Heath Fecht is the Lead Agronomist for his family's farm, Cornerstone Production Company, in Wray, Colorado.
Cornerstone's potato fields are on 4200+ acres, which can mean driving 8 hours to reach all the fields. Having the ability to remotely monitor his crops' emergence, canopy cover, and issues like weeds, pests, and diseases is a huge benefit that saves time and gas money.
Heath shares the reports he gets from Plant Insights in his meetings with other Cornerstone staff, making the team more efficient by concentrating on areas that need attention. "It was extremely hot and windy at the beginning of the season. With this program, I was able to start getting reports of some heat crinkle that we saw out in the field in a timely manner."
Heath found the imagery detail and the AI super impressive and much more detailed than anything he had experienced with satellites and aerial imagery services in the past. "[Plant Insights] was able to pinpoint an insect onto the plant, which was very impressive to me. Before that, with the planes and the satellites, there was a sky view, but there was no detail incorporated with it."
"I think any potato farmer with center pivot irrigation would benefit from this system."