Saving Money and Pesticides for Apple Growers -- Gleason Ivey Meyer

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so welcome everyone joining in you're attending  the north central integrated Pest Management   Center pests and progress webinar um my name is  Laura Iles I'm one of the co-directors of the   north central integrated Pest Management Center  there are four Regional integrated Pest management   centers all supported by USDA NIFA Crop Protection  and Pest Management Regional coordination program   and the north central Pest Management program  we have the mission to share IPM across the   region promote IPM research extension all those  things and we're very excited to be hosting   today's webinar if you have questions there's  a Q&A part at the bottom of your Zoom screen   so you see that little Q&A feel free to post  questions for our speakers in there if you're   just having trouble hearing or something like  that feel free to post that in the chat um the   chat will be monitored by us hosts so I'm excited  today for our talk on Saving Money and Pesticides   for Apple Growers with New Spray Technology  and Warning Systems and I'm going to let you   get started Mark and introduce our speakers and  take it away hi everybody can you hear me okay   yes I'm Mark Gleason I'm a plant pathologist  at Iowa State and I'm the Project Director   for this particular project that's been  going on for about three years and uh so   uh there's three presenters today  and so Liv why don't you go ahead hi my name is Liv I'm a graduate student working  under Dr Gleason happy to be here Melanie hi I'm   Melanie Lewis Ivey and I'm at the Ohio State  University and I'm on the Wooster campus and   I am the fruit pathologist the state fruit  pathologist and fresh produce safety specialist okay well we'll uh we'll get started here  and cover these two related but somewhat   differing subjects uh today and uh we'll  just uh get going on that the first aspect   that we wanted to cover is our work  with this uh novel um uh type of of Orchard sprayer called the intelligent sprayer  it's um it's it's an outgrowth of the Airblast   sprayer which has been around as long as I have  which is a long time at least since the 1950s   this has been the standard for pesticide and  other applications in the in the in the apple   orchard but uh but um you know there's some some  issues with uh with the airblast and it has done   a nice job for pests and Disease Control if  we get our timing and our rates right but   um and and the technology is very familiar  uh to uh to most commercial Apple Growers   uh but the negatives is it it's a it is  somewhat prone to to spray drift as anybody   who's used them knows and um unfortunately  a fair amount of the spray misses the target this intelligent sprayer is uh   direct development of research and uh and uh  engineering by Dr Heping Zhu who's a an engineer   at the USDA spray lab in Wooster Ohio and he's  been doing this work for more than a decade um   and uh and developing a prototype and then has has  gotten it far enough that it is uh commercially   available now a company that's manufacturing it is  called Smart Apply Incorporated in in Indianapolis okay so what's different about the intelligent  sprayer what makes it intelligent well uh one   thing is uh that it uses LiDAR which maybe have  turned familiar to you um it's it's a it's a   laser pulse uh that's released by the sprayer  and then bounces off the tree and the reason   we're showing a bat here is uh that uh there's an  analogy to the way a bat Finds Its food uh in the   environment it puts out these uh high frequency uh  sound pulses and they bounce off insects and other   things to tell the bat uh where there's something  to eat well in the case of the intelligent sprayer   um the purpose is a little different the pulses go  out and they're they're not um ultrasonic they're   they're laser but they get reflected off the apple  tree and they essentially tell the sprayer those   Reflections tell the sprayer where the tree is  and uh and how how dense the canopy is so the the   sprayer in real time develops this picture of of  uh the the presence and the location of the tree   and the um and the density of the tree and uh  this information goes very quickly to the the   nozzles that enables the nozzles to turn on and  off and Target the particular trees that are there if you're looking at it it doesn't look a whole  lot different than a uh than a standard AirBlast   except there's some add-ons here uh in the  cab there's a tablet a user interface tablet   computer that sits in the cab and enables you  to make a lot of adjustments and take a lot of   data on how much the spray you're applying as  well and then there's the LiDAR sensing device   which is this unit that you see in the middle  there kind of poking up behind the uh behind   the cab and the nozzles are different than  what you see on a standard Air Blast there   what's called pulse width modulation Valves  and they can turn on and off very quickly so   they can respond to information from the from the  LiDAR that tells it where the where the where the   vegetation is in the row and how dense it is  so this is very much a a sprayer that can see   there is an analogy to driverless cars that you  may have heard of or drive driverless trucks for   that matter uh where the LiDAR units the  technology uh as the intelligent Sprayer   sits on top of the of the vehicle and um laser uh  Reflections uh help to help the vehicle determine   where it is in space and and to hopefully control  it now we're going to switch now to uh to hearing   from Liv uh talking about some of her uh findings  in in an orchard um using the intelligent sprayer   at uh in Iowa so Liv it's all yours thank you so  we had conducted a three-year research study at   the Iowa State Horticulture research station in  Gilbert Iowa we were working with about an acre   block of Golden Delicious apples and they  were on um a vertical axis training system sorry going ahead thank you would you like me to say next for the  slides that would all help me yes thank you okay   okay thank you so in comparing the intelligent  