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NRCS Grant To Help Conserve Irrigation Water, Improve Crop Yields in Georgia and
South Carolina
A new grant will help University of Georgia
and Clemson University scientists show
farmers a new technology that will help them conserve water and improve the
yields of their crops.
The scientists will use a three-year, $500,000
Natural Resource Conservation Service
grant to install on farms and conduct field days for variable-rate irrigation
systems.
Five center-pivot irrigation systems in Georgia and one in South Carolina will
be retrofitted with VRI technology each year for the next three years, said
Calvin Perry, a researcher with the UGA
College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences.
"The goal of this project is to take an innovative product like VRI to farmers,"
said Perry, who is also an engineer with the UGA department of biological and
agricultural engineering, "and let them test it and see it working and get them
interested in using it."
Crops have to have water from rain or irrigation to grow properly. The center
pivot is commonly used for irrigation in Georgia.
Farmers don't have much control over how much water the nozzles spray as they
pass over crops like peanuts, cotton or corn.
Fields, even small ones, can vary widely in topography and soil types. Some
places can be wetter or drier than other places in the same field.
The concept behind VRI technology is simple: Apply water when and where crops
need it. Don't apply it where they don't. VRI technology uses computer maps,
sensors and software to control where and how much water the nozzles on a center
pivot spray on crops.
The VRI technology for this project was developed at UGA's National
Environmentally Sound Production Agriculture Laboratory in Tifton, Ga. UGA is in
the process of getting a patent for the technology, Perry said.
UGA scientists have tested the water efficiency of VRI systems on one
farmer-owned field in east Georgia and two in south Georgia. The VRI systems
allowed the farmers to place the right amount of water on their crops for
optimal yields and reduce the water used by 8 percent to 20 percent in each
year.
"In most cases," Perry said, "VRI conserves water."
There are about 10,000 center pivots in Georgia, said Kerry Harrison, an
irrigation specialist with the UGA Extension Service. They're used to water
about 75 percent of Georgia's 1.5 million acres of irrigated cropland.
The grant funds will be used to identify VRI-suitable pivots in Georgia and
South Carolina, Perry said. Web sites and other educational materials will be
created to inform and educate stakeholders and policymakers in both states on
VRI systems' benefits for communities.
To find out more about VRI, call (229) 386-3377. Or go to the
Web site.
Story by Brad Haire, University of Georgia, from
Southeast Farm Press.
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