Open Source Tools for Agricultural Landscapes

Written on June 18th, 2023 by Kyle Birchard

Our Goals

Build infrastructure for agri-ecological modeling and data management

The profusion of technologies for agriculture-related decision making can benefit from a new usability layer. One of the aims of Open Sensory is to wrap disparate modeling tools and sensor networks into an integrated, intuititve system that can be used by horticultural and viticultural managers in their daily work. This system will inform management activities, and can be used to report on conditions in real-time, for forecasting, and for post-season evaluation.

A landscape-scale vision

Mobile organisms, including pollinators, pests, natural enemies, and pathogens, stray far beyond property lines, and we believe there are clear benefits to managing them at that scale. Having a clearer picture of the sources and sinks can enable proactive, targeted management that conserves valuable time and resources committed to crop production. Moreover, by connecting activities in the field to their consequences through a new generation of knowledge management tools, producers can better refine what works, when it works, and why it works.

Build capacity for new tools and techniques

We believe many of the new technologies we envision should be made available on an open source basis. This places the power of innovation directly in the hands of the people working most closely with the real problems out there. Breaking out of the mindset of proprietary licensing opens up new ways to marshal the cumulative efforts and intellectual capital of practitioners in agriculture. This is not a zero-sum game; collaboration has the potential to accelerate the adoption of sensor networks and analytical tools to the benefit of everyone.