Bnchmrkng Adv Irrigation Schdlng for Peanuts in AL, FL and GA while evaluating plating date and irrigation impacts on new peanut cultivars, yield, grade, aflatoxin, and water requirements and use of drone technology for management decisions

Research trials conducted at UGA facilities have shown that producers can gain a significant benefit from the implementation of an irrigation scheduling strategy more advanced than the checkbook method. The checkbook method was designed to be conservative, thus ensuring that water was not the limiting factor. However, more recent research is showing promising benefits from better timing of irrigation rather than having it as a non-limiting factor. 
To aid in the validation of the results found from research plots, similar irrigation scheduling trials were performed through an on-farm research trial in southwest Georgia. The results of this trial show that proper irrigation management has the potential to both increase field yield and water use efficiency of the crop if irrigation is properly managed. 
Thus, the overall conclusion of this study is that there are major benefits available to producers willing to adopt more advanced irrigation scheduling methods than just the checkbook method. These scheduling methods can be coupled with technologies such as VRI to better spatially manage irrigation across a production field. These methods also have the potential to increase the efficacy of other precision agriculture operations by better matching all inputs to the field variability and requirements.