The first spot-spraying “green-on-brown” sprayers were rolling into test plots 30 years ago, in the mid-1990s. So why isn’t every Midwestern cornfield crawling with self-driving sprayers today, spritzing minute amounts of finely calibrated herbicide mixes onto individual weeds?
Precision technology outpaces farmer adoption
Target spray technology, such as John Deere’s See & Spray systems, drone sprayers and Weed It, has the potential to transform agricultural pesticide management — but only if and when farmer adoption becomes widespread.
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