DRONE USE IN SOD PRODUCTION By Brian Schwartz, PhD, and Jing Zhang, PhD
Figure 1.
Figure 1. Chris Roquemore (Patten Seed/Super-Sod) and Dr. Jing Zhang (University of Georgia) preparing to fly over dormant, overseeded, and painted TifTuf bermudagrass with three different drones and sensors during early February 2019 to compare results.
Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS), also known as drones, are being used in a wide range of industries such as photography, film production, real estate, construction, emergency services, and agriculture. Agriculture is one of the most promising areas where drones can be used to address some major challenges including soil and field analysis, planting, spraying, irrigation, and overall crop health assessment. Although the use of drones in turfgrass production is in its infancy, many opportunities lie ahead.
Jing Zhang is a research scientist in the University of Georgia’s turfgrass breeding program and works with Brian Schwartz on the Tifton Campus. Her prior work at the University of Florida included using remote-sensing technologies to monitor turfgrass performance. During her former position as a coordinator for a collaborative project funded by the USDA-Specialty Crop Research Initiative (SCRI) to improve drought resistance in warm- season turfgrass species, Jing worked with different
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turfgrass breeders in the Southeastern U.S. and saw the opportunities of using drones to monitor large variety trials. Now that she has validated drone-based data with ground-based measurements, routine drone data collection has been integrated into the Tifton breeding program.
Tis story originated last year as some members of the sod industry in Georgia began adopting certain drone technologies as they rapidly changed in price and availability. Chris Roquemore, who is a remote pilot and the Vice President at Patten Seed Company and Super- Sod, had already started taking drone images himself on their production fields, relying on an online platform to process the images.
Brian and Jing met with Super-Sod and exchanged ideas on the possible applications of drones in sod and seed production. During those visits, Chris and Jing flew their separate drones over the same production fields
TPI Turf News March/April 2019
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