January / February, 2002

Improved Food Safety and Reduced Environmental Impact

For the last two summers, Agricultural Engineers, Richard Ledebuhr and Gary Van Ee, have spent much of their time spraying Michigan field crops. Activities include conducting extension workshops, spraying research plots, and working directly with growers. The objective stays the same—minimize spray materials needed to produce high quality, abundant, safe food.

Application technology became Van Ee and Ledebuhr's primary focus since 1985. They first developed the patented "Air Curtain" spraying concept for orchards. The first five years were centered on developing a large tree sprayer for Grand Traverse area cherries and apples. The early 90's focus of the "Air Curtain" adjusted to include the more compact canopy of semi-dwarf apples common to Michigan's Fruit Ridge production area. As Van Ee and Ledebuhr continued developing the "Air Curtain" spraying concept for orchards, they became aware of its smaller canopy crops (blue berries, grapes and row-crop vegetables) limitations.

Concurrently Van Ee and Ledebuhr are developing a new spraying system called the Proptec atomizer, for smaller plant canopies. Research is being conducted using the Proptec atomizer to spray grapes, blue berries, peaches, and row-crop vegetables. Michigan State University has licensed commercial manufactures to produce both spray application technologies. Additional information can be found at: www.bei-inc.com and www.proptec.com

Ledebuhr and Van Ee are cooperating on several multi-disciplinary projects for a variety of crops including: apples, cherries, grapes, carrots, asparagus, wheat, sugar beets and Christmas trees. Twelve different prototype sprayers are being readied for the 2002 production season. The following pictures are the prototype sprayers:

Truck-mount, magnum, Curtec sprayer used to spray wheat, grasses and Christmas trees

Agricultural Engineering
Michigan State University
A.W. Farrall Hall
East Lansing, MI 48824-1323
(517) 355-4720

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