Agricultural Weather Stations / Ag Weather Station

in Climate Smart Agriculture

Agricultural Weather Stations play an increasingly important role in Climate Smart Agriculture(CSA), if you want:

Increase yield

Understanding the impact of meteorological conditions on pests and diseases

Understanding Agricultural Insurance

Then you’ll love the content in this article.

Let’s dive right in.

Agricultural Weather Stations Definition

Agricultural meteorological stations are not like normal weather stations, but record temperature, humidity and rainfall data.

It provides useful data value for farmers, and can be closely linked with the life cycle of crop cultivation.

How to connect closely? Look down, please.

An agriculture weather station is a meteorological monitoring instrument composed of various sensors, which is used in the field of agriculture.

It includes temperature and humidity sensors, wind direction and speed sensors, air pressure sensors, rainfall sensors, these conventional observation items.

It also includes special sensors such as light, soil temperature, soil moisture, leaf wetness sensor, CO2 and so on.

Generally installed in farmland or greenhouse, solar power supply, and wireless transmission (Zigbee, NB-Iot, Lora, GPRS).

CHAPTER 2:

Climate Smart Agriculture (CSA)

CSA is a term proposed by FAO in recent years. It has been closely linked to our daily life and is also in line with the sustainable development strategy.

We will make a brief and intuitive exposition step by step.

Climate Smart Agriculture (CSA) Definition

FAO coined the term CSA in the background document prepared for the 2010 Hague Conference on Food Security, Agriculture and Climate Change.

Climate Smart Agriculture (CSA) is an approach to help the people who manage agricultural systems respond effectively to climate change.

That explicitly aims for three objectives:

sustainably increasing agricultural productivity, to support equitable increases in farm incomes, food security and development;
adapting and building resilience of agricultural and food security systems to climate change at multiple levels; and
reducing greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture (including crops, livestock and fisheries).

Note

CSA is not a set of practices that can be universally applied, but rather an approach that involves different elements embedded in local contexts.

Why We Need Climate Smart Agriculture (CSA)

Population increases and food decreases

The UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) estimates that feeding the world population will require a 60 percent increase in total agricultural production.

Climate disaster risk increases year by year

With many of the resources needed for sustainable food security already stretched, the food security challenges are huge.

At the same time climate change is already negatively impacting agricultural production globally and locally.

Climate risks to cropping, livestock and fisheries are expected to increase in coming decades, particularly in low-income countries where adaptive capacity is weaker.

Impacts on agriculture threaten both food security and agriculture’s pivotal role in rural livelihoods and broad-based development.

Global greenhouse gas emissions

Also the agricultural sector, if emissions from land use change are also included, generates about one-quarter of global greenhouse gas emissions.

Climate Smart Agriculture (CSA) Content

CSA relates to actions both on-farm and beyond the farm, and incorporates technologies, policies, institutions and investment. Different elements which can be integrated in climate-smart agricultural approaches include:

Management of farms, crops, livestock, aquaculture and capture fisheries to manage resources better, produce more with less while increasing resilience
Ecosystem and landscape management to conserve ecosystem services that are key to increase at the same time resource efficiency and resilience
Services for farmers and land managers to enable them to implement the necessary changes

CHAPTER 3:

The Role of Agricultural Weather Stations

There are many kinds of monitoring sensors in agrometeorological stations, and the changes of each monitoring factor have different effects on crops. The following are general descriptions of the main monitoring factors.

