We call it dry flower. We are gearing up to spray for it in the next couple of weeks. We have been spraying Merivon for about 4 years now. It's basically Cabrio with an extra chemical. I think we will stick with the tractor sprayer set-up the coverage just can't be replicated by a drone.
@@trentneumann5788 Makes sense to me. They did mention dry flower as a Queensland thing - bit different to this new “rat tail”. I suspected the Merivon news would be a yawn to many, but considering the need to rotate fungicides, is it really best to blow the (reportedly) best fungicide on flower blight? What’s left to use on husk spot a couple of months later?
@nutkinfarm we do rotate Merivon/Cabrio with another fungicide. It's always best practice not to spray the same chemicals more than 2 times in a row. We had a demo of autonomous sprayer with gps guidance and obstacle avoidance technology, and you had to do was fill it when it came back to you. Let's just say the tree canopy was not its friend. For a $200k+ piece of gear it still needed a lot more R&D
The way I look at it. You pay maybe $15k for a drone to spray top down. Or you pay $90k for a tractor and $40k for an airblaster to spray up from the bottom.
@@nutkinfarm yes we need the dry or normal to come back Interesting the drones are definitely the way of the future but with a 40L spray tank it makes me wonder how many times you would have to refill it on say 1000 trees.
@@kdegraa I was slashing a couple of blocks this last week and, despite all our recent westerlies, it’s still wet in places. I reckon the water table is full.
@@mattikelby5571 This concerned me too. Some sprays could surely be concentrated for drone use, but others (often fungicides and contact insecticides) are "coverage" or "blanket" sprays. The rep said they're working on drones that spray up, but surely that'd put downward pressure on the drone? A lot of "watch this space" yet to come, I think.
We call it dry flower. We are gearing up to spray for it in the next couple of weeks. We have been spraying Merivon for about 4 years now. It's basically Cabrio with an extra chemical.
I think we will stick with the tractor sprayer set-up the coverage just can't be replicated by a drone.
@@trentneumann5788 Makes sense to me. They did mention dry flower as a Queensland thing - bit different to this new “rat tail”. I suspected the Merivon news would be a yawn to many, but considering the need to rotate fungicides, is it really best to blow the (reportedly) best fungicide on flower blight? What’s left to use on husk spot a couple of months later?
@nutkinfarm we do rotate Merivon/Cabrio with another fungicide. It's always best practice not to spray the same chemicals more than 2 times in a row. We had a demo of autonomous sprayer with gps guidance and obstacle avoidance technology, and you had to do was fill it when it came back to you. Let's just say the tree canopy was not its friend. For a $200k+ piece of gear it still needed a lot more R&D
The way I look at it. You pay maybe $15k for a drone to spray top down. Or you pay $90k for a tractor and $40k for an airblaster to spray up from the bottom.
@@kdegraa if only it were that simple. The problem is that if a $15K drone doesn’t do the job, it’s a waste of $15K and a loss of crop.
@@kdegraa $7,000 will get you a decent TTI hand sprayer for younger trees.
You can get a 90HP tractor for around $60,000
Nice work Daniel, they are predicting a wet spring/ flooding this year.
Last I heard they were backing off on the La Nina prediction, but sounds like I need to update my reading!
@@nutkinfarm yes we need the dry or normal to come back
Interesting the drones are definitely the way of the future but with a 40L spray tank it makes me wonder how many times you would have to refill it on say 1000 trees.
I hope not. Sick of this damn wet weather.
@@kdegraa I was slashing a couple of blocks this last week and, despite all our recent westerlies, it’s still wet in places. I reckon the water table is full.
@@mattikelby5571 This concerned me too. Some sprays could surely be concentrated for drone use, but others (often fungicides and contact insecticides) are "coverage" or "blanket" sprays. The rep said they're working on drones that spray up, but surely that'd put downward pressure on the drone? A lot of "watch this space" yet to come, I think.