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Drones Providing New Perspective For Agriculture Industry

Feb 17, 2016 | 3:53 PM

LETHBRIDGE – Drones are giving farmers a never before seen look at their property.

The use of this technology is not mainstream yet, but more and more farmers are getting on board, especially those that are more tech savvy.

Owner of JZAerial Inc. in Calgary, Jan Zalud, says the drones provide a new perspective, “For farmers, when they do their field scouting, they can’t cover nearly all the field, especially if you’re talking a quarter section or something large, and a lot of them might not have an idea what’s going on in the middle of the field for example. With drone technology you can now use that to get out into these hard to access areas in a non-destructive manner and see what’s going on.”

He adds that drones on the farm can also be used for more sophisticated applications such as identifying weed pressures, detecting issues with irrigation systems, and helping in the early detection of diseases.

If the drones are being used for a business, which includes farming, then you must get a permit which can be renewed every year. The permits restrict individuals to how high they can fly and where they can fly, which is designed to ensure public safety.

A lot of these systems start around $20,000 and range up to $100,000 for really high end mapping drones.