sprayer as Dr Gleason had talked about versus   the standard Air Blast sprayer one of the things  that we wanted to look at was our volume output   per spray using the different sprayer  types So In This research we had compared   the standard Air Blast sprayer which we  had calibrated to 100 gallons per acre   and then we had used the intelligent  sprayer and the intelligent sprayer   we chose two different rates to compare to  the standard Air Blast sprayer rate next this slide is a bar graph that represents the  spray volume savings that we saw using the   intelligent sprayer at both of the rates we had  chosen compared to that standard Air Blast sprayer   so on the vertical axis you can see the percent  of spray volume saved and on the horizontal axis   you can see the years so 2020 through 2022 and the  volume saved per season so the blue bars represent   the spray volume saved using the intelligent  sprayer compared to the standard Airblast sprayer   using a low flow rate and the gray bars using  a high flow rate with that intelligent sprayer   so you can see in 2020 we had started with  two rates and we saw a savings of about 30   percent using that low flow rate and a savings  of about 20 percent using that high flow rate   in the intelligent sprayer compared to the  standard sprayer in 2021 and 2022 our group   had decided to drop our rates to sort of see  how low we could go compared to the standard   sprayer and we saw even greater savings so with  that low rate between the two years we saw about   50 to 60 percent and with that high rate between  the two years between 40 to 50 percent savings   next so on average the intelligent sprayer using  the intelligent sprayer you can save approximately   30 to 60 percent per spray versus just using  the standard Airblast sprayer in your Orchards so why do we see the savings well as Dr Gleason  had talked about with the technology that the   intelligent sprayer uses it's much more  accurate and so it's really only going to   put out or apply pesticides onto the canopy  so if you have large gaps in the canopy or   we had a Derecho a few years ago which is a  very intense Windstorm that took out many of   our trees so we actually have a lot of gaps  in our Orchards right now using that standard   sprayer it would be applying pesticides in  those gaps using the intelligent sprayer   those nozzles are actually going to turn  off because there's no canopy to spray next so what does this mean for larger acreages and  tank mixes and having to go back and refill   because using that intelligent sprayer we're  not applying pesticides in spaces where we   don't need to apply them we actually save and  conserve on volume to be able to put pesticides   out and to cover more area than we traditionally  could with that standard Air Blast sprayer next so what does this mean on a per spray basis well  the biggest thing is the time of the growing   season so earlier on you don't have as much  volume in your canopy so there's less tissue for   the intelligent sprayer to see and to spray later  on as the canopy develops and you see more volume   more density there will be a lot more tissue to  spray so it's going to be putting more volume out   there are other more Orchard specific  factors so I had said we work we're   working with a vertical axis system a lot of  people now I think are when they're putting   in new Orchards they're looking at more of  those tall spindle high density plantings   the trees are a lot smaller in height for some  of the rootstock that you're using so there's   not as much to spray height wise and the canopy  is a lot smaller than what you would see on maybe   a semi-dwarfing rootstock in those vertical  axis systems pruning is also big so if if some   things have happened on your farm you weren't  able to maintenance as much as you would like   um you weren't able to cut out some of the  branches or dead wood that you had seen   there's more to spray there versus yeah if you're  keeping up with maintenance and you're pruning and   you're really training that canopy to look like  what you want it to look like and to be optimal   for the apple trees growth and development there's  less to spray so there are also other factors to   consider on an individual spray basis as well as  total volume over the entire growing season next so the second thing we wanted  to look at was spray coverage   so with the intelligent sprayer we saw  savings but how does that compare to   the coverage that we see using the standard Air  Blast sprayer and so the image above where it   says water sensitive papers this is how we  collected the coverage data water sensitive   papers are these yellow cards so when they're  exposed to an aqueous solution they turn blue   and the other picture where you've got sort  of this number system superimposed onto this   yellow apple tree this is where we had placed the  cards in the trees when we had done these water   sensitive paper tests and this was just to get an  idea as to the coverage that we saw comparing both   sprayer types in many different locations of the  tree so further into the Tree close to the leader   further out on either sides at different heights  things like that we wanted to just get a general   idea as to what kind of coverage we saw throughout  the entire tree as opposed to specific locations   next so for the coverage dates and like we  had talked about it really depends on where   you're at in the season with how much the  intelligent sprayer is putting out compared   to that standard sprayer we also wanted to get a  good representation of canopy volume throughout   the season so we had taken coverage data at the  very beginning of the Season where it was about   half a quarter inch green half inch green things  like that then we had taken it a little bit later   when the canopy volume filled out and increased  so around bloom a little bit after bloom and   then our last date was pre-harvest when we saw  full bloom and the apples had put on size next so these cards represent the coverage that we  saw using a low flow rate with the intelligent   sprayer a high flow rate with the intelligent  sprayer and then that 100 