Ongoing research

Advanced Sensing & Management Technology in Specialty Crops: Page

Update 2011: Assessment of Nutrient Status in Almond

The first three seasons of field sampling have been completed. Nutrient dynamics in fruiting and non-fruiting leaves suggests that leaves of fruiting spurs may exhibit nutrient deficiencies when non-fruiting leaves on the same tree may have adequate leaf concentrations. (Figure 1).
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Advanced Sensing & Management Technology in Specialty Crops: Page

Update 2011: Assessment of Nutrient Status in Pistachio

Results from 2010 leaf analysis for the month of May suggest that leaf samples from fruiting branches have a better relationship with yield than samples from non-fruiting branches, and leaves from the lower canopy have a better relationship with yield than leaves from the top of the branches for the...
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Advanced Sensing & Management Technology in Specialty Crops: Page

Water Status & Water Demand: Ken Shackel & Blake Sanden

This component of the SCRI project allows the systematic study of the interaction between fertility and water management in almonds. Almond research conducted by Bruce Lampinen has demonstrated a substantial influence of water management on tree nitrogen nutrition.
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Advanced Sensing & Management Technology in Specialty Crops: Page

Demand Estimation

Validate ETa models (SEBAL, NCAR-WRF), estimate orchard water needs (Ustin, Sammis) Remote Sensing of yield, phenology, crop development (Slaughter, Upadhayaya, Whiting) Develop fertilizer response curve (Brown, Sanden, Lampinen) Modeling crop nutrient & water demand Climate/phenology based yield mo...
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Advanced Sensing & Management Technology in Specialty Crops: Page

Integration & Validation

Beta development of web-based decision support toolkit "NutMan" Iterative validation and improvement of models and tools Beta-development of a web-based decision-support toolkit NutMan under control and deficit conditions, and iteratively testing to refine and validate models and tools.
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Advanced Sensing & Management Technology in Specialty Crops: Page

Status Determination

Evaluate spectral measurements/correlate to crop status (Whiting, Lampinen, Slaughter, Upadhayaya) Relate ETa to plant water status (Shackel, Smart, Sanden) Modeling crop nutrient & water demand Climate/phenology based yield modeling (Whiting, Ustin) N & water modeling in pecan & almond (Sammis, Wan...
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Advanced Sensing & Management Technology in Specialty Crops: Page

Principal Investigators

Affiliation Investigator Research Programs Patrick Brown, Professor of Plant Nutrition, Department of Plant Sciences, University of California, Davis, CA Crop Nutrient Status & Demand Jan Hopmans, Associate Dean and Professor, Department of Land, Air and Water Resources, University of California, Da...
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Advanced Sensing & Management Technology in Specialty Crops: Page

Sensing at Orchard Scale

Fig. 1. Image from NDVI time series Orchard-level NDVI image from a 2008 time series in a study orchard is shown in Fig. 1. The strong variation in canopy size and closure, as an indicator of vigor is demonstrated in Fig. 2.
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