S14 - Session O4 - Preliminary evaluation of irrigator emitters used as solid set canopy delivering system in apple orchard and vineyard

Authors: Eric Mozzanini *, Marco Grella, Daniel Bondesan, Paolo Marucco, Claudio Rizzi, Claudio Ioriatti, Paolo Balsari, Fabrizio Gioelli

Recently, valuable alternatives to conventional Pesticide Application Equipment are under investigation in 3D crops for improving pesticide spray application efficiency. Promising alternative is represented by solid set canopy delivery systems (SSCDSs). Customized SSCDSs, tested in orchard and vineyard, showed potential to reduce PPPs spray drift guaranteeing adequate spray deposition and biological efficacy. Based on these premises, this study evaluated the feasibility to use a flat fan pulsed emitters (StripNet ® n Netafim), usually installed in orchard and vineyard for irrigation and frost damages prevention, also to perform spraying applications, being potentially adopted as fixed spray system. Laboratory tests were performed to characterize the droplet size spectra generated, using laser diffraction system. Contextually, horizontal spray pattern, 2D condition, was also characterized. Semi-field trials were carried out to measure StripNet ® spray distribution employing the emitters as usually placed for irrigation purposes (out and at the top of canopies at 4.5m spacing along the rows) using water sensitive papers at different canopy heights, depths and distances from the emitters in apple orchard and vineyard. Droplet size spectra generated by StripNet ® was characterized by a 1.88% V 100 , producing a very coarse spray quality, with potential benefit for drift containments, while horizontal spray pattern allowed to identify the potential ground losses and its spray range equal to 4.65m. Semi-field trials indicated differences between crops for spray coverage, with higher homogeneity at all canopy height and depth for apple orchard. In vineyard was observed a high coverage, more than 80%, in the top part of canopy while, for the bottom part (grape band), lower coverage was measured affecting the overall uniformity. Despite for apple orchard the adoption of StripNet ® placed in the tested configuration can be a feasible option also for spraying applications, for vineyard further studies are required to investigate both alternative configurations and engineering improvements of StripNet ® pulsed emitters.