Spanish’s experience on improving inspection of sprayers: official manual for ISO 16122 and ISO 16119

Mandatory inspections in Spain are organized following ISO 16122. In order to guarantee a clear and comprehensive inspection’s procedure in all of the official inspection’s workshops, the Spanish Ministry of Agriculture published an official inspection’s manual based on ISO 16122 in order to improve and harmonize the process.Postprint (published version

Monitoring site-specific spraying in vineyards from a prescription map obtained with a UAV

This work presents the development of an actual site-specific spraying map of a variable rate sprayer prototype, which works following a prescription map obtained with a UAV. Trials were conducted in Torrelavit (NE Spain) in a representative vineyard of 3 ha of variety Merlot. PPostprint (published version

Assessment of map based variable rate strategies for copper reduction in hedge vineyards

Reduction of Plant Protection Products (PPP) has become a priority in agriculture, led by European directives and regulations due to the negative impacts and social awareness that pesticides have raised in the population. In viticulture, the use of copper to control Downy Mildew (Plasmopara viticola) is posing severe problems of soil, water and environment contamination, and European Commission is regulating its use through the EU regulation 2018/1981. A targeted spraying management can be done benefiting from the novel development of variable rate application (VRA) technology for orchard sprayers, resulting in savings of PPP. In this research, the quality of the application in terms of copper deposit in leaves of two VRA strategies where compared versus the conventional strategy performed by the farmer (REF).This research was developed with funding from the Spanish Ministry of Agriculture Fisheries and Food within the project GOPHYTOVID [contract 2018002001192], and partial funding from the FI-AGAUR grant from the Generalitat de Catalunya (2017 FI_B 00893).Postprint (published version

Taking advantage of difficulties. Variable rate application based on canopy maps to achieve a sustainable crop protection process

The aim of this work wasto evaluate the use of Variable Rate Application technologies based on prescription maps in commercial vineyards with large intra-parcel variability to achieve a more sustainable distribution of Plant Protection Products (PPP).This research was funded by the project Gophytovid: Optimización del uso de fitosanitarios en viticultura en base a mapas de vigor (Rural development 2014-2020 for Operational Groups)Postprint (published version

Development of canopy vigour maps using UAV for site-specific management during vineyard spraying process

Site-specific management of crops represents an important improvement in terms of efficiency and efficacy of the different labours, and its implementation has experienced a large development in the last decades, especially for field crops. The particular case of the spray application process for what are called “specialty crops” (vineyard, orchard fruits, citrus, olive trees, etc.)FI-DGR grant from Generalitat de Catalunya (2018 FI_B1 00083). Research and improvement of Dosaviña have been developed under LIFE PERFECT project: Pesticide Reduction using Friendly and Environmentally Controlled Technologies (LIFE17 ENV/ES/000205)This research was partially funded by the “Ajuts a les activitats de demostració (operació 01.02.01 de Transferència Tecnològica del Programa de desenvolupament rural de Catalunya 2014-2020)” and an FI-DGR grant from Generalitat de Catalunya (2018 FI_B1 00083). Research and improvement of Dosaviña have been developed under the LIFE PERFECT project: Pesticide Reduction using Friendly and Environmentally Controlled Technologies (LIFE17 ENV/ES/000205).This research was partially funded by the “Ajuts a les activitats de demostració (operació 01.02.01 de Transferència Tecnològica del Programa de desenvolupament rural de Catalunya 2014-2020)” and an FI-DGR grant from Generalitat de Catalunya (2018 FI_B1 00083). Research and improvement of Dosaviña have been developed under LIFE PERFECT project: Pesticide Reduction using Friendly and Environmentally Controlled Technologies (LIFE17 ENV/ES/000205)Postprint (updated version

Advanced spraying systems to improve pesticide saving and reduce spray drift for apple orchards

New spraying systems embedded with different technologies have been developed for pesticide application in 3D crops. However, while applied to specific tree crops, the potential spray drift mitigation for advanced spraying systems needs to be classified due to the great variability of spray equipment and canopy structure. Here a precision spraying system was developed and compared with two typical spraying systems (conventional system, optimized system following the best management practices) for the applied volume/pesticide and spray drift in an apple orchard at two growth stages following the ISO22866-2005 protocol. Compared to the conventional system, the other two advanced systems significantly reduced the amount of ground drift (>60%) at most of the sampling distances at the growth stage BBCH 72, while the precision system demonstrated the best drift mitigation (57.3% reduction) at the stage BBCH 99. For the airborne drift, a remarkable drift reduction was also achieved with the two advanced systems. Specifically, the optimized spraying system exhibited a drift reduction by approximately 80% at the first growth stage, and the precision application demonstrated its considerable advantages in minimizing drift loss for the sparse canopy at the stage BBCH 99. Moreover, the saving of applied volume/pesticide was achieved by 12% with the optimized system and 43% with the precision system. This study revealed the necessity and prospect of the advanced spraying systems to reduce the environmental contamination and health risk from pesticide applications in fruit tree production.This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under grant agreement No 773718 (OPTimised Integrated pest Management for precise detection and control of plant diseases in perennial crops and open-field vegetables, www.optima-h2020.eu). Open Access funding provided thanks to the CRUE-CSIC agreement with Springer Nature.Peer ReviewedPostprint (published version

Influence of sprayer type, air settings and nozzle type on drift during spray application in vineyard. Effect of canopy density on spray retention

Sprayer types, as well as working parameters, have direct influence on the amount of spray retained on the canopy. This research was focused on the quantification of spray amount that exceeded the last canopy row during the spray application in a vineyard parcel.Postprint (published version

Relative efficiencies of experimental and conventional foliar sprayers and assessment of optimal LWA spray volumes in trellised wine grapes

Leaf wall area (LWA) has been proposed as an appropriate dose expression for field testing of plant protection products (PPPs) applied via foliar spray in trellised grapes. However, its efficiency could change depending on the characteristics of the crop or the pesticide application equipment (PAE). Herein, three spray technologies were evaluated. A traditional air-assisted tractor-mounted sprayer was compared with two portable knapsack sprayers: a backpack mistblower and a backpack hydraulic sprayer.Postprint (updated version

Evaluation of leaf deposit quality between electrostatic and conventional multi-row sprayers in a trellised vineyard

© 2020. This manuscript version is made available under the CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0 license http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/© 2020. This manuscript version is made available under the CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0 license http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0Spray application technologies for specialty crops have developed considerably in recent years with regard to improved control, reduced cost, and ability to avoid environmental contamination. For example, new developments in electrostatic sprayers have been progressively introduced as an alternative for vineyard spray applications.Postprint (author's final draft

Dynamic evaluation of airflow stream generated by a reverse system of an axial fan sprayer using 3D-ultrasonic anemometers. Effect of canopy structure

Air assisted sprayers are currently used for the applications of plant protection products in fruit trees and vineyards. However, the use of these equipment carries a high environmental risk, mainly owing to the generation of airborne spray drift in the lower boundary layer above crop canopy. Hence, many tests are currently focused on investigating several factors that affect the efficiency of the spray process, in which air assistance and air behaviour are two of the most difficult parameters to evaluate. This present work proposes a first approach on the characterization of the airflow generated by an orchard sprayer equipped with an axial fan and an air reverse system in the outlet plane of the air, while circulated through two artificial rows of canopy representing vineyard trellis, using 3D-ultrasonic anemometers to measure the experimental data.Postprint (updated version