Drones: Rapid Advancements in Aerial Remote Sensing Technologies for Agriculture.

Drones are a hot topic right now in many industries, including agriculture.  Like many technologies that were initially developed for military applications, drones are becoming commercialized and commoditized at an astounding rate.  Growth in sales of commercial drones is exceeding market predictions by wide margins.  Drones are proving to be a useful tool in agriculture from quick crop scouting to rigorous precision agriculture applications.

Remote sensing technologies for agriculture are increasing across the board, from satellite imagery to aerial photos taken from manned aircraft. However, drones offer a game changing capability by providing close-up, high resolution images, obtained anywhere and on-demand.  Small drones are rapidly becoming more affordable, more reliable, and ever easier to operate.

Specialized sensors that can view wavelengths of light invisible to the human eye are providing unique insights into crop health.  These “multispectral” cameras, as they are often called, can provide images indicating areas of crop stress. Data obtained from these images and other factors, such as weather, time of year, and knowledge of local conditions, are providing new information to growers to make timely crop management decisions.

With increasing aerial imagery data comes a need to organize, curate, analyze, and disseminate information gained from that data.  Software tools are being developed to leverage connected devices and the ever expanding IT infrastructure at the farm to help avoid information overload.

Researcher, companies, and growers are working to develop technologies and best practices to put the whole picture together.