Support for this study was provided by The Southeastern Peanut Research Initiative of the National Peanut Board and the Georgia Peanut Commission and by David Langford and Richard Talley of Earthtec Solutions, LLC. (Link 1, Link 2)

Rationale: Proven technologies for remote monitoring and scheduling advisories have moved from a place of convenience to a cost saving necessity. Diesel fuel and/or electricity for irrigation and fuel for pickup trucks, as well as labor costs and time used in driving to crop fields to check on water are affecting profitability. We need to reduce these costs while still confidently tracking crop water needs.

In most of our research applications at SIRP, we have built upon 12 years experience with Adcon, Inc. radios and compatible soil and meteorological sensors. Adcon provides web hosting for data in near real-time. Earthtec Solutions represents Adcon in the east. A New Jersey-based company, they provide web hosting of monitoring and advisory services. Farmers can access their information on the Internet at home, office, or, using web-enabled phones, in the field.

Study Objectives: Provide wireless soil water monitoring in corn, sweet corn, cotton, peanut and soybean irrigation research; monitor micrometeorological conditions in the vicinity of our studies; and provide real-time feedback of irrigation effects on soil water. A secondary objective is to refine and test web-hosted irrigation scheduling.

Methods and Equipment: No Data

SIRP map showing location of base station radio at "B" and relay transceivers radios at "R", weather station at "W", and observation site transceivers at "o".
View of the roof mounted base station antenna and Adcon A840 base station. The base station ports directly to the building network where it has a fixed IP assignment.
Typical transceiver location, this one at the East Drip Field serves AddIt (Adcon 723) minitransceivers in the VRI center pivot and East Drip Field. Each relay transceiver uses an AddWave radio (Adcon 733) to channel communications to the base radio. These solar charged, battery powered units can communicate and store data from assigned AddIts or AddWave radio until forwarding communications are available, if interupted. AddWave units can also be hardwired to a variety of sensors. When terminals eventually corrode, the AddWave radios can still be used for relay purposes, as they are here.
View of the weather station and relay transceiver located between the Camilla linear and Pine fields. This weather station is fitted with a Combi-sensor (air temperature and relative humidity), tipping bucket rain guage, and wind direction /wind ruin sensor.
View of the field where transceivers that are part of this project are located. The peanut planting is just beyond the cotton (foreground) behind the place where the linear move sits. To the left of this view is the field corn tillage and scheduling study, also irrigated by the Newton Linear shown.


Results to Date: No Data

Reports No Data