- Author: Trina Kleist
- Posted by: Gale Perez
AI-trained machines slash labor costs
Experimental robots are reducing the costs of hand-weeding by learning the difference between weeds and lettuce. In addition, steam can clear the soil of fungi and spores that cause lettuce and spinach to wilt, reducing the need for chemical herbicides in the bargain, according to the latest research by Steve Fennimore and his lab at the UC Davis Department of Plant Sciences.
Fennimore, a professor of Cooperative Extension, presented his findings at a recent meeting of the California Leafy...
/h2>- Author: Richard Smith
- Posted by: Gale Perez
Richard Smith is the UC Cooperative Extension Vegetable Crop Production and Weed Science Farm Advisor in Monterey, Santa Cruz and San Benito counties.
Automated weeders remove weeds inside the three- to five-inch-wide uncultivated band left around the seedline by standard cultivation. Automated weeder technology has improved significantly over the past decade. All automated weeders use 1) cameras to detect plants, 2) a computer to process the image and make decisions about which plants to keep and which to remove and 3) a kill mechanism. Kill mechanism that operates in the seedline used by currently available machines are either a split blade that opens around keeper...
- Author: Elizabeth Mosqueda
- Author: Richard Smith
- Author: Steven Fennimore
- Posted by: Gale Perez
Elizabeth Mosqueda is an Assistant Professor at the California State University, Monterey Bay.
Richard Smith is a Vegetable Crop Production and Weed Science Farm Advisor with UC Cooperative Extension.
Steve Fennimore is a Cooperative Extension Weed...
- Author: Richard Smith
- Author: Steven Fennimore
- Posted by: Gale Perez
Spinach is susceptible to weed pressure because it is produced on high-density 80-inch wide beds with 18 to 42 seedlines. There is no opportunity to cultivate the bed top so all weed control is accomplished by managing weeds in prior rotations, cultural practices, chemical weed control or hand weeding. Clipped spinach is mechanically harvested and must be kept as weed free as possible to reduce hand weeding costs. In the recent UC publication, Sample costs to produce and harvest organic spinach (Tourte et al, 2015 http://coststudies.ucdavis.edu/current/ ) hand weeding costs averaged $440 per acre. However, weeding costs can easily exceed $1,000 per acre in weedy fields, and...
- Author: Richard Smith
- Posted by: Gale Perez
On January 12, 2016 the Federal EPA label for Kerb SC was reinstated for leaf lettuce. The registration on leaf lettuce was pulled in 2009 and Dow AgroSciences worked in the intervening years reregister Kerb. The new label allows for the use of Kerb from 25 to 55 day prior to harvest (Table 1). The 25 day preharvest interval is significant because it allows the use of Kerb on baby lettuce which is typically harvested in 25-30 days after the first wet date during the summer months (Figure 1). The 25 day preharvest interval gives growers an option for controlling weeds in high density plantings; this change is very helpful because high density plantings cannot be cultivated and weeds that occur must be removed by hand prior to mechanical...