The Sensors menu is one of the most crucial components of the farm management dashboard, providing comprehensive tools to manage, calibrate, and expand your soil moisture sensor network. From enabling and disabling sensors to customizing calibration settings, the Sensors menu is all about helping farmers get the most accurate data from their fields. In this post, we’ll explore the different functionalities available in the Sensors menu, including Sensor Management, Soil Type Customization, Calibration Services, and Purchasing New Sensors.
Sensor Management: Optimize Each Sensor for Your Farm’s Needs
The Sensor Management section provides tools to ensure that each sensor is operating optimally for the unique conditions of the farm. Here, farmers can:
- Enable / Disable Sensors: Easily manage active sensors on the farm. If a sensor is not needed for a particular field or has been moved, it can be temporarily disabled.
- Change Sensor Radius: Adjust the sensor radius to define how much area each sensor represents on the heatmap overlay. This feature allows farmers to better reflect the actual soil conditions in each specific area, ensuring accurate representation of soil moisture data.
- Set Soil Type: Different soils have different moisture-holding capacities. This option lets farmers set the soil type for each sensor, allowing the system to properly calibrate moisture readings. Whether the soil is sandy, loamy, or clay, setting the correct soil type is key to getting meaningful data.
- Set Crop Type: Different crops have different root depths, and knowing this helps the sensor optimize its moisture readings for each crop. By setting the crop type for each sensor, farmers can be sure that irrigation is targeted where it’s needed—whether that’s the upper layers of soil for shallow-rooted plants or deeper for crops with extensive root systems.
- View Sensor Status: Keep track of the health and operational status of each sensor. This feature allows farmers to see whether sensors are active, check battery levels, and identify any potential issues that might require maintenance or recalibration.
Modify Soil Types: Customize for Accuracy
Not all fields are the same, and soil properties can vary significantly from one farm to another. The Modify Soil Types menu option allows farmers to customize soil parameters, such as field capacity and wilting point, to match the specific conditions of their fields. By modifying these values, farmers can ensure that soil moisture readings are accurate and truly reflective of the unique properties of their soil. This level of customization helps improve irrigation decisions and ensures that crops are neither over- nor under-watered.
Custom Calibration: Tailored to Your Soil
For those who want the highest level of precision, we offer Custom Calibration services. Farmers can send a soil sample from their field to our lab, where it will be thoroughly analyzed to determine its specific moisture-holding characteristics. Once calibrated, the sensors will provide readings that are precisely tuned to that soil, ensuring maximum accuracy. This service is particularly valuable for farmers dealing with highly unique or mixed soil types that may not fit into standard classifications.
Purchase Sensors: Expand Your Sensor Network
The Purchase Sensors option allows farmers to easily expand their sensor network. As the farm grows or as new fields are brought into production, additional sensors can be purchased directly from the dashboard to extend coverage. By increasing the number of sensors, farmers can get even more granular insights into soil moisture variability across their farm, leading to better-informed irrigation strategies.
Conclusion: Fine-Tune Your Sensor Network for Maximum Efficiency
The Sensors menu is all about giving farmers control over their soil moisture monitoring system, ensuring that the data collected is as accurate and relevant as possible. With tools to manage sensor activity, customize soil and crop types, and even calibrate sensors to specific soil samples, the dashboard empowers farmers to make data-driven decisions tailored to their farm’s unique conditions. By expanding and optimizing their sensor network, farmers can improve irrigation efficiency, conserve water, and promote healthier crops.