gallons per acre rate   for our standard sprayer and the position that we  had chose to show in today's webinar series was   the position two so that middle section on that  central leader we had just placed the card right   on the trunk of the tree there as you can see with  the low flow rate and the intelligent sprayer we   see about a three percent coverage savings or  excuse me coverage spray coverage using the   high rate so that's 0.09 we saw about a 25 percent  spray coverage and that's very comparable to the   standard rate at that hundred gallons per acre  so using the high flow rate with the intelligent   sprayer and the standard sprayer at 100 gallons  per acre we actually see similar spray coverage   on those cards and this is representative  of actually all of the locations on the tree   for the spray coverage cards that we had seen  and the data that we had taken and I also want to   note that when we had done these tests we weren't  using any adjuvants or spreaders or anything like   that no pesticides we were just using water so the  implications there are if you're using a spreader   you could achieve more coverage than that 25  percent but still putting on at that high rate   next so again we see equivalent coverage so we talked about spray volume savings we  saw similar coverage but what about adequate   Pest and disease management at the end of  the season and I think on the next slide in Iowa over all three years at the end of  the season we had harvested apples taken a   look at incidents of Sooty blotch and  fly speck which is one of the diseases   as well as fire blight in The Orchards  and we saw equivalent control in each of   our treatment plots with the intelligent  sprayer compared to our standard sprayer   and it's also important to note  that these were dry years as well and then I think there's a note on the next slide   about the Ohio so I'll let Dr  Ivey take over for this one okay I didn't know I was taking over no problem  though so uh in um we did both these studies in   Iowa and Ohio and we used um we looked use  in Orchards that were experimental or high   density but we also had demonstration trials  at two different Growers locations in Ohio   and we evaluated uh disease so any  type of disease whether it was a rot or   um scab and then we also looked at uh pest injury  and we saw equivalent control in all three of the   years both within our experimental Fields but  also within our demonstration trials and so in   fact one grower has started to or purchased  last year the spray technology and is now   using it based on the um the research  that we've done here in Ohio and Iowa so that's my input the only I don't know if you want to comment  on this because this is Ohio data you could okay sure well so then we were  interested in how long it would take   um to pay back the intelligent sprayer because it  is an investment and uh the the cost of it varies   depending on whether or not you you know buy a  brand new sprayer or if you have it retrofitted   whether or not you you know take the sprayer and  get it retrofitted at the um provider or if you   have to you know deliver it there and get it back  so the costs differ um depending on the the um   the type of spray system that you end up  purchasing and you can see here that if you look   um at the very bottom where is one acre it  will only take you around um 112 years to   pay off the sprayer which obviously that's um  not not feasible but if you look up into the   um you know 20 to 50 acres then you're getting  down to three and a half in 20 for a 20 Acre Farm   three and a half years to pay it off versus  a 50-acre farm where it will only take about   um a year to pay it off and we've considered  the cost Savings in fungicides as well as the   differences in the amount of time or or labor to  to do the spray for this and I think if you if you   advance that there's an average that we  show on here yeah so less than two years   for a 50 plus acre Orchard and this  is based on high density uh plantings okay uh thanks Melanie I'll just uh wrap it  up here for the intelligent sprayer just to   repeat what we've said the intelligent sprayer in  our trials saved uh 30 to 60 percent uh in spray   volume with the same pests and Disease Control as  you would get on the on the standard Air Blast it   is commercially available it is uh expensive but  then the payback for larger Orchards is is fairly   short we are doing an economic analysis as a  uh Melanie alluded to and that bottom line on   the economic analysis for both Iowa and Ohio data  we'll be coming up very soon we have a couple of   really good economists working with us so I think  at this point we'll uh we'll stop and uh and ask   for questions with regard to this intelligent  sprayer um uh field work does anybody have   any questions before we jump into the second part  which is uh having to do more with Warning Systems   um yeah you thank you guys for the first part so  you mentioned that it's commercially available   like where I mean where would one start even  searching for an intelligent sprayer if they're   interested well there's the the company and  uh I think it's called Smart Apply these days   Smart Apply Incorporated is that right Melanie  I think that's right they're in Indianapolis   um and they've been uh in some of the larger  trade shows showing but they're also working   through a number of dealerships so I understood  from Doctor Zhu that uh they're working through   John Deere John Deere dealerships around  the country as well as several other   um uh you know larger equipment providers  they're not they're not manufacturing it but   they're they're taking orders uh on it there and  then they're coming from the from Indianapolis very good and we had a question  from one of our attendees   um in the Q&A it says I have a small  Orchard and this technology is too large   for me I use a backpack sprayer but I do have an  electrostatic sprayer used for applying titanium   dioxide would that sprayer be able to attract  the electromatic spray to the foliar canopy you want to handle this Melanie or so okay let  me take a shot at you and correct me where I'm   