EarthScout® products have been designed and engineered with input from all major segments of farmers, ranchers, and growers – with crops grown outdoors, indoors and in combination. The one thing everyone agreed on: they wanted different combinations of sensors to meet their needs. That’s why we offer various sensor packages on our products that can all be further customized with more than a dozen microclimate data points to choose from.
While the EarthScout L-series are designed as outdoor (Land-based) units, the A-Series have been designed for (Artificial environment) Indoor Growing. Still as durable for outside use, the A-Series EarthScout units have custom-configured sensor packages better suited for critical indoor growing environment metrics.
Reducing Risk Means More Peace of Mind
One of indoor growers’ favorite features of the EarthScout App is the Notifications & Alarm function. By setting parameters on the app, alerts can be sent directly to your phone, day or night, to help you nip problems at the bud—before they turn into disasters.
INDOOR GROWING ENVIRONMENT CONCERNS AND GREATEST OFF-HOURS RISKS:
- Falling temperatures
- Poor ventilation
- High CO2 levels
- Humidity changes
- Equipment failures
- Water leaks
- Power outages
EarthScout as “System Scout”
Even if just temperature and humidity are being monitored in a hoop house, having a backup system is a good idea. While most sophisticated greenhouse growers have metrics to monitor the off-hour risk factors listed above, their alerts might be sent from different systems. The big benefits EarthScout offers are system redundancy plus integrated alerts—sent directly to your phone—warning about temperature extremes, humidity concerns, CO2 levels, hydration/soil-moisture levels, lighting failures and more, depending on your sensor package.
Optimizing Profitability with EarthScout and KPI’s
The bottom line in any successful business is profitability. At EarthScout, we’re focused on helping you build the Key Productivity Indicator (KPI) metrics that maximize yield, quality, and net profitability – all with a private data network you own.
Your data will never be sold to Big Data or Big Ag, even if the company is sold (it’s in our bylaws). You owning your data (forever, mind you) means you can build secure Intellectual Property and continuous improvement protocols around your moisture, nutrition and energy management data.
With EarthScout, you not only grow smarter with every data-package download per day, you also build knowledge for improvements with every harvest.
Better Moisture Management
Moisture management can include air humidity and temperature metrics along with the moisture levels in the soil. All EarthScout units have a temperature and humidity sensor included. You may be surprised at the different readings in humidity and temperatures that show up in different parts of an indoor growing environment, depending on ventilation and other factors.
That’s why we recommend placing an EarthScout in a central location of a grow room and adding more as needed to monitor humidity/ventilation corners or areas of concern.
Monitoring Plant-Available Moisture
One of the most important sensors offered by EarthScout captures KPI around irrigation and fertigation. These sensors are usually placed at mid-root and/or lower-root level in the soil.
- Our TDR soil sensors need no calibration
- Our TDR soil sensors measure moisture as well as soil temperature and electro-conductivity (EC)
- Alert options for soil moisture level extremes
Better Nutrition Management
Beyond the above and below-ground microclimate readings provided by EarthScout, we offer an integrated Tissue-Testing service at a reduced price for EarthScout customers. This service is state-of-the-art for nutrient management and Continuous Quality Improvement.
Our recommended tissue-testing program samples the macro and micro-nutrient levels being used by plants at different stages of their growth, with a “Grow Coach” consulting that gives you in-season insight to help correct any nutritional deficiencies before visible symptoms develop. As you further dial-in with integrated tissue-testing and EarthScout data, we can offer advice on weekly nutrient adjustments that push certain levels in order to optimize the traits you desire.
Better Energy Management
Measuring the light that drives photosynthetic energy production is critical for indoor growing environments. Whether measuring solar radiation from natural sunlight, Photosynthetic Active Radiation (PAR), or Daily Light Intervals (DLI), EarthScout gives you real-time data with graphic overlays that can show you how light affects temperature, humidity and moisture levels.
For artificial lighting, it’s Photon Photosynthetic Flux Density (PPFD) or light intensity that matters most. By optimizing PPFD, growers can push productivity and maximize yields. However, more light intensity means more heat. For growers looking to maximize intensity without damaging the plants, EarthScout offers a custom sensor to monitor leaf temperatures.
Optimizing Moisture, Nutrient and Energy Management by Growth Stage
Up to this point, indoor or A-series EarthScout units are being mostly used in legal medical and recreational cannabis grows. By monitoring your growing environment combined with tissue testing, you can ensure that your plants are getting what they need when they need it, from the vegetative growth stage through the flowering growth stage.
You can set alerts to be sure your plants are getting plenty of light and moisture during development, and when you combine environmental data with plant tissue sampling, you can really dial in the nutrients your plant needs to build a strong foundation of plant health. Plant health is the best defense against insects, disease, and extreme (heat) conditions. Nutritional needs to watch include Nitrogen, Phosphorus, and Potassium ratios and micronutrient balancing (Calcium, Zinc & Boron).
Any nutritional deficiencies can be diagnosed with tissue testing to assure quality-improvement for your next growth cycle and by using EarthScout integrated metrics to produce more consistent results and growing returns in quality, consistency, and profitability.
If you’re not sure where to start with IoT technology on your farm, visit our website at www.earthscout.com to learn more or call 877-443-7832.
Burke Johnson is a Specialty Crop sales representative for EarthScout. Burke has more than 30 years of experience in agricultural marketing/communications and branding with global clients including Syngenta, Bayer Crop Science, Pfizer Animal Health, John Deere, CropLife International and more.