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Article: UM, growers look to protect potatoes Computerized weather station, scouts help stop blight, improve crops
- Article from:
- Bangor Daily News Bangor, ME
- Article date:
- March 18, 2009
- Author:
CopyrightCopyright 2009 Bangor Daily News Bangor, ME. Provided by ProQuest LLC. (Hide copyright information)
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EXETER - For 30 years, Exeter potato farmer Neil Crane used the
calendar and his personal field experience to determine when to
irrigate his potatoes and when to begin spraying fungicides.
"He used to look at a plant, judge its size and the time of year,
and decide it was time to spray," Steve Crane, part owner of Crane
Bros. Inc., said Tuesday.
But under a partnership with the University of Maine Cooperative
Extension, science now is ruling the calendar at Crane's farms.
Using an on-farm computerized weather station that feeds data to
the university and scouts from UMCE that visit individual fields,
Steve Crane can tell precisely when to water or treat his uncle's
1,300 acres of potatoes.
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