wrong electrostatic is a is a technology that  um that spray Engineers have been working with   a number of years and the idea is um that the  spray droplets released by the sprayer uh could   have a charge that was opposite to the charge  on leaves and foliage of the tree and therefore   there'd be an electrostatic attraction  between the positive and negative positive   um coming off the sprayer and  the negative on the tree and   um that that would make for greater accuracy  in uh in the spray I'm not getting around to   answering your question because I think the answer  would depend on the specific kind of equipment   um what I'd ask is if you put the uh put your  email address in the chat we can do a little   research for you uh we we need to ask you a little  bit more detail about the sprayer model and see if   we can come up with a better uh answer because I  think the answer may be specific to your equipment   we just need some more details maybe great thank  you yes please go ahead and put information in   the chat and we'll make sure to get that to you  Mark so you can do that information any other   questions over just intelligent sprayer I put  the link um in the chat box to the the company   um Smart Apply and I also put a link to um our  website which is based at Iowa where you can   find more resources on the intelligent sprayer  and warning systems and the research we've done   on on this um system there's a lot of good stuff  on that website um podcasts with a whole variety   of people in the in the in the entire realm of  uh spraying and apple IPM and um blogs and uh   videos and so forth kind of makes it come alive so  it's probably worth your while take a look at that um question um what is the recommended intelligent  spray rate to use in apple okay and that's a   really good question and and just chime in  here Melanie or Liv if I'm misleading here but   um I think the answer is it depends   um it may depend on a number of factors  like some of the ones that Liv mentioned   um and it may have to be customized to your  orchard we've been using and talked about spray   um rates like .06 and .09 those are settings  for the intelligent sprayer but I think   to get the most efficiency this will probably have  to be customized to the particular Orchard when   Melanie was talking about high density Orchard  versus uh semi-dwarf or older Orchards the the   answer may be different it may also be dependent  on the uh the extent to uh which the pruning has   been done and so forth you want to add anything  Mel yeah I think you know that be when when we   think of sprayer rate with the intelligent  spray we're not talking about a volume per   gallon you know rather it's you know the amount  of or the flow of the of the fungicide through   the nozzles and so that 0.06 to 0.09 within  that range you you should um get good coverage   um targeted coverage and good Disease Control  those are the two rates that we've tested and   ideally you know you would you would select one  of those rates you wouldn't want to go below it   and you could possibly go above it but if by going  above it then you're losing out on your savings   um because you're putting um you know a higher  flow rate so more more fungicide or insecticide   that that's going out we have evaluated this in  grapes and we looked at three different rates and   grapes and we looked at across in the west and  as well as here in Ohio and and we determined   you know for grapes that the rate really does  matter and so we were able to figure out what the   low what the low rate would be to give adequate  control versus being too low so I I definitely   wouldn't recommend going below that 0.06 you know  in order to achieve the Disease Control that that  

you're looking for of course you know if you have  a really high disease pressure year you might you   might need to increase it but um staying within  that range is recommended and you also with the   system we didn't talk about it go into the details  but you you will put in there the width of your   rows and so that you're making sure that the spray  you know distance is optimized and so a lot of the   there's a lot of variables that not a lot but  several that you input into the computer and then   it does all the work for you okay and I think  kind of a follow-up it says regarding the Iowa   spray cover data does the 0.06 rate provide three  percent coverage only all over the tree canopy Liv you want to comment sure so yeah that  um that slide that had shown the pictures   that was that was pretty accurate as far  as yeah with all the locations in the tree   um it could vary between three percent and ten  percent things like that at that rate but I also   want to emphasize too that we did see similar um  adequate pests and Disease Control at the end of   the season using all of those rates and we didn't  use adjuvants or spreaders for that as well you   know which I know is common for a lot of Growers  to use to make sure that they're not only getting   the pesticides on the plant but they're getting  the coverage that they want after applying so that   was just water that we had used in that so no no  spreaders or adjuvants or anything like that but   yeah I would say that three percent coverage  again it varied between three and ten percent   using that rate in all the locations on the tree  that we had taken that data just to add to that   um uh we have uh Dr Zhu um uh Heping Zhu who  developed the intelligent sprayer uh has some   very nice videos of what a droplet looks like um  with a spreader added to it and it really covers   a a a considerably larger area because it doesn't  bead up as much as it would on a waxy coated leaf   leaves have a naturally waxy coat so it kind of  breaks that surface tension in the in the drops   spread out but as Liv said she was working with um  water no pesticide no spreader so that would be a   kind of a minimum result for what she got that'd  be a real stringent test but you know the other   the other thing is you can use spray cards to see  what your pattern is looking like they're not hard   to use give yourself an idea in your particular  Orchard situation with