Mahmoud Safari; Nikrooz Bagheri; Aziz sheikhi garjan
Abstract
Tomato fruitworm (Heliotis) is the most destructive pests of the crops of Solanaceae family. In favorable environmental conditions, Heliotis spread quickly. In recent years, drone prayers have been used to control pests but the performance of these sprayers has not been evaluated in tomato fields yet. ...
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Tomato fruitworm (Heliotis) is the most destructive pests of the crops of Solanaceae family. In favorable environmental conditions, Heliotis spread quickly. In recent years, drone prayers have been used to control pests but the performance of these sprayers has not been evaluated in tomato fields yet. This research was carried out in a tomato field infected by the the Heliotis pest and the drone sprayer performance was compared with the performance of tractor lancer sprayer and back knapsack sprayer (atomizer) in the form of Randomized Complete Block Design (RCBD) and in three replications. The results showed that in tractor lancer, atomizer and drone sprayers the solution consumption was 1200, 211 and 32 liters per hectare, drift was 45.6, 13.06, 20.68 percent and field efficiency was 60.66, 69 and 90.2 percent respectively. In 14 days after spraying, the effectiveness was calculated 59.75%, 40.06% and 41.75% in drone method, atomizer and lancer methods respectively. In terms of effectiveness coefficient, the spraying with the drone was found better than that with atomizer and lancer methods on the 4th and 8th days after spraying. The spraying quality coefficient in atomizer and drone sprayer was 2.92 and 1.22, respectively. Economically, profit to cost ratio was calculated 4.15, 4.88 and 2.33 in lancer, atomizer and drone method respectively. Finally, according to the results, the use of drone sprayer to control tomato pests is recommended technically but in terms of economical aspects more studies should be done.
