AgWired

Forecasting for Farming Success

There are two kinds of information that are important for Pessl Instruments: “ground truth” and expected forecasts. The Austria-based company claims that it offers a one-of-a-kind tool for farmers:

“What we do is we measure the ground truth,” Gottfried Pessl, President of Pessl Instruments said. “That means what’s going on actually on the field of the farmers but we now also bring in the weather forecast. The weather forecast comes from a Swiss company we have teamed up with and this Swiss company delivers us a five day weather forecast in real-time for that particular farm.”

Gottfried adds that the technology is based entirely on the internet giving farmers the option of accessing the “ground truth” and weather forecast information on any internet capable electronic device, such as a cell phone.

“We have a wireless system which brings the data in a centralized server and through that centralized server our clients can worldwide have real time access to the data,” Gottfried said.

The information collected from Pessl Instruments, Gottfried explained, is valuable for irrigation management for plant protection requirements. He says the collected data can help farmers “optimize the use of the chemicals, to prevent the diseases to prevent insect pest outbreaks and also to have a full traceability of their crop.” Plus, he says using weather forecast data together with real-time weather helps farmers schedule their farm operations associated with the weather, such as harvest sprays.

“Most of the activities on the farm are very much dependent on if the weather is good or the weather is bad,” Gottfried said.

The company now exports tools and technology to about 70 countries.

I interviewed Gottfried about his products and technology. You can listen to my interview with Gottfried here:

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Filed as: Agribusiness / Audio / Environment / Equipment / Farming / International / Technology / Weather

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Posted by Laura • August 24, 2008 • 4:52 pm

Help Flooded Farmers in the Midwest

Willie Nelson is sending out pleas for help. He’s calling for donations to help family farmers that are being devastated by severe weather and flooding in the Midwest.

Severe weather in nine Midwestern states is devastating family farmers. Disastrous floods in Iowa and Wisconsin have hit farmers especially hard–more than 30 counties in Iowa alone have already been declared federal disaster areas. More areas are expected to be threatened by rising flood water in the next few weeks.

Willie Nelson

Filed as: Ag Group / Environment / Farming / Weather

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Posted by Laura • June 23, 2008 • 11:22 pm

MO Hail

It might have been a sunny spring day yesterday but today is a different story.

Here’s the scene on my deck a few minutes ago. As the hail stopped the sun poked out for about 10 seconds too.

Yep, a typical midwest weather pattern for the spring. I’m sure someone out there will get the notion that this is unusual and the effect of global warming.

Me, I’d take some warming right now.

Filed as: Weather

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Posted by Chuck • April 3, 2008 • 12:54 pm