Agrovista’s (stand 302) purchase of farm-monitoring and prediction specialist Plantsystems last September has strengthened its ability to monitor temperature, relative humidity, irrigation, soil moisture and conductivity levels and to influence these remotely, says Mark Davies, head of its soft-fruit business.
“Plantsystems’ telemetry solutions use radio-linked monitoring stations that provide accurate real-time data from any location and are ideal for use in tunnel crops grown in pots, bags or troughs,” he points out. Irrigation can be applied via an irrigation switch controller according to soil moisture status from office PC or a smartphone, allowing growers to fine-tune irrigation and fertigation to match crop need, he adds.
A new development shows soil-moisture status in an easy-to-access “traffic light” format that allows growers to instantly see whether they need to irrigate or not.
Agrovista has partnered growing-media supplier Botanicoir, showing at the same stand, to develop Precision Plus, described as a “steerable” medium allowing strawberry growers to quickly react, increasing or decreasing moisture content, pH or EC level, due to its short-cut fibre and use of chemical buffers.
Part Article from the Horticulture Week, written by Gavin McEwan.
