Sky Machines Magazine - Unmanned and Remote Aviation Issue #001 2016 | Page 58

Gettign Started

When was the last time, if ever, you had aerial survey done of your property. You could pull up something from Google Maps of course but that does not have the new irrigation damn you put in last year. It does not include the new shed or the new irrigation system you installed. Maybe the recent flooding of the creek has caused erosion to one of the paddocks and you need to account for the change in lost yield. If it does show all this, the resolution is not much use to you.

Start with a standard photographic survey and set the benchmark. Ask the people who do that for you to do some multi-spectral survey of a portion of crop so you can explore how it will help you reduce the use of topical treatments and better understand the health of the land. An NDVI (Normalised Difference Vegetation Index) scan is simple enough with the current tools available. Moisture content sensors are becoming available so you may be able to use less water in some places but increase it in others.

Sky Machines

A Drone in the Farm Shed