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A new system allows growers to get a good look at what's going on down below, helping them to eliminate problems before they occur.
AS PAUL Skinner showed off his company's new Soil Information System, the crowd at Duarte Nursery's recent Friend's Day literally began to "ooh and ah." That's because Skinner was showing the crowd at the Hughson, CA, nursery a video shot by a tiny probe that was plunging 1½ meters below the surface of a Napa Valley vineyard, exposing the makeup of the soil. The video slowed perceptibly at one point, and Skinner explained that the probe had encountered a clay layer, producing another round of "oohs." "Just within the Napa Valley we have tremendous variation," Skinner told the audience. "Soil variability is the rule, not the exception."
The problem in the past was that...