What’s new: OpticMapper Soil sensor status update www.veristech.com What’s new: OpticMapper Soil sensor status update

www.veristech.com OpticMapper NEW for 2010

The Sensor Technology: Veris Soil EC Veris Soil OM

Two questions about sensors: Does it work? Does it matter? What input(s) can be managed? Is the information unique—vs. soil surveys, EC maps, etc.?

Sensor stability, repeatability Raw Data Repeatability Mapped on 8-28-2010 & 9-7-2010

Correlation to soil property--OM

Correlation to soil property— low levels of OM KS

Correlation to soil property— low levels of OM GA Sample # OM CEC 1 0.9 3.1 2 0.8 3 1.6 5.3 4 2.5

Application #1: Population Rx Lab-tested OM varies from 2.1 to 3.4 within the poorest soil type on this field; and from 2.2 to 3.6 within the most productive soil type. 1) Soil varies between soil types—fixing the line placement error 2) sensors show soil as a continuum, providing evidence for varying rates within soil types 3) There are variations across the field for a given soil type.

Application #2: sampling zones In devising sampling zones, where have historical productivity and manure applications likely caused soil nutrient variability? Soil EC OM High P in high OM zones in AL and GA

Application #3: VR Nitrogen The OM on this field ranges from just under 2% to nearly 4%. A nitrogen Rx using the UN-L credit for OM, applied using an OpticMapper map would generate over $40/acre in savings versus no adjustment. And over $10/acre advantage versus a flat 2% OM adjustment. Also improved soil sampling for available N; other apps: applying organics to low OM areas, VR irrigation Low N Med N Hi N

Is it unique? On some fields soil texture and soil OM correlate reasonably well, so an EC map would likely suffice. SOIL EC SOIL OM

Is it unique? On many fields soil texture and soil OM show different patterns. (Salinity, low OM clays, black sands) SOIL EC SOIL OM

Is it unique? (EC and red wavelength R²)

Soil Sensor Report: commercial products 2010 Veris best year; record sales on all products EC usage increasing (VR N in northern US/Can, VR corn population, cotton) High-acreage (10,000 ac/yr) pH mapping clients EC: growing number of multiple unit users: Helena, CPS-Agrium, Wilbur Ellis, Simplot 10->50 units; crop consulting firms Centrol, Crop Quest, AgriTrend; units dug out of sheds

Soil Sensor Report: VisNIR First 3 sensor mobile platform--Germany Canada—Arctic circle 5 state Veris Research Germany Australia

Soil Sensor Report: VisNIR 5 state Veris Research: long term conservation tillage sites 150 0-60 cm soil cores 573 15 cm sample segments lab-analyzed 800 co-located Vis-NIR-EC-Force probe insertions

Soil Sensor Report: VisNIR Improved nitrogen and energy use efficiency using NIR estimated soil organic carbon and N simulation modeling. Graham, C.J., H.M. van Es, J.J. Melkonian, and D.A. Laird. 2010. In: D.A. Clay and J. Shanahan. GIS Applications in Agriculture – Nutrient Management for Improved Energy Efficiency. pp 301-325, Taylor and Francis, LLC. Infrared sensors to map soil carbon in agricultural ecosystems. McCarty, G.W., Hively, W.D., Reeves, J.B., Lang, M.W., Lund, E., Weatherbee, O. 2010. In: Proximal Soil Sensing, Progress in Soil Science Volume 1. New York, NY: Springer Science. 14:165-176. Evaluation of spectral pretreatments, partial least squares, least squares support vector machines and locally weighted regression for quantitative spectroscopic analysis of soils. Benoit Igne, James B. Reeves, III, Gregory McCarty, W. Dean Hively, Eric Lund, and Charles R. Hurburgh, Jr. Journal of Near Infrared Spectroscopy Volume 18 Issue 3, Pages 167–176 (2010)

Acknowledgement veristech.com Funding for Vis-NIR development provided by the Small Business Innovation Research programs of the U.S. Departments of Agriculture and Energy veristech.com