your particular trees and   you know Etc what what are your does your spray  pattern look like um you know in various parts of   the tree in in Ohio we we used our our fungicide  mix so we didn't use just water and our coverage   um was a bit higher um we were definitely within  um you know the 10 to 25 percent and you know   generally I think it depends on who you talk to  um but you know we have been you know working with   Heping Zhu and basically anything over you know 40  or 50 percent is excessive and so you want to try   and stay you know in in the range that you're  not you know just putting it off to to run off   um because that's not necessary and that's wasting  product and it's you know not as sustainable   um so you will see an increased percentage when  you when you use um your adjuvants or your um   um your oils okay great thank you everyone  good disc and I know we have a whole other   part so I don't want to um take up  too much time now we'll definitely   have time at the end for more questions and  questions on the intelligent sprayer but   um disease Warning Systems I believe is what's  up next Mark yes so this is a also part of the   same project in which we did the intelligent  sprayer we were looking at um a couple of   disease Warning Systems uh uh both looking at  them by themselves and also in combination with   the intelligent sprayer technology to see how  far we could um uh take the pesticide reduction   so you may be familiar with Warning Systems  they're using weather data to predict disease   risk mostly weather data you can measure  it in your orchard or you can use weather   estimates from nearby weather stations and  and in a minute Melanie's going to talk   about the NEWA system which would be a little bit  different than measuring It Yourself by yourself   um and the uh the idea of The Warning Systems  and they're based on Research is that you spray   a fungicide or bactericide whichever is  appropriate only when the disease risk is   high so if the system tells you you have  a high risk of of an outbreak then you're   you're be able you're able to time your sprays  more efficiently and perhaps save some sprays   so uh I'm turning it over to Melanie now and  uh talking a little bit about these uh weather   stations and weather networks yeah so as as Mark  mentioned you know these Warning Systems rely   heavily on weather data they also you know  incorporate the pathogen biology and the crop   type but whether data is critical to the success  of these these models and you can you know collect   using a weather station the the data and input  it by hand into the model or you know you can use   the software or these platforms that you know will  take that weather data in real time for you input   it into the model and then give you an output and  there are a few of these platforms available and   the one that we work with here at Ohio State is  NEWA which is the network for Environmental oh I   always forget this the Network for Environmental  and Weather Applications NEWA and um you can   access this tool at newa.cornell.edu so it's  hosted there and if you move on to the next slide um here in Ohio we started using the system  in 2016 and there's a yearly subscription   fee for it and that subscription fee varies  depending on um whether or not you get a state   subscription or individual Growers can also  get a subscription so here in Ohio my fruit   pathology program with support from the fruit  marketing growers association and from the USDA   and Heping Zhu we pay for that subscription so  anybody in Ohio can access any of the weather   stations that are connected to this system and  and use utilize the the IPM tools that are on it   this system supports two different  um types of weather stations uh a   rain-wise or an onset which are both the  base price for them are both about the same   it will also support other weather stations but  you have to work with the new coordinator to make   sure that the data that's being collected from  that weather station is compatible with their   um with their database and their software  and and so in fact here in Ohio at our at   our outline branches our research stations we  converted our data had you know we worked with   a software engineer who converted our data so  that it was compatible and we did that using   the new coordinator help and then once once you  have your weather station set up and you can   then request Hardware on boarding and you would  do that through your state partner so right now   um Iowa does not have um a subscription for  the entire state but as a grower you uh you   could you know get a weather station and set it  up and you have the option of making your weather   stations public as well so I don't think we have  any producers in Ohio who haven't made theirs   public so if you're close by you know you can make  estimates and use their weather data to help you   predict when you might want to spray depending  on the disease or the insect pest that you're   that you're looking at um we have I think 46 of  weather stations now connected to NEWA um in our   state and most of our large-scale Apple producers  are are using um NEWA in some form of or another   um if you want to advance the slide okay so there  are several tools IPM tools available through   NEWA and of course we're going to be focusing  on diseases today and there are three disease   models there that you can access for forecasting  there's fire blight sooty blotch and flyspeck   and apple scab there are also Apple thinning and  irrigation models that you can utilize and then   there are multiple insect pest models that that  you can utilize our Growers here in Ohio use the   fire blight Model a lot as well as the Apple  scab and then they also take advantage of the   Apple carbohydrate thinning model so they they  use this this platform quite a bit uh next slide   so for the risk assessment model for fire blight   um this focuses on a biofix state or time at first  open blossoms so if you just recall a little bit   about Fire blight the primary infections occur  during Bloom and the bacteria enter in um through   the flower and then infect systemically