Influence Of Temperature

Low temperature effect	High temperature hazard
● Cool damage Cool damage means that during the growing season of crops, the temperature is 0°C. Above, sometimes even crops at about 20°C Hazard. ● Cold damage Cold damage refers to crops in tropical and subtropical regions of China. Winter temperatures above 0°C (sometimes slightly below 0°C) Harmful phenomenon. ● Frost Frost refers to the short-time low-temperature frost damage that occurs when the temperature of the soil surface or plant surface drops below the freezing point of the plant tissue in the warm season and freezes in the body tissue. ● Freeze damage Freezing damage refers to a kind of agrometeorological disaster caused by low temperature below 0°C or severe temperature change during overwintering of overwintering crops and fruit trees.	● Impaired photosynthesis, increased respiration, and reduced net assimilation. ● Accelerate transpiration and disrupt the water balance in the crop. ● The high temperature hazards encountered during the flowering period of crops will reduce the flowering rate, pollen germination, and the cracking of anthers. The final result is the reduction of seed setting rate. ● When crops encounter high-temperature hazards during grain filling, they will cause premature root failure and decline in leaf function, shorten the grain filling period, and seriously affect the increase in grain weight. ● High temperature directly burns agricultural organisms.

Influence Of Water

Hypohydration Hazards	Excessive Water Hazard
● Drought Drought refers to long-term precipitation, resulting in air drying The lack of water in the soil causes the water in the crops to be deficient and affected. A crop that grows and develops normally, reduces yield, and even dies Meteorological disasters. ● Dry hot wind Dry hot air is a kind of agricultural disaster weather that affects wheat in the warm season with high temperature, low humidity and a certain wind force.	● Flood disaster It refers to outbreaks of flash floods caused by heavy rain and heavy rain. River flooding, flooding large fields of farmland, destroying agriculture facility. ● Waterlogging harm Waterlogging is caused by excessive or excessive rainfall, or Poor farmland drainage, resulting in farmland water accumulation, so that dry field crops victimized. ● Wet damage Wetness is caused by prolonged rain or excessive rain.Or poor drainage of farmland after floods and floods, so that soil moisture long-term saturation, resulting in poor air permeability, temperature too low to damage crop roots and cause crop growth development is blocked or died.

Influence Of Wind

Advantage	Adverse effects
1. Regulation of winds on the microclimate of farmland Wind will affect farmland turbulent exchange intensity, increase the exchange of heat and moisture between the ground and the air, increase soil evaporation and crop transpiration, and also increase the exchange of CO2 and other components in the air, so that the air inside the crop groups is continuously updated, temperature, water vapor, CO2, etc. play an important role in the regulation.	1. Harm of winds to crops Wind power above level 6 can harm crops. Winds with a wind speed of >17m/S (Grade 8 or above) are called strong winds, and they are harmful to agriculture. The strong wind accelerates the transpiration of the plant, causing excessive water consumption, resulting in closed stomata and reduced photosynthetic intensity.
2. Wind and Photosynthesis At low wind speeds, the boundary layer of the blade becomes thinner, the CO2 diffusion resistance decreases, which is beneficial to the transport of CO2, and photosynthetically active radiation can be reasonably distributed to the leaf layer in the form of a flash, thereby increasing the intensity of photosynthesis and improving light. Energy efficiency.	2. Wind energy aggravates drought and causes soil erosion If windy weather occurs in arid regions and dry seasons, not only the consumption of soil moisture increases but also the drought conditions will increase. Gale will also blow away a lot of topsoil and cause wind erosion.
3. Influence of wind on pollen and seed spread Many plants in the natural world are cross-pollinated and spread by the force of the wind. The size of the wind speed will affect the pollination efficiency and the seed propagation distance, thus exerting a great influence on the reproduction and distribution of plants.	3. Wind energy spreads pests and diseases Wind energy spreads pathogens and causes the spread of crop diseases. According to studies, spores of wheat rust spread northwards in the spring and spread northwards into the cool regions, and fall into the winter warmer regions with the northerly airflow, causing damage.

Influence Of Soil PH

Impact on plants
1. Most plants are difficult to grow at pH>9.0 or <2.5. Plants can grow normally over a wide range, but all plants have their own suitable pH. Sour-acid plants: rhododendron, bilberry, camellia, cedar, pine, rubber tree, lithia; Hi-calcium plants: alfalfa, grass rhinoceros, southern sky, cypress, eucalyptus, eucalyptus, etc.; Saline-alkali plants: Tamarix, Elaeagnus, Poria, etc.
2. Plant pests and diseases are directly related to soil acidity and alkalinity: 1) Underground pests often require a range of pH environmental conditions, such as bamboo and earthworms and chafers and alkalis. 2) Some diseases only occur within a certain pH range. For example, damping-off often occurs in alkaline and neutral soils. 3) Soil activated aluminum: exchangeable aluminum adsorbed on soil colloids and aluminum ions in soil solution, it is an important ecological factor, which has a significant impact on the distribution, growth and succession of natural vegetation; In strong acidic soils containing more aluminum, the plants that live in this type of soil are often resistant to aluminum or even aluminum (dendrobium, tea); but for some plants, such as clover, alfalfa, aluminum is toxic, The growth of aluminum in the soil is inhibited; research shows that aluminum poisoning is an important cause of land degradation of artificial forests.

Influence Of Soil EC

1. Make the soil more compact.When the granule structure in the soil is reduced, the aeration and water permeability of the soil will be poor, and the soil will become sticky when it comes into contact with water. After the drying, there will be a large number of cracks on the surface. Roots stretch very slowly in such soils, and impervious and impermeable soils are more likely to cause root injury.
2. Inhibition of vegetable root development.Planting vegetables in salt-damaged soils generally shows short stature, poor development, and dense foliage. In severe cases, they start to dry or brown from the leaves, turning inwards or outwards, and the roots turn brown and die.

CHAPTER 4:

Application of Agricultural Weather Stations

Agrometeorological stations can be seen everywhere. They can be found in every corner of our lives and play a huge role.

Crop monitoring
- Greenhouse
- Orchard / apple / kiwi / mango / cherry
- Vineyards / (weather is critical to the quality of the brewed wine)
- Tea Garden / Black Tea / Green Tea /
- Herbal medicine base / planting of traditional Chinese medicine
- Tobacco leaf production base
- Flower Plant / Flower Growth
Forestry monitoring
- Forest Growth / Pine / Bamboo / Rattan /
- Forest fire prevention
- Forest planting / breeding
Livestock monitoring
- Grass grows
- Soil desertification
Fishery monitoring
- Fish exhaust station
- Aquaculture
- Fishery changes
Pest forecast
- Different pests are harmful to different host crops and all involve meteorological elements. In general, temperature, humidity, sunshine, etc. are the main meteorological elements. However, the effects of wind and vertical airflow on the adults of migratory pests cannot be ignored.
Agricultural insurance
- Agricultural insurance is an insurance designed to protect the economic losses caused by insurance accidents such as natural disasters, accidents, diseases, and diseases in the production of crops, forestry, animal husbandry, and fishery.

CHAPTER 5:

Find More About Climate Smart Agriculture

Climate Smart Agriculture is already a trend in our current life. I hope the audience can learn more from other aspects. Including Wikimedia/Patent/Video and so on.

WikiPedia

AgWeatherNet
AgWeatherNet is an automated agricultural weather station network operated by Washington State University in the Pacific Northwest.^[1] It is the first and the largest agricultural weather network in the United States.^[2] Every 5 seconds, over 175 sensors (as of 2018) record air temperature, relative humidity and dew point, soil temperature at 8 inches, rainfall, wind speed, wind direction, insolation and leaf wetness.^[2]^[3] The data is reported back from each sensor to WSU’s Irrigated Agriculture Research and Extension Center in Prosser, Washington and made available to the public on the Internet. The network can be used to predict and warn of crop hazards such as freezes (especially damaging to Washington fall crops like apples) and hailstorms.^[4]
Sensors are located mostly in the irrigated regions of Eastern Washington like the Yakima Valley, but also cover some non-irrigated areas like the Palouse and areas of Western Washington such as the Chehalis River valley.^[2]^[5] The Oregon Hop Commission funds three sensors in northwest Oregon.^[6] Several cranberry farming concerns fund a sensor at Grayland on the Pacific Coast.
The system began in 1988 with the name Public Agricultural Weather System (PAWS).^[7]

Patents

US20160078570A1:Methods and systems for managing crop harvesting activities
InventorJames Ethington Alex Wimbush
Current Assignee Climate Corp
US20160078375A1:Methods and systems for recommending agricultural activities
InventorJames Ethington Eli Pollak Tristan d’Orgeval Coco Krumme Evin Levey Alex Wimbush Erik Andrejko Moorea Brega Sivan Aldor-Noiman
Current Assignee Climate Corp
US20170061052A1:Generating Digital Models Of Nutrients Available To A Crop Over The Course Of The Crop’s Development Based On Weather And Soil Data
InventorJohn Gates Steven De Gryze
Current Assignee Climate Corp

Videos

Agricultural Meteorology
Climate Smart Agriculture: What it is all about

CHAPTER 6:

Buy Agricultural Weather Stations

The factories of agricultural weather stations are all over the world. How can we choose the most suitable one?

When you come to this page, ZATA Agrometeorological Station has appeared in front of you.

I believe that when you finish reading the introduction below, you will make the right purchase decision.

	ZATA Weather Station	Other Weather Station
Cost	Lower	Higher
Professional	Higher	Normal
Function	Maxium 12 Items	Maxium 6 Items
Rain Characteristic	Optical Principle	Tipping Principle
Wind Characteristic	Ultrasonic	Three-cups type
Power Consumption	Lower	Normal
Data Transmission	RS/Zigbee/NB-IoT/Lora/GPRS	RS/GPRS
Installation	Easy-In One Hour	In One Day
Maintenance	Maintance Free	Regular Maintenance
Image Acquisition	Build-in All-in-One	None
Cloud Platform	Million-level Concurrency	Customized

Learn More Request A Quote

CHAPTER 7:

Future of Agricultural Weather Stations

Although you have read the detailed introduction above, you have a general understanding of the agrometeorological station. Next, I will make the following guesses about future agrometeorological stations.

More sensors for monitoring different kinds of biological characteristics.
Smart farm system is formed in close connection with agricultural production system, and the farming plan on site is adjusted in real time according to the calculation model.
Monitoring data access to IoT large data platform, the introduction of artificial intelligence, to provide more refined recommendations for regional planting.

CHAPTER 8:

Agricultural Weather Stations FAQs

Here are some common questions about agrometeorological stations. We will update them regularly through customer feedback.

I hope you can find the answers here. If you have more questions, please email to us.

What is Agricultural Weather Station

You can call “farm weather station” also.

An agriculture weather station is a meteorological monitoring instrument composed of various sensors, which is used in the field of agriculture.

What Agricultural Weather Station Can Measure

Temperature, Humidity, Pressure, Wind Direction, Wind Speed, Radiation, Rainfall, CO2, Soil Temperature, Soil Moisture, Soil PH, Soil EC, and so on.

How Does Ag Weather Station Supply Power

Mainly use the solar power system. You can use the AC220/DC12 adapter also.

Which Data Transmission Types Are Supported

RS485 / RS232 / Zigbee / NB-IoT / Lora / GPRS / LTE 4G

How About the Price of Agricultural Weather Stations

Prices vary from different manufacturers.

It is necessary to select suitable suppliers according to the types of monitoring elements.

The price of the ZATA weather stations range from several hundred to two thousand dollars.

Maintenance Cycle of Agricultural Weather Stations

The maintenance period of conventional Agrometeorological stations is 3 months to 6 months. It depends on the contamination of the sensor.

For example, the inlet/outlet of the tipping rain sensor is blocked by foreign bodies, and the bearing of the mechanical wind sensor is worn.

ZATA Agricultural Meteorological Station is maintenance-free, because its integrated design features do not require regular maintenance. This will greatly improve the efficiency of customer use.