Learn about our recent travels!
We've been busy - read more about what we've been up to!
Tuesday Feb. 4 Wanapum Dam
Technology Research review for the Tree fruit Commission
In Washington State, every orchard grower contributes a few pennies per box of apples/cherries/pears shipped toward industry research. Once a year, the growers in the Tree Fruit Research Commission meet with university researchers & industry entrepreneurs to review existing and future technology projects. Recent tech projects range from genome research to disease modeling & pollination challenges. Current projects include orchard robotics and tree sap analysis. Would you expect tree sap analysis to be interesting? Well, Oregon State University & Washington State University researchers are digging in to measure the speed of heat traveling through a tree trunk to determine water uptake for a tree....pretty cool! Stay tuned for updates on Innov8.ag collaboration with this group!
Feb. 4-6 in Spokane, WA.
The Spokane AG Expo
What we learned:
Our innov8.ag team had the opportunity to participate in this years Spokane Ag Expo. The themes from this event were equipment, data collection, universities, community colleges, and farming community members.
A perfect example of all of these factors coming together was a meeting Innov8.ag had with a company that’s looking to manage costs, particularly the costs of pumping water to 6,000+ acres of potatoes, corn, and mint. With annual electricity costs of over $1 million a year just for irrigation, there's a strong interest in leveraging data to optimize water time - with resultant impact on their bottom line as well as being good for the environment.
Thursday, Feb. 13 in Wenatchee, WA.
The Next-Gen Network: Software Panel and Demos
Washington State University Extension hosts regular Next-Gen Tree Fruit grower meetings for young growers, and Innov8.ag trekked up to Wenatchee to hear growers share first-hand how they're using technology to improve productivity and profits in their orchards. Participants in this event included the 20's & 30's crowd representing some of the state's largest orchards including Zirkle, McDougall & others. Lots of good learnings for us here, where growers shared successes & challenges to data access & insights. This is a great forum for us, as it brings together progressive minds where we can invest to enable research & insights.
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