Location: Horticultural Crops Production and Genetic Improvement Research Unit
Project Number: 2072-30500-001-015-S
Project Type: Non-Assistance Cooperative Agreement
Start Date: Jul 1, 2025
End Date: May 31, 2027
Objective:
The objective is to partner with Washington State University to develop strategies and tools for weed management pipelines in permanent small fruit cropping systems.
Approach:
This effort aims to leverage existing and ongoing research on the impact of long-term soil management practices on weed populations in vineyards. ARS plans to develop a system for collecting high-throughput information on weed populations in small-fruit cropping systems. While systems like this exist for precision spray technologies, weed scouting itself has been largely neglected in technology application research. Using this system, ARS will be able to accomplish the following:
(1) long-term effects of soil management practices on weed diversity in vineyards.
(2) identification of actionable economic thresholds for weed management in small fruit cropping systems.
(3) adaptation of precision tools for weed removal. Key products anticipated from this work include open-source datasets and models for public use, as well as peer-reviewed publications.