI systems, including software tools for generate prescription maps, are commercially available for VRI practices. However, algorithms and models are required to determine the desired amount of water that needs to be applied based on t... R. Sui, J. Baggard

275. Yield Assessment of a 270 000 Plant Perennial Ryegrass Field Trial Using a Multispectral Aerial Imaging Platform

Current assessment of non-destructive yield in forage breeding programs relies largely on the visual assessment by experts, who would categorize biomass to a discrete scale. Visual assessment of biomass yield has inherent pitfalls as it can generate bias between experimental repeats and between different experts. Visual assessment is also time-consuming and would be impractical on large-scale field trials. A method has been established to allow for a rapid, non-destructive assessment of bioma... P.E. Badenhorst, A. Phelan

276. Yield Maps, Soil Maps, and Technical Efficiency: Evidence from U.S. Corn Fields

Yield maps and GPS-based soil maps have been increasingly used in U.S. agriculture but little research has explored the economic relationship between mapping technologies and agricultural productivity. Research on this relationship is lacking, perhaps because maps are information inputs that do not directly enter the production function in a comparable way to conventional inputs. A stochastic frontier model was used to evaluate one potential avenue through which mapping technologies may influ... J. Mcfadden, A. Rosburg