so as soon  as you have Bloom you have a risk for fire blight   infections to occur and so that is why that is  the biofix you can use cougarblight or MaryBlyt   and the MaryBlyt in this case has been modified  somewhat to be used as an epiphytic infection   potential or EIP and so in this image on you can  see on the right hand side are the risk levels   um based on the EIP value and on the left side  based on Cougar blight and the model for the   EIP which is what we recommend here in Ohio it  considers four different factors so the bloom   date whether or not you have a history of fire  blight in your orchard or in a nearby Orchard   uh temperature for epiphytic growth and then the  blossom wetting period and so it takes all this   information um and as as well as your weather  data and it provides an output and you can see   the output here is color based which is really  nice it makes it very easy you don't really have   to pay attention to the numbers you can just  look at the colors and then if you advance one   you can see then it provides you with  recommendations and you know working   together with your state expansion extension  Specialists or with your crop Consultants you can   you know adjust your spray gram spray program  accordingly here in Ohio our primary bactericide   that we use is streptomycin although we do  have streptomycin resistance in some of our   Orchards and once we've identified resistance in  an Orchard then we go ahead and make modifications   to the recommendations using something such  as kasugamycin so this is very nice that it   provides this information based on your state too  there's a link which I'm not showing but you can   click on Ohio for instance and then it will link  you to resources from the Ohio specialist which   in this case is me okay next Slide the second  one is the sooty blotch and fly speck and this   model is based on um research that was done in  New York and when Mark talks about the model   he'll be talking about the Iowa model um which we  used for our research but I wanted just to point   out that NEWA uses the New York model it's based  in Cornell so that makes sense um their biofix is   90 percent petal drop and in this case they're  focusing on Leaf wetness duration or your LWD   and predicted rain events and it also you input  when your last fungicide application date is   and then once you have an accumulation of 175  wetting hours that's predictive of an infection   vent and would warrant a spray application  and again it's color-coded here as you can see   um so there will be green yellow or red so low  medium or high risk and if you advance Mark   you can see here that it gives you recommendations  for spraying and they also provide recommendations   based on a hundred gallon per acre or a product  per 100 gallon uh for the fungicides to use so   again this would have a link and it would link to  Ohio or whichever State you were coordinating with   um to get your recommendations from from that  in terms of spray so that's just a very quick   overview of um the two risk assessment models that  we're focusing on for this project which is fire   blight and sooty blotch and fly speck next slide  is you Mark I think okay um as as Melanie said we   tested sooty blotch and fly speck uh warning  system but it was an Iowa version when we had   developed in Iowa uh and uh and the MaryBlyt uh  uh fireblight model that um that Melanie had had   mentioned and this is Liv's uh data that I'm I'm  talking about here um so how how does this work   compared to the one Melanie talked about it's  um in a sense it's a little bit simpler uh not   better Just simpler um it's it it starts when you  put on the first fungicide first cover fungicide   spray then you start counting up hours of relative  humidity greater than 90 percent after that and   day by day you add up those numbers and when that  total reaches 350 hours it's time to spray again   once you start spraying again then you  resume a regular calendar based timing   for sprays following that so that that delay  is only done once during the growing season   and this is the paper this mostly at all paper  is the research that we use to develop that that   warning system in Iowa we did have three dry  years as uh as Liv said and um we had um a lot   of we sprayed a saved a lot of sprays for sooty  blotch and fly speck for an average of four per   year which is exceptional I think if he got back  into a wetter cycle that might be more like two   or three sprays per year but in a dry year you can  you can certainly save more as far as the the fire   blight and Maryblyt fire blight warning system um  Melanie already described the inputs and so forth   um we were able uh uh in Liv's work to to save  one spray in 2021 uh uh one antibiotic spray   um in in her plots well yeah so not antibody but  fungicide uh sorry not not fungicide antibiotic   um so just just looking at this as a whole  um the the Disease Control on these sooty   blotch and fly speck and uh and um then fire  blight we're we're equivalent we had about the   same incidents uh it was low um being dry here  low incidence of both sooty blotch fly speck and   um and Fire blight an equivalent to whether or  not we use the warning system so although we were   able to save sprays we did not sacrifice  anything in terms of Disease Control   just to wrap up this session um we talked  initially first half hour about intelligent   sprayer and then later about Warning Systems  uh to to try to fix this these ideas both of   these things contribute to saving pesticide  sprays the intelligent sprayer technology saves the volume has to go on a given acre of Orchard  because of the greater accuracy and less waste so   we're saving volume per trip pesticide per trip  and and all the other things expenses that go   along with um with spraying Warning Systems  disease Warning Systems on the other hand   um save trips if if we're not putting on an  insecticide at that particular time we don't have   to make that spray trip at all so we're saving  all those costs associated with the trip itself   and the the spraying the the pesticide  savings here would be in in the in the   