Vegetable production is crucial for human health thus it should be of the utmost importance to all of us. As a consequence, growers are dealing with enormous amounts of stress. Not only because of the importance of their work, but also because of the expectations that are upon them regarding the vegetable health, way of growing, amount and quality of production etc.

Because of that the choices that growers make must be well thought through and carefully planned, otherwise their crops can be overwhelmed by diseases and pests. Decision support system practices like water management and irrigation management, balanced nutrition, post-harvesting management, etc. need to be adapted to minimize plant stresses and to improve the quality of vegetables and their health, resulting in not only quality produce, but also high yield.

Decision support systems

Combine monitored and forecasted data to get a powerful tool, which will help you optimize your production and produce more with less.

• WEATHER MONITORING: Monitor climatic conditions in your nursery to have optimal conditions for germination and further start conditions when sowing your vegetables.
• FERTILIZING MANAGEMENT: Optimize fertilization time. The best is if the spreading of the fertilizer is followed by rainfall.
• PLANT PROTECTION MANAGEMENT: With the help of disease models for pathogens in vegetables and spraying window forecast you can optimize your plant protection activities to have reduced disease risk and incidences. For example: If spraying is followed by a rainfall of 30 mm, there is a good chance that it will wash away the treatment and you will have to repeat the spraying to keep your vegetables protected.
• IRRIGATION MANAGEMENT: To have homogenous plant growth and good quality monitor your soil moisture to know when your crop is suffering water stress and start your irrigation system on time. Don’t over-irrigate. For example: Avoid tomato cracking by applying too much water.

Recommended equipment

Basis sensor set, needed for pest and disease monitoring of different veggies includes at least a rain gauge and sensors for air temperature, relative humidity and leaf wetness. These sensors are available in most METOS^® weather stations.

For soil moisture control we recommend soil moisture add-ons:

• Soil Moisture & Soil Temperature Sensor PI54-D
• Watermark Soil Moisture
• Sentek Drill & Drop TriScan Probe (60, 90,120 cm) or Pessl AC Probe (60, 120 cm)

Different veggies need different things. And to offer full support for your exact plant protection management Pessl Instruments disease models have been developed. Disease models provide the best information possible to enable conscious decision making and use the best tools to produce more, both in terms of quantity and quality.