Research Update: Pesticide Application Technology

At a Glance

ETDS Progress

Research Topic: Performance of Ground and Aerial Pesticide Application Technology
PI: Simerjeet Virk
Team: Ravi Meena, Ajay Sachinujjani
Main Objective: Understand the performance capabilities and limitations of modern ground and aerial application technology for effective pesticide applications.

Motivation

Due to rising input costs and growing concerns about pesticide use in agriculture, there is increasing interest in employing the latest ground and aerial application methods for targeted pesticide use. However, information on how these technologies can be used for precise, effective (both broadcast and targeted) applications is limited and therefore requires research to understand their in-field performance.

Proposed Solution

Thorough performance assessment of ground and aerial application technologies to understand their performance and limitations in terms of:

Maintaining and applying the desired application rate (GPA)
Rapidly and effectively changing rates for VR applications
Application uniformity and quality for both broadcast and targeted applications

Results to Date

Ground Sprayers

Proper sprayer setup, including nozzle selection and other operational settings such as look-ahead time, is important for effective variable-rate or targeted applications.
Sprayer speed and controller responsiveness affect rate change and stabilization and should be considered while creating and implementing prescription maps.

Aerial Sprayers/Drones

Application within the swath is variable, so proper calibration to determine operational parameters such as height and effective swath is important.
Variable-rate applications can be imprecise due to in-swath variability in spray deposition and fast operating speeds.

A boom sprayer instrumented with sensors and a data acquisition system to collect nozzle-level flow rate and response time.

A self-propelled sprayer applying pesticides in cotton during field testing.

A spray drone applying harvest-aids to cotton during spray defoliation testing.

A spray drone applying fungicides in peanut during applications aimed to evaluate drone performance.

A spray prescription (Rx) map based on aerial imagery for variable-rate PGR application showing rates for different zones.

An as-applied map from a sprayer showing PGR rates applied within the field.

Flow rate response during rate transitions for sprayer equipped with rate controller (RC) and pulse width modulation (PWM) systems.

Single-pass spray patterns for a spray drone at different target application rates.

Comparison of single-pass patterns between drones with hydraulic nozzles (T30) and rotary atomizers (T40).

Next Steps

Evaluation of the latest targeted application technologies on ground sprayers to evaluate their agronomic and economic benefits
Assessing in-flight performance of aerial sprayers/drones during broadcast and variable-rate applications to evaluate application accuracy and rate errors

Citation

Byers, C., S.S. Virk, G.C. Rains, and S. Li. 2024. Spray Deposition and Uniformity Assessment of Unmanned Aerial Application Systems (UAAS) at Varying Operational Parameters. Frontiers in Agronomy, 6, 1418623. https://doi.org/10.3389/fagro.2024.1418623
Meena, R., S.S. Virk, G.C. Rains, and W.M. Porter. 2024. Comparative Performance of a Sprayer Rate Controller and Pulse Width Modulation (PWM) Systems for Site-Specific Pesticide Applications. AgriEngineering. 6(3):3312-3326. DOI: https://doi.org/10.3390/agriengineering 6030189

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