This article appears in the July 2020 issue of Potato Grower.
Maintaining proper soil moisture balance is important for all crops, but it can be especially critical for potatoes.
“Potatoes are shallow-rooted and prefer a more optimum soil water content range than other crops with deeper roots,” says James Han, FieldNET Advisor solutions specialist at Lindsay Corporation. “Depending on the growth stage, excessively wet or dry soil can reduce tuber yields, produce misshapen tubers and negatively affect processing quality.”
Effective irrigation management will result in optimized yields and size distribution, along with quality of both seed- and consumption-grade tubers. Han says water requirements for potatoes vary with each of these growth stages:
- Vegetative growth: After planting, this stage of growth begins when the eyes break dormancy and produce sprouts.
- Tuber initiation: Soil moisture levels should be watched closely, because water stress during this period can reduce the number of tubers produced per plant.
- Tuber bulking: Tuber size and quality is closely related to moisture supply in this period. Total yield of potatoes is most sensitive to water stress during tuber bulking.
- Tuber maturation: Potato plants require less water for tuber bulking during this stage, because of reduced transpiration from the dying leaves and lower tuber growth rates.
“For potatoes, the soil moisture content must be maintained at a relatively high level and depends on several factors, including cultivar maturity characteristics, plant population, water-holding capacity of the soil, climate and whether the tubers are grown for seed or consumption markets,” says Han. “To get it right, growers historically have had to rely on visual inspections and complex calculations, but that’s no longer the case. Now, FieldNET Advisor does the work for them—compiling all of the critical data and delivering the information growers need to decide when, where and how much to irrigate.”
Using proprietary crop growth models, FieldNET Advisor tracks the development of each hybrid, including critical development stages and root growth. It also continuously updates the crop’s forecasted maturity date, provides an estimate of any yield loss to date due to water stress, and projects potential yield loss through crop maturity if no additional irrigation is applied.
Chuck Powell, regional sales manager for Lindsay, says potato growers who are facing increasing input costs and increasing quality demands from both the fresh and process potato markets must rely on data when making irrigation decisions during the growing season.
“FieldNET Advisor helps you optimize crop performance and maximize output while reducing water usage and other input costs,” says Powell. “It’s the right tool to give you the right irrigation information at the right time.”
Growers who use the technology get real-time data on what’s happening in their field—from weather changes to crop conditions—and receive custom daily irrigation recommendations, he explains.
“Thanks to FieldNET, you can put irrigation plans into action with the touch of a button on a smartphone, tablet or computer—anytime, from anywhere,” says Powell. “That means potato growers can make quick but better-informed decisions on irrigation, which is crucial for effective potato growth and gives them an edge with pest and disease control.”
In addition to potatoes, FieldNET Advisor can be used on more than 20 other crops around the world, including alfalfa, barley, corn, corn silage, cotton, dry edible beans, peanuts, popcorn, sorghum, soybeans, sugarbeets, sweet corn, surgarcane, spring wheat and winter wheat.
For more information about FieldNET Advisor, talk to your local Lindsay dealer or visit www.fieldnetadvisor.com.