Wednesday, August 5, 2020
John flew the drone around yesterday to check on the corn fields here at the main farm. He uses our DJI Phantom 4. This is our 2nd generation of UAV (unmanned aerial vehicle); our first one was much less convenient to use… a DJI Phantom 2 with a GoPro camera attached. The first drone required you to set the camera before take-off and it took video or still photos until it returned. With the current drone, you can switch from video to still photography while in-flight from the hand-held control.
The drone photos found some ‘holes’ in the crop canopy, mostly due to the crop drowning in the bottoms of WASCoBs, or sometimes it was a glitch in the operation of the planter’s section control. But, mostly the crop looks great and healthy and on its way to a good finish.
John launches the drone on its flight.
Here are some of the aerial pictures.
Triangle by Junkin field. Through the center of the picture, you can see how precisely the planter’s section control worked in the rows coming in from the left to the end-rows that run vertically.
Down by the railroad. This area has some of our best soils.
John can even drop down and get a diagnostic picture. This looks pretty healthy.
Looking North from near US 50
Mailbox field
Buildings and grain system
These photographs have great value, not only because they are interesting, but it allows us to evaluate crop and crop protection systems. These images also help us evaluate planter and air drill performance. From this information, we can make some helpful improvements for ’21.
