Spatially variable herbicide application technology

This review considered changes that have occurred in relation to the patch spraying of weeds since the end of the HGCA/Defra/LINK project in 2002 (Lutman et al., 2002 – Project LK0902: Developing a Weed Patch Spraying System for use in Arable Crops).

At the end of that project we demonstrated that it was possible to map weeds and to use the map to control the sprayer and apply herbicides on a spatially selective basis.

All the components (mapping procedures, computer controllers, sprayer and appropriate software) were commercially available.

However, since then commercial uptake of the technology has been very limited.

In the course of the review we talked to a number of the key players in the industry and visited several commercial demonstrations of spraying and precision agriculture technology.

We also, in association with the Precision Farming Alliance, held a one day meeting on the future of patch spraying.

These discussions, along with searches of current published information, linked to patch spraying, formed the basis of this review.