Sowing the Seeds of Innovation

The recent affordability and availability of drones have made Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS) a new, viable tool for farmers looking to bring their industry into the 21st century.

Japan has been using drones as crop dusters and seeders for about two decades, an application which is being investigated for implementation elsewhere.

The agricultural application of UAS that is gaining popularity is aerial surveillance. Essentially, the drone maps out the farm and gathers raw data to be read and processed by software through which data analysts – not necessarily the farmers themselves – derive information that determine the steps the farmer needs to take in order to meet set goals or simply manage their farm more efficiently.

For example, Phil Hamm of Oregon State University’s (OSU) Hermiston Agricultural Research and Extension Center (HAREC) told Spudman Magazine drones could be used to quickly identify diseases and insects and apply targeted doses of pesticides accordingly. 

“If you have the way to treat a small area, then the cost of treatment is small,” Hamm said in the magazine’s April 2014 issue. “The economic thresholds that came into play are no longer ones used and then you’re looking at a whole lot of cost savings.”

A less-known use of drone technology is livestock tracking, which is especially useful to ranchers. Instead of having to spend money and man hours physically monitoring your herd, why not just track it with a drone which can send live feeds directly to your computer? 

Drones are very promising tools for the modern farmer. Bad PR, privacy concerns, and downright paranoia are major hurdles that the UAV industry has to overcome in order for drones to see mainstream use.