The Weather Notebook: Watching the Grapes

Watching the Grapes
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Dave Thurlow, Host

Monitor Weather Station
Hi, I'm Dave Thurlow from the Mount Washington Observatory; this is The Weather Notebook. Watch the weather and save money: how? Well, let's examine the case of New York State Trooper James Mohart. When he's not fighting crime, Mohart is growing grapes on a small farm near Lake Erie. Until recently, this part time farmer fought grape disease in a very traditional way. He would spend about thirty dollars an acre to spray his crops with fungicides. He did this three or four times a season, whether his grapes were at risk or not.

But Officer Mohart figured he has better things to do with his time and money. So, in cooperation with a local researcher, Mohart outfitted his vineyards with a small weather station. It tracks precipitation, temperature and leaf moisture. Plugging that information into a computer model, he was able to deduce the most likely time blights would attack. Powdery mildew, for example, isn't dangerous unless it's early in the season, the temperature has hit 50 degrees and one-tenth of an inch of rain has fallen.

Using these weather clues, Mohart now sprays when his crops need it and not according to a set calendar. He applies about one third less pesticides each year, saving money and keeping a lot of chemicals out of the environment.

There are some limitations, however. When a farmer determines that it's time to spray, he must do so pretty quickly. Otherwise it won't work. So, farmers with a lot of land have a hard time applying fungicides to all their crops in time. Still, a researcher who works with Mohart says western New York grape growers could cut annual pesticide use by almost one thousand pounds. The growers could save over three-quarters of a million dollars a year, just by watching the weather.

Thanks today to Weather Notebook writer George Homsey. The Weather Notebook is produced by the Mount Washington Observatory. Funding is provided by Subaru, and by the National Science Foundation.