{"id":95309,"date":"2022-02-15T12:30:37","date_gmt":"2022-02-15T17:30:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.hobbyfarms.com\/?p=95309"},"modified":"2022-02-15T12:31:02","modified_gmt":"2022-02-15T17:31:02","slug":"see-spray-targets-your-weeds-not-your-healthy-plants","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hobbyfarms.com\/see-spray-targets-your-weeds-not-your-healthy-plants\/","title":{"rendered":"See & Spray Targets Your Weeds\u2014Not Your Healthy Plants\u00a0\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"

Whether you have 2 acres, 10 acres or more, if you grow crops of any kind you\u2019re going to need to deal with weeds. Blanket spraying of any kind of herbicide can negatively affect your soil quality. And if you\u2019re not careful, spraying could target plants you\u2019re trying to grow. <\/span><\/p>\n

John Deere tackled this problem by developing farm technology that takes the guess work out of spraying. It\u2019s called See & Spray<\/a>\u2122, and the company recently won a Best of Innovation award at the Consumer Electronic Show (CES 2022) for it.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

What is John Deere\u2019s See & Spray?<\/span><\/b>\u00a0<\/span><\/h2>\n

John Deere\u2019s See & Spray\u00a0looks a lot like a sprayer attachment for your tractor, but it\u2019s much more than that. A robot with advanced technology on board, the See & Spray uses computer vision and deep learning to instantly recognize the difference between your weeds and your plants.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

How does it work? As the sprayer moves across your pasture, a camera will scan the area and detect color in your field. It picks out green plants in fallow land, the sprayer is activated, and it will only target those weeds specifically. <\/span><\/p>\n

That means it sprays herbicide on a single plant instead of broadcasting it across a wide area. <\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

According to John Deere, this targeted spraying will mean the average farmer sprays an average of 77 percent less herbicide. The technology helps to reduce herbicide resistance because farmers can mix different products. They can also use more expensive products without as much waste. <\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

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Read more: Do you know the parts of a sprayer? In this video, we break them down.<\/a><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

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Spraying Less Helps the Environment<\/span><\/b>\u00a0<\/span><\/h2>\n

Like other large companies, John Deere has put an immediate focus on persevering the environment and reducing their carbon footprint. Having a targeted herbicide sprayer with the ability to recognize the difference between healthy crops and weeds will reduce one of the biggest environmental issues farmers face when spraying herbicides\u2014spray drift. <\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Spray drift occurs when spray is airborne and the droplets of herbicide move away from the plants you\u2019re spraying. The amount of spray drift you have is affected by<\/span><\/p>\n