form of fungicides and antibiotics depending  on the warning system that you're looking at so if we add up these two and we we put these  Technologies together to see how they would do the   Warning Systems with the intelligent sprayer and  um what we ended up with was less volume per spray   trip that's the intelligent sprayer and fewer  spray trips that's the use of The Warning Systems   but we yet to repeat we had an uh equivalent  disease in Pest Control compared to Standard   air blast and using a calendar-based uh  timing rather than a warning system timing   um the result we think we're completing our  economic analysis here but it looks like the   IPM would be considerably more cost effective by  combining this technology uh and or or using them   alone and uh and considerably less environmental  risk because we're just putting on less pesticides   and less less wastefully it comes the question  and and um this this was related to a question   that that a a listener um asked is how how low can  we go with um with reducing these pesticides and   um we when we combine the intelligent sprayer  with Warning Systems uh we're we're looking   at two uh spray reduction Technologies one with  with um volume per acre reduction and The Warning   Systems with um saving additional trips so each  of those times we're reducing our our pesticide   umbrella to protect the tree and and so  the the the question how low can you go   um will partially be answered uh by the um uh  fine-tuning these Technologies or these these uh   strategies to your own Orchard so variety location  experience with the system with the intelligent   sprayer uh one one learns how to use it  effectively and likewise with the Warning Systems   the the more you use it the more efficient um get  so all these factors are going to go into how far   that pesticide umbrella can can shrink just as a  wrap up here um this is our project team and and   Melanie and and I were the the state leads and  me and Ohio in Iowa and she and Ohio and there's   our email addresses if you want to contact us for  anything uh Heping Zhu is the um the engineer uh   the lead engineer behind the intelligent sprayer  he's at the USDA ARS spray lab in Wooster Ohio   um so he's actually a USDA employee with just a  courtesy appointment to Ohio State uh we have the   economist Wendong Zhang um and uh Nieyan Cheng  was his graduate student they're both working   together on the analysis of the economics on the  project Liv Meyer that you've heard from and this   um webinar and Bailey Miller was a former  technician at um at Ohio State and Jose Gonzalez   was the overall project coordinator based at in  Iowa State so with that we can take any additional   questions uh they can be on the um Warning Systems  or intelligent sprayer or whatever else you have   on your mind yes thank you guys so much so please  type in your questions into that q&a at the bottom   of the screen one I just kind of wanted to ask  like between the intelligent sprayer and disease   Warning Systems like if you if you're not using  either one like which which one do you think you   would start with first would you just start both  at the same time which one might save you more and   pesticide like where would you start as a grower  well that's a good question and and I think it's   a fair to say it depends and there's a number of  factors in Melanie and Liv can can chime in here   um I think that the potential to save pesticides  is probably greater with the intelligent sprayer   because you're saving substantial percentage  every time you you put on that spray the   barrier for some Growers will be the cost um  that is it's a substantial investment to to   go that way but again our economic analysis um  to this point shows that it is can be repaid uh   um you know in a reasonable amount of time but it  depends on the orchard size for a larger Orchard   there'll be economies of scale with that larger  Orchard and um repayment will come more quickly   the other thing about Warning Systems is they're  cheaper to get into far cheaper to get into   one could buy weather gear and And subscribe to  NEWA in the case of Ohio it's free to subscribe   um that so you can get into that sooner um it it  will save spray trips and that that does save all   the costs associated with that trip including the  gasoline Machinery depreciation labor Etc um so   again you're saving trips with the Warning Systems  and you're saving volume with the intelligent   sprayer so um which should you get in first um I  think it's going to depend on the circumstances   of your particular Orchard Enterprise um  Etc I want to comment uh Melanie or Liv   I I I think that you said it beautifully  yeah ideally I would love for people   to you know jump on board with the  intelligent sprayer just because of the   so much savings and reduced drift and reduced  environmental impact and you know we've done   for several years on multiple crops now and  it's just really really a great IPM tool and   I think for us in Ohio the next step is to see  if we can work with the state to you know get   some type of subsidy programs or environment  you know programs that will help support   purchasing one based on you know the environmental  um uh the benefits to the environment by by using   it I think uh Melanie if I'm correct um  uh one of the federal programs has support   for for this but I don't know whether  it's directly applicable here or not yeah and it's not offered every year right I'm not sure   some states have have started to you know  provide subsidies for the intelligent sprayer   um The Warning Systems they they do take a bit of  your your time you know you need to be checking   the weather data one thing I didn't say about NEWA  is that it has a really nice app which I think is   part of the reason why a lot of our Growers have  jumped on board using it because they can be out   in the field and just go to the app and and look  and make decisions but you do have to be checking   it you know every day or at least every other  day and you know be ready to respond as well   so it's not as convenient that way as just  doing a calendar spray program for instance   um that's a good point the convenience factor but  I think it's fair to say that for both of these   technology intelligent sprayer and Warning Systems  there is a learning curve to get the good good   at them and uh I I think you could uh ascribe to  that too Liv because you know you you worked with   it and intelligent sprayer directly and actually  driving it up and down the roads for three years   and um would you agree there's you know there you  get better as you go and you understand it better   yeah I was actually going to make a comment  about that with adopting both systems   um I don't think the learning curve is as steep  you know um if you feel overwhelmed if we've been   talking about this um with the intelligent sprayer  yeah it's it's basically equivalent to getting a   new application on your phone like what NEWA has  and just kind of figuring out the ins and outs   um right away of the tech and it's their  customer service is also pretty good you   know we've had to call them a couple of times for  things but pretty manageable for the most part so   and low maintenance you know even with all  this technology you know it's low maintenance   it only requires calibration once at the  beginning which is nice you know ideally   if you're using other sprayer technology  you should be calibrating every time but   you know that doesn't happen all the time  but um with this one it's a a once and done   per year the only thing that would add to  that uh that I think we mentioned in our   in our grower manual that we have available now  on our website is um that um there's a I'm sorry   like a little window isn't it live that that  receives the laser Reflections and that has to   be kept clean and that's something you want to  wipe clean before you go out to spray each time   um yeah and that's just as simple as using a  cloth and a plastic cleaner to get in there so   yeah kind of like your backup camera so the uh  yeah the new uh beta like is that pretty much   Nationwide um Can people kind of like download  it now and start checking it out or do you have   to kind of wait till the growing season no you  can go to you can go to NEWA now and you know   if there's a you know you can select any public  weather station and look look at that that data   um and you know it it provides all  the weather data as well as the models   um but you would have to you would have to go you  know select a state on there and then go to that   you know select a weather station within that  state in order to play with it so if if you want   to play around with it I would say go to Ohio  and there's we have three of them in Wooster   um you know click on one of them they're  all public and you can see and it   it retains the data from the day you set up the  weather station if so you on board and so I can   go back you know to 2016 for instance  which is kind of nice you can go back   and you know look at historical data and it  presents it in a very nice way in nice graphs   um we're on NEWA 3.0 now so it's much  better to use than it was you know four  

or five years ago there really have put a  lot of work into having a nice interface there's a question on the uh on the chat are there   any risks of fungicide resistance  development because of less amount   of fungicide applied with the intelligent  sprayer that's a really good question um we haven't we haven't document Well we'd like  to think that that's true you know we haven't   documented any increased risk as long as you're  at the effectiveness level the the minimum level   at which the fungicide is effective and can can  retain its Effectiveness between spray intervals   then you should not have um additional or or  any additional risk of fungicide development   by fungicide resistance one thing to keep  in mind is a lot of the spray savings most   of the spray savings here is because uh what was  formally drift in other words it missed the tree   is now uh hitting the where you want it to go so  you could consider that drift to be essentially   wasted uh and and there's very much less drift  when you're in the intelligent spray mode so   um yeah I'll add to that that you know it's it's  not actually reduced volume you know the same   amount of volume is going on to the canopy it's  that you have reduced waste and so if you think   about fungicide resistance and how it works you  possibly could be lowering your risk because you   don't have that off-target drift and off-target  drift often is contributing to resistance   development in off-target microorganisms and then  depending on you know how resistance moves around   um that can that you know you have a reduction in  horizontal movement so in terms of fire blight you   have less off-target um bacteria being hit by  your antibiotic for instance we did look at it   in grapes um so we sampled um before and after for  QoI or Strobilurin resistance we sample before and   after each spray um throughout the season and  we saw no no um difference in fact we saw no   resistance development using a standard fungicide  program for grade and you know that's uh those   are a group of fungicides that are highly at risk  for for fungicide development the QoIs yes so um   yeah I think the uh the key is having that good  coverage the kind of thing Liv was talking about   if you've got if you have a good coverage on your  target then you're you're well protected excellent   well we're at about time um everyone so thank you  so much for all the excellent webinar um if you're   attending you will receive an email um when the  video is available and and please share that with   anyone who wasn't here um just to let you know our  next Pest and progress webinar will be February   15th that will be 12 30 p.m Central 1:30 Eastern  time um we're going to be talking about trapping   and development of degree day models for Missouri  Berry crops and we're going to have Clement   Akotsen-Mensah from Lincoln University of Missouri  and a couple of his collaborators um talking about   that so hopefully we will see you all in a  in a month so thank you everyone thank you

2023-01-27

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