I would like to see FB get to the point where in the catalog of plants, the moisture level per plant type is known by FB and the watering sequence would go and measure the moisture and then water accordingly.
I can see how to do the measurement and dispensing, but I do not know how to do the moisture requirement piece - especially building out the shared catalog. Any ideas anyone?
This is a multi dimensional issue, needing more sensors than currently provided by the FarmBot ecosystem today, To approach this dimesion of agrophysics one needs to accept each type of plant uses water in different ways and at different phases of their life. Compare celery, a marsh plant (that is both an herb and a vegetable) and the modern Bell Green pepper ( actually a fruit in the berry family). Then translate knowing if the need water into, What are the outcomes one desires of the harvest? A blanched white mild flavor of celery that is good in soups or a a strong crunch that is great in a salad or snack. Both of these are vascular tracheophytes,but build cells in different ways , the rheology is different and we eat them in different ways, we eat the seeds in the Peppers (well the fruit)but the branches in the celery and then how we manipulate them for desired outcomes differently. While we have the basic curves presented by the farmbot, it doesn’t know about the weather or habitat of the plant, we can look up the weather and the forecast of rain, sun temperature and we can measure this outside of the bot. Soil moisture a relative measurement but local humidity and tempature impact plants and cells, ( place a green pepper next to an ac heat exchanger vs in the open field…
We then can look for patterns that produce outcomes that we heterotrophs desire either in flavor. Reducing water and covering celery has for me desirable flavor, while plucking early flowers and reducing water for a pepper plant while it is maturing then giving it full sun when the second bearing of fruit and ample water (soil and leaf moisture) produces less yield but a sweeter taste. I measure moisture in increments differently, weighted scales for celery are in 6 hr times while peppers in 24 hr adjustments as they consume water at different stages celery nearly constant while peppers inconsistent. For peppers on dry days tell it’s root system to keep growing while it’s leaves shorten it’s cell growth. Most gardners say look at a plant and determine if it needs water, and then I say look at new young leaves on a pepper plant and they look curled and withered, and I say look how healthy that is! What is the outcome of the particular plant desired and how can you take in the complexity of the ecosystem and manipulate to match the outcome.
You can imagine I may have heard this question many time… that one, and the other favorite “ what is the speed of sound?”….
-joe
Wow. That is quite a considered answer. Thanks.
I was more looking for plant likes
-a little water
-a good watering
-a lot of water
I know little about gardening except that some plants like a lot of water and some less so.
I thought that would be a good place to start, and the curves build the capability, but as the curves are not populated, I thought a simple little, good or lot would be a reasonable start. 80/20 kind of thing.
So a more basic answer to help you in your endeavor, check for last time water script rain,Check for rain in forecast then if there is rain, don’t water, else water against the curve. For me , if it has rained more than 3ML in last 6 hors, than add for more challenging LUA development see here:
for simple sequence variables based on soil moisture testing see here:
I have a sidecar AGX system that does this with Python and MQTT
One can get exacting water measurements by controlling the pressure through the solenoid and measuring the output to use in your calculations, if you don’t have a pressure regulator ahead of this, I saw some large scale variations in output.
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