Picketa Systems has introduced a major new feature to the company’s LENS platform: Custom Critical Levels. This innovation provides agronomists with unprecedented control over nutrient management, making it easier than ever to optimize crop health and maximize yields. Digitizing this next level of precise nutrient management will provide more detailed insights that can help guide farm profitability and sustainability.
Understanding critical values in agriculture
Critical values are used to determine whether plants have the right amount of nutrients or are experiencing deficiencies or toxicity. Traditionally, these charts, which measure nutrient percentages or parts per million, are static and often do not account for the unique conditions of each field, a particular variety or a stage in the growing cycle.
While standard critical limits serve as a general reference for agronomists to assess nutrient adequacy, they tend to be broad and generalized, based on academic trials conducted decades ago. Our new feature addresses this limitation by providing a more dynamic approach tailored to the specific conditions of each region, variety, field or section.
Adaptation for optimal plant health
Custom critical values allow agronomists to fine-tune nutrient management at each growth stage. This feature allows them to create and customize templates that are specific to each field, recognizing that crops often deviate from standard growth times. For example, if corn is sprouting earlier than expected, agronomists can change the critical values to match the actual growth stage, ensuring accurate nutrient management.
The goal is to develop customized nutrient profiles based on region, soil conditions, crop varieties and weather patterns. Agronomists using the platform can start with traditional critical values, but are encouraged to adjust them based on their expertise. In addition, this feature helps farmers reliably monitor and adjust their nutrient plans to keep crop yields on track throughout the season.
A detailed view of the Custom Critical Levels feature on Picketa Systems’ LENS platform, showing real-time analysis of nutrient data to optimize crop health and yield.
Trust your agronomist: adjusting the levels
This powerful tool requires trust in your agronomist’s expertise. While custom critical limits provide the flexibility to create new templates, it is often more practical to adjust existing templates based on field conditions and growth stages. Experienced agronomists can use their knowledge and the insights gained from LENS’ real-time tissue analysis to make informed adjustments rather than starting from scratch.
This approach ensures that the nutrient management plan is not only customized, but also based on practical experience and data. By working closely with your agronomist and making informed adjustments, you can achieve the best results for your crops and make the most of this innovative feature.
Benefits of the features
- Customized nutrient plans: Develop precise nutrient plans tailored to the specific needs and growth stages of your plants.
- Real-time adjustments: Instantly adjust your strategies using real-time, location-based precision data to ensure optimal fertilizer application.
- Improved evaluation: Closely monitor the health of your plants and refine your approach to new varieties with confidence.
- Ongoing optimization: Use data from high-performance fields to continuously refine and improve nutrient targets over time.
Who can use this feature?
Custom critical limits can be accessed through our Fieldbook platform and exported as spreadsheets or PDF reports. This feature provides valuable benefits for:
Farmers: Access accurate, up-to-date data to manage your crops effectively and in real time. Adjust foliar feeding based on these results to ensure optimal nutrient mixes for current plant conditions.
Agronomists: Develop and adapt nutrition programs to specific regional, soil and crop conditions, improving the effectiveness of nutrient management.
Input companies: Evaluate the effectiveness of products through research and verify their impact on large-scale producers.
Experts in seed breeding: Use detailed data to advance research and development of new hybrids and plant varieties.
Bridge between research and practice
This feature is particularly valuable for professionals involved in nutrition program development, agricultural input manufacturing, and seed breeding. It accelerates the application of research findings to commercial fields and enables agricultural scientists to quickly implement and benefit from new findings.
Automated performance tracking accelerates the process of refining nutrient targets. Companies can now leverage the best-performing fields to continuously improve their nutrient strategies by focusing on successful trends and using these high-performing profiles as benchmarks for fields with similar characteristics.
Improving agronomy through communication
At Picketa Systems, we understand that agronomy is as much about effective communication as it is about scientific expertise. A consistent, up-to-date and transparent platform is critical to providing farmers with excellent service. With custom critical levels, agronomists can keep their clients informed throughout the season and provide them with a superior crop